Jose Mourinho

[Dougal]

Fair enough we are in cc final but we hardly had to break sweat to get there considering our fortunate draw.

I hope you’re not suggesting just any manager could have got past Leyton Orient (on a bye), sacked Lampard’s Chelsea (on pens), Stoke and Brentford?

How you get to the final (or not) makes no difference. We lost to Colchester last season. The important thing is to win the final and that is exactly where we judge Mourinho. He’s here to finish the job that every manager since Ramos couldn’t. We know the rest of the circus is pure shit. Or at least we should.

 

[14/04/91]

I hope you’re not suggesting just any manager could have got past Leyton Orient (on a bye), sacked Lampard’s Chelsea (on pens), Stoke and Brentford?

How you get to the final (or not) makes no difference. We lost to Colchester last season. The important thing is to win the final and that is exactly where we judge Mourinho. He’s here to finish the job that every manager since Ramos couldn’t.

But do you not agree there's a bigger picture? Should we win this cup, that's his legacy "look what I did. Redknapp/AVB/Pochettino couldn't win a trophy like I did"

I won't be judging Mourinho on whether we win the League Cup. Don't forget we finished something like 12th in 2008 as League Cup holders; I wouldn't class that as success.

 

[Deleted member 27995]

But do you not agree there's a bigger picture? Should we win this cup, that's his legacy "look what I did. Redknapp/AVB/Pochettino couldn't win a trophy like I did"

I won't be judging Mourinho on whether we win the League Cup. Don't forget we finished something like 12th in 2008 as League Cup holders; I wouldn't class that as success.

This is peoples problem.

You're looking at a managers legacy.

You're overlooking the fact that if he wins it, the club you support won it.

If we finish say 8th, people will moan, the same people who laugh at those who take satisfaction of finishing above certain teams in the league ...

So unless we win it all, boo?

 

[Beni]

Don't understand why its either Mourinho or the players and why wins and loses cannot be attributed to both.

The first 30 mins, I thought the formation and tactics were spot on, we looked dangerous on the counter, and barring a marginal offside things could have looked to have paid off inside 2 minutes. Ndombele and Hojbjerg although outnumbered, bossed Thiago and co in that 30 mins, and counter attacks started through them, and then through Kane.

30 Mins onwards, Kane gets injured, and we fail to capitalize on our counter attacks because they get slowed down with Kane not able to do what he was previously doing resulting in Ndombele and Hojbjerg starting to get overrun. This then had a knock on effect where our counter attacks stopping, Aurier and Doherty were not able to get forward and in effect started dropping back deeper becoming a back 5.
Hindsight: should Mourinho have made the sub taking Kane off there and then instead of waiting until half time? Should Kane have made the decision for the good of the team and admitted defeat that he was unable to continue, instead of prolonging what appears to have been the inevitable? Who knows, I would give both Mourinho and Kane the benefit of the doubt with the hope it could have been run off or strapped up at half time. Sadly wasn't the case.

Liverpools first goal, 1 minute to go until half time, and we switch off. Firstly Kane is pretty much unable to run, and cannot close down Henderson who is allowed to come forward from centre back half-way into our half before picking a ball over the top for Mane to get in behind us, where Aurier switches off and doesn't drop. However we talk about sitting too deep, and reversing this, but what can Aurier do when we are trying to protect ourselves and you have 3 out of our 4 defenders all trying to play a higher line and in line with eachother, yet our most experienced player in that back line, Davies, is 2 yards behind them playing Mane on. Call that lack of ability, mentality, whatever you liked, that is what happened. Mane then is able to square it, and instead of Dier just having that desire, mentality, leadership and owning the danger and clearing it out for a throw, a corner, who cares. He doesn't, and is relying on another to be that person, and ends up up neither he or Lloris do and a tap in for Firmino.

The subs and formation change at half-time are then on Mourinho. Just because of Kanes injury, I do not believe we should have changed our formation. A like for like replacement with Vinicius coming on, would have hopefully got us back to playing how we were in that first 30 mins, when we had a fit Kane.
Why Doherty at right back against someone as quick and strong as Mane, when Aurier if we are talking about best fit out of the 2, surely was the obvious choice.
Lamela and Winks made no sense. Bale maybe for Kane, yes, however you are asking our most valued player who we will look to, following Kanes departure, to get us back into the game in Son, to play a role that just negates his threat. Vinicius should have been Kanes replacement in my opinion, ad Winks and Lamela coming on, just made us have no out ball except to an isolated Son.

Second half performance was due to the formation change and the subs made by Mourinho, but that doesn’t excuse the players side of things with the 3 goals we conceded (Yes I’m including their disallowed goal) which all comes from lack of ability, mentality, awareness and resulting errors to conceding a goal.
For example, you’ve just conceded a minute before half time, and you don’t need telling as a professional footballer, that the first 10-15 minutes of the second half are so important to not concede and do anything stupid. So what do we do, we concede inside the first minute, by a stupid ball by Dier straight down the middle of the pitch intercepted in our half, Doherty then is too tight to be with someone of Manes strength and pace, and then what should be a simple save or pushed out wide by an experienced goalie