Ex-Manager watch: Antonio Conte

[Shanks]

I dont actually think it's hugely helpful for us to use that term! We are a successful, wealthy and very famous club.

I'm proud to support spurs. My only ask is that we play the football that we have always endeavoured to play.

You seem to be implying that our inherent "spursyness" makes us not good enough for the amazing Conte. Well, perhaps he should get more out of the players he has been given? Or show some tactical acumen and flexibility? Instead of playing a formation that is not only mindnumbingly boring and passive but also completely ineffectual against all but the worst teams!

The world and his uncle can see that the 343 DOES NOT WORK! There are numerous reasons why that is the case. But Mr Antonio "I can walk on water" Conte seemingly cannot see it!

He IS the wrong fit for our club as I have been saying for almost a year now.

There are clearly issues with the ownership and player recruitment, but let's not hide behind the fact the last 3 managers have been completely wrong for us.

We have won fuck all, yet claim to be in the big six

it’s a myth, we are small fry compared to those big 5/6, and Newcastle will win something before us

 

[spurmin]

I dont actually think it's hugely helpful for us to use that term! We are a successful, wealthy and very famous club.

I'm proud to support spurs. My only ask is that we play the football that we have always endeavoured to play.

You seem to be implying that our inherent "spursyness" makes us not good enough for the amazing Conte. Well, perhaps he should get more out of the players he has been given? Or show some tactical acumen and flexibility? Instead of playing a formation that is not only mindnumbingly boring and passive but also completely ineffectual against all but the worst teams!

The world and his uncle can see that the 343 DOES NOT WORK! There are numerous reasons why that is the case. But Mr Antonio "I can walk on water" Conte seemingly cannot see it!

He IS the wrong fit for our club as I have been saying for almost a year now.

There are clearly issues with the ownership and player recruitment, but let's not hide behind the fact the last 3 managers have been completely wrong for us.

343 worked last season. We played some great entertaining football and when we didn’t we still won.
He wasn’t the wrong fit then..

 

[spursn17]

I never understood why Levy went for Jose or Conte as they are win now managers when backed - we are not a win now club as we dont back managers with the sort of money Jose, Conte would want. Always thought it should have been a Potter or another Poch type coach. Will be interesting to see where Levy goes after Conte...it all seems a bit of a muddle at the moment with the club.

 

[ComfortablyNumb]

"Not charismatic enough".

I thought the whole point of Conte was that he had the gravitas to persuade Danny to loosen the purse strings. How's that going?

 

[14/04/91]

I never understood why Levy went for Jose or Conte as they are win now managers when backed - we are not a win now club as we dont back managers with the sort of money Jose, Conte would want. Always thought it should have been a Potter or another Poch type coach. Will be interesting to see where Levy goes after Conte...it all seems a bit of a muddle at the moment with the club.

Spot on. This downward spiral all started when he chose to replace Poch with Mourinho.
Whether Poch had run his race is debatable but to replace him with a personality and playing style polar opposite was a huge mistake and is the biggest indicator of Levy having no idea about football.
Then he decides against Ten Hag because he lacked charisma! What a joke. Is he a good coach or not? That’s the only question, not how will he come across in the media.
And now he’s pulling up trees, playing Luke Shaw at centre half by choice and getting the best out of players like Wan Bissaka. Because he can coach them to be better.

 

[walworthyid]

We have won fuck all, yet claim to be in the big six

it’s a myth, we are small fry compared to those big 5/6, and Newcastle will win something before us

Ok. We're small fry. Your point is?

 

[walworthyid]

343 worked last season. We played some great entertaining football and when we didn’t we still won.
He wasn’t the wrong fit then..

Yes he was and yes I said at the time. We played some decent counter-attacking football but let's not pretend that we were amazing. It was always going to be a style with a limited shelf life because the very best teams can press you and stop the passing lanes that we relied on.

Low block football does not work at the highest level anymore.

 

[Shanks]

Ok. We're small fry. Your point is?

Haven’t really got one, just that we aren’t successful.

I’m an equally proud fan too, and I don’t enjoy it currently either but I’m not getting ahead that we are big and successful, we try to be at times but it ain’t working with the current leadership.

get the big names manager in, pay the big bucks but give him white to work with.

rinse/repeat

 

[Lukasz]

We need Pochettino back ASAP. We’ve been apart long enough to have another go. At the moment i dont care about champions league or trophies anymore, I just want to see this team playing good football again!!!

 

[walworthyid]

Haven’t really got one, just that we aren’t successful.

I’m an equally proud fan too, and I don’t enjoy it currently either but I’m not getting ahead that we are big and successful, we try to be at times but it ain’t working with the current leadership.

get the big names manager in, pay the big bucks but give him white to work with.

rinse/repeat

We are a big club both in fan base and money. We are successful as we have won multiple trophies and played consistently at the highest level in our country and more recently in Europe.

We are a big club.

 

[spurs9]

How was Klopp doing 15/16 months into his time at Liverpool? I remember listening to 5 Live coming back from games with one Liverpool fan after another calling for Klopp to be fired.

What about Arteta? Even Pep had an underwhelming first season at Abu Dhabi in sp[ite of all the investment that came before him.

