Good column on spurs in Telegraph by Henry Winter

[JJetset]

I think he is the best and most respected football hack Henry Winter and here is his take, spot on. :clap:

Daniel Levy lacks Martin Jol's class


By Henry Winter

Last Updated: 1:57am BST 27/10/2007

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No class: that's Daniel Levy for you. No centre-halves: that's Martin Jol for you. This double whammy combined to throw Tottenham's season into disarray. If Ledley King had been fit, and Jol been allowed to recruit a commanding stopper, then Spurs would not have leaked goals from St James' Park to White Hart Lane – and that was just this week.

Even when Spurs fans knew their manager was history, early on during Thursday night's Uefa Cup tie with Getafe, they kept chanting his name.
Jol knew his fate, knew that the moment Levy flirted with Sevilla's Juande Ramos that a good man working had become a dead man walking. Somehow, Jol retained his dignity. Levy would not recognise it but Jol's decorum under pressure is real class.
As he moves his pieces around a lilywhite-and-black chess-board, the Spurs chairman should understand one reality: Jol was perfect for the club, being an average coach with a soul and a commitment to attacking football. The Dutchman was not in the league of Sir Alex Ferguson, Arsene Wenger or Rafa Benitez but then neither are Tottenham in the same realm as Manchester United, Arsenal or Liverpool. Fact.
Levy, whose credibility has been shredded over his handling of Jol's exit, has delusions of grandeur if he believes Spurs have Champions League potential. Jol took Spurs to the boundaries of their legitimate ambition, to fifth place (twice). After the sterility of some of his Levy-appointed predecessors, Jol made Spurs watchable and respected again.
Following time-honoured fashion, the denigrating of the departed will now begin. Jol will be depicted as having lost the players. Dimitar Berbatov and Jermain Defoe were clearly unhappy and at odds with the manager. No doubt. But no wonder. Levy had undermined Jol so badly that any minor football-related tensions were allowed to spread like poison ivy.
Anyone with any empathy for the erstwhile glory, glory institution that was Spurs, a club with the best atmosphere in the Premier League (outside of Fratton Park), will wish Ramos and Gus Poyet well. A word of advice to the new management: keep your centre-halves fit and your eyes on a fickle chairman.
www.telegraph.co.uk/winter

Lots more other good stories in there today also worth a read.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?menuId=35&menuItemId=-1&view=SUMMARY&grid=F2&targetRule=

 

[LSUY]

:clap: That article is spot on. It doesn't matter if your view was Jol should stay or Jol should go everyone will admit that the way Levy and his fellow directors handled the entire situation from the start was god awful and an insult to Jol and the fans.

You don't go looking for a new manager three games into a season, you don't have one director saying one thing and another director saying something else, you don't take as long as they did to give public support to the manager when the news of being caught first broke, you don't fire the manager hours before a must win game and you don't let the fans find out the news the way they did. Everything the board did in this situation lacked class and I hate to say it but I'm glad Bill Nick wasn't around to see this because it is probably one of the darkest days in Tottenham's modern history.

 

[Randall Flagg]

Great article, and fucking spot-on there Teemu!

 

[wingnuts_ashes]

he was right when he said that jol was an average manager, but i don't want to be an average team, i want spurs to be the best and maybe in a few years this will be seen as a big turning point for the club.

 

[am_yisrael_chai]

I can't believe people would applaud this article. Yes the board handled the situation badly but it pretty much stops there. Jol was not an average manager, he was the 5th best manager in the league, FACT. However, surely none of us share Winter's view that we aren't every bit as good a club as the scum, 'pool or man poo, most importantlly thank heavens our board won't accept that. Should we chastise a board for not accepting a perennial 5th position as succcess, should we chastise them for wanting to try and break the top 4, should we question them for hiring one of the top coaches in europe on recent results who plays open attractive football in the spurs tradition ? i think not. so my fellow spurs supporters surely the conclusion is we thank BMJ for his contribution to our development, wish him well in the future, apologise for the manner in which his departure was handled, thank the board for having the fortitude to take an unpopular decision, for finally getting rid of CH, thank them for going out to get the very best replacement available, forgive them the shame they have brought on the club through their handling of the situation and most importantly unite behind them and Ramos/Poyet. Remember that if Enic want to sell the club for the most money they need a new ground and a great team playing CL football, not exactly like we and they aren't goal aligned !