You can argue that we should be doing better, but cannot dismiss the fact that there are players who have been here far too long, our recruitment with only two recent exceptions has been shambolic, when we do spend big money we spend it very badly (Ndombele), we play a wing back system with only one decent wing back (Perisic) out of 5, and the common denominator ifor 20 years is ENIC.

Conte isn't perfect and isn't immune to mistakes, however he is IMO not the issue here. As mentioned in another thread, whoever we appoint doesn't really matter - 18 months from now we will be having the same conversation

We have owners who have no real ambition and have been making the same mistakes for 20 years - we will only ever fluctuate between 4th and 7/8th, with long periods of frustrating football interspersed with periods of optimism. This is how it will be and it won't change whether Conte is our manger or not

At around the same time (20th game of Klopp's 1st full season) Liverpool were 2nd, just about to go on a poor run that took them down to 5th and they ended the season in 4th.

 

[Humbolt]

The fact is that while we have ENIC in charge it doesn't matter a jot who the manager is. So I say sack Conte and get Poch back. We'd not win anything but at least the football would be watchable. Plus Poch would actually want to be here unlike the miserable bellend that is Conte

 

[Montalbano]

I think it’s laughable that anyone thinks we were going to win the league with Conte when the most vital part of his system are wing backs and we have bottom half quality in the position. Then again, I’m equally baffled that all else equal (don’t know if there was a fitness concern, etc.) Conte picked Sess ahead of Perisic for this match (who I feel strongly is our strongest in the position)

It’s a two way street. We clearly don’t have the tools to win a title with Conte’s system, hence the horrible football, but I think with a few windows we can get there. It’s up to Conte to make a decision whether he’s ready to commit to a project, and then the club to commit to giving him time / backing he needs. But both sides need to be clear on this vision or it’s a colossal waste of time.

Remember Arteta’s “Trust the Process” started in 2019. It’s 2023 and now they’re finally placing top 4 for the first time (and somehow probably the league title).

 

[Sloop]

Albert Einstein once said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

FYI, it's a good saying, but there's actually no evidence of it ever being said by Albert Einstein.
See: https://checkyourfact.com/2019/06/2...-instanity-same-thing-over-different-results/

 

[slartibartfast]

The fact is that while we have ENIC in charge it doesn't matter a jot who the manager is. So I say sack Conte and get Poch back. We'd not win anything but at least the football would be watchable. Plus Poch would actually want to be here unlike the miserable bellend that is Conte

For the final 12 months under Poch the football was far from watchable.

 

[Trent Crimm]

"Not charismatic enough".

Nuno says hi. A man with the charisma of a camels amnion. ?

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

I do sometimes miss the days of BMJ throwing Defoe and Mido or someone on up beside Keane and Berbatov to just cause absolute carnage.

Nice to hear I’m not alone in that. Obviously Kane is incredible but would be nice to occasionally have another one or two strikers to get the fans excited and give us that option at times, that quarter of Keane, Berba, Defoe and Mido was pretty decent tbf.

But Conte and many modern managers play with one up front. Conte did however play with 3-5-2 at Inter which worked really well but the signings so far indicate he’s building a squad for 3-4-3.

 

[Harrier]

Yep, this signing got me more excited than any transfer i can remember in a long while having seen what he has done for a number of years previously in the premier league. Still absolutely baffled by how poor he has been.

IMHO he’s likely been shackled by the tactics Conte has instructed him to carry out.

Otherwise I can’t see why his form has dropped of a cliff.

 

[Japhet]

One thing about Conte that has been debated well on here is his stubbornness’ to stick to his 3-4-3.

On one hand it’s his favoured formation and I can see why he’d want to drill the specifics of this to the squad and then add players to fit accordingly rather than say play 4-3-3 and then have to re-coach them his favoured 3-4-3 when he gets enough players to suit it.

However there is an argument that some have interestingly put out on here which is that if he is such a good coach then why given that the 3-4-3 is clearly at times not working, does he not switch to a back 4 as the football can’t really get much worse.

Having played and coached myself (obviously not quite at Conte’s level) I find it a very interesting debate.

Pep and Klopp took a similar approach to conte in that they came in straight away switching to their favoured 4-3-3 and bought players to better suit this style of play.

The main issue with Conte is that 3-4-3 is a very specialist formation and requires quite specific signings so it can take quite a while to build the squad that he needs and then when he leaves we’re left with a squad that is quite niche.

Id be ok either way but if we are going to back Conte then it has to be properly on his terms, for me that would mean this Jan signing a CB, RWB and AM minimum to really kick us into life otherwise it’s going to be a long 2nd half of the season.

The obvious response to that is that if Conte wants to be backed with possibly 200-300m to build such a 'niche' squad, it's perfectly reasonable to expect him to sign a contract that says he at least intends to be around to put his ideas into practice, otherwise we could be landed with a very expensive project that nobody else really knows how to manage. At this moment it's a bit of a stand off between him and Levy which is quite ridiculous being as there should be more trust. Levy has already backed Conte with a fair lump of wedge and got no sort of commitment in return so I have some sympathy for him.

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

Quite simply it's all irrelevant 3-4-3 or 4-3-3, Conte or Pochettino, Investment no investment. Until Levy fucks off we will not move forward, he is just too involved in things he doesn't understand and is nothing more than a millstone around the clubs neck when it comes to what happens on the pitch.

Absolutely 1,000,000% spot on ?