 

[JJetset]

I can't believe people would applaud this article. Yes the board handled the situation badly but it pretty much stops there. Jol was not an average manager, he was the 5th best manager in the league, FACT. However, surely none of us share Winter's view that we aren't every bit as good a club as the scum, 'pool or man poo, most importantlly thank heavens our board won't accept that. Should we chastise a board for not accepting a perennial 5th position as succcess, should we chastise them for wanting to try and break the top 4, should we question them for hiring one of the top coaches in europe on recent results who plays open attractive football in the spurs tradition ? i think not. so my fellow spurs supporters surely the conclusion is we thank BMJ for his contribution to our development, wish him well in the future, apologise for the manner in which his departure was handled, thank the board for having the fortitude to take an unpopular decision, for finally getting rid of CH, thank them for going out to get the very best replacement available, forgive them the shame they have brought on the club through their handling of the situation and most importantly unite behind them and Ramos/Poyet. Remember that if Enic want to sell the club for the most money they need a new ground and a great team playing CL football, not exactly like we and they aren't goal aligned !

There is the promised land where we want to be and there is reality.
What Winter states is correct and is the reality of our boards delusions of grandeur.
We are a multi million pound business run like a corner-shop and have behaved appallingly.
We are all spurs fans yes but some of us also operate in the business world and we can see when a huge piece of mismanagement happens and how avoidable and Mickey Mouse it makes us look as a club.
I think Winter sums it up perfectly and honestly from an outsiders point of view.

 

[Gilzeanking]

I too , can't believe people are applauding this .

I s'pose its the easy thing to do ...have a go at the faceless board members ...

...and take care to avoid anything negative about the familiar and loved faces .... all emotional twaddle of course .

The board aren't good at sneaking round and hiding behind the curtains when they go out looking for (badly needed) new management .

SO WHAT ?

 

[sloth]

JJetset, Randall and Teemu a trio of right numpties if ever I've seen one. Which bit of the article are you whole-heartedly agreeing with lads? This bit...

"Jol was perfect for the club, being an average coach [at an average club]... ...Levy has delusions of grandeur if he believes Spurs have Champions League potential. Jol took Spurs to the boundaries of their legitimate ambition, to fifth place (twice)."

His entire point is that we're a mediocre club and therefore deserve a mediocre coach with a great personality. That manages to insult Jol, the fans, the chairman and the club all in one sentence and instead of castigating him for it you give him a round of applause. You lemons!!

But apart from that, his other point was that Jol wasn't allowed to sign a top class keeper, which isn't the way I saw it at all, in fact as far as these things can be known at all Jol seemed to be Robbo's biggest fan.

Anyway, a great piece by, what did you call him again? The best and most respected football hack Henry Winter. LOFL :roll:

 

[Gilzeanking]

So JJset , Randall and Teemu.....sandwich short of a picnic these three .

 

[SpursOldBoy]

JJetset, Randall and Teemu a trio of right numpties if ever I've seen one. Which bit of the article are you whole-heartedly agreeing with lads? This bit...

"Jol was perfect for the club, being an average coach [at an average club]... ...Levy has delusions of grandeur if he believes Spurs have Champions League potential. Jol took Spurs to the boundaries of their legitimate ambition, to fifth place (twice)."

His entire point is that we're a mediocre club and therefore deserve a mediocre coach with a great personality. That manages to insult Jol, the fans, the chairman and the club all in one sentence and instead of castigating him for it you give him a round of applause. You lemons!!

But apart from that, his other point was that Jol wasn't allowed to sign a top class keeper, which isn't the way I saw it at all, in fact as far as these things can be known at all Jol seemed to be Robbo's biggest fan.

Anyway, a great piece by, what did you call him again? The best and most respected football hack Henry Winter. LOFL :roll:

I was about to post something along the same lines but you beat me to it :grin:.

There is no way we are a mediocre club with delusions of grandeur. The timing of the decison and the manner in which the board carried it out leaves a lot to be desired but their desire to see us back at the top cannot be faulted.

 

[fieryjack]

So JJset , Randall and Teemu.....sandwich short of a picnic these three .

:up: Some people on here have no ambition.
What kind of league (or world) would it be if everybody just accepted their position?
Fucking journalists don`t you just love `em. Writing about Tottenham, how easy is that. Most of them just sit around waiting for the board to shoot us all in the foot again.

 

[Legend10]

Henry Winter a respected and the best football hack:rofl:

Bloke is a prize prick who knows absolutely fuck all about football and surprise surprise he writes an article that shows he knows absolutely fuck all about football.

Henry Winter a respected and the best football hack:rofl:

 

[DC_Boy]

That article is an insult to Spurs - we are not an average club - we are way above average -we have won 16 trophies - the 5th highest haul in English fotball -

Last season we were the 5th best club in England - that's better than some 95% of the 100 or so professional clubs in England - throw in the hundreds of decent semi-pro clubs etc etc

A club like Stoke or Preston or Ipswich may be described as average - I leave their supporters to argue that one - we most certainly are not.

It may also have escaped Winter's gaze that we came within one game of Champions League football a couple of years ago

Of course breaking the top 4 is difficult - I for one never thought it would happen this season and have been saying so on here for months - but we are allowed to try

Last week we released figures showing us to be probably the 11th highest club by income in Europe (probably the world) - more than 11 clubs enter the CL - we can be one of those entrants

The media in general have done us no favours all summer and autumn with their typical build 'em up knock 'em down approach plus a simplistic 'Jol this Levy that' approach to the situation. As usual I have little time for most of them.

 

[Legend10]

As always DC you put it how it is

 

[oohaahedgar]

Stupid article.

 

[oohaahedgar]

Henry Winter, twat. Fact.

 

[N10toN17]

The premise of this article is not that far off the mark, he's saying our chairman and boards handling of this fiasco is poor, well he's right. As far as the average comments go, yes compared to Preston or Ipswich we are certainly not average, but he is probably comparing us to the Pool, Utd and the scum, where we are most definately average in comparison.

He's not saying we shouldn't aspire to match the big three, but equally, Everton, Villa and Citeh will have similar aspirations to us and give or take have a similar trophy haul to us as well.

 

[DC_Boy]

As always DC you put it how it is

Cheers Legend

 

[DC_Boy]

The premise of this article is not that far off the mark, he's saying our chairman and boards handling of this fiasco is poor, well he's right. As far as the average comments go, yes compared to Preston or Ipswich we are certainly not average, but he is probably comparing us to the Pool, Utd and the scum, where we are most definately average in comparison.

He's not saying we shouldn't aspire to match the big three, but equally, Everton, Villa and Citeh will have similar aspirations to us and give or take have a similar trophy haul to us as well.

Hi N10 , he may well be meaning 'compared to Pool etc' - then he should make it clear by calling us an average Prem club or some such to more clearly define his terms

Secondly Everton have played in the Champs Lge and all three clubs will have aspirations to play in it in the future - should those three give up too?

He says 'Jol took Spurs to the boundaries of their legitimate ambition, to fifth place' so he is saying we can't legitimately aspire to top 4, and then chucks in some 'delusions of grandeur' and 'mediocre' barbs - for what purpose?

So do we all simply accept the top 4 is how it is for eternity - what's the point of football then?

Maybe the fact is no-one can break the top 4 for the foreseeable future - but surely we and Citeh Villa Toon Everton, whoever can try.

 

[N10toN17]

Howdy DC, I can't read his mind, but at the moment fifth place is our legitimate aspiration, if we can consistently finish close to the big four he and others outside our club might start thinking, hang on Spurs can break the cartel.

Two fifth placed finishes (and I have to include myself in this as I fell for it as well) and we thought we we're gonna crack the nut and have plainly not got the squad to get near the top four at the moment, he's probably alluring to our delusions and again he's right because I had those delusions at the start of the season also.

We got excited by our two best finishes in years, the board then somehow got it into there head that top four was on and so did alot of us, ( I note you didn't DC, well done). We forgot that you have to learn to walk before you can run and to an outside journo like him and supporters of other clubs we look a bit daft.

We've got to be consistently better than the likes of Everton and City and Villa before we take on the big boys, clearly at the moment we've a long way to go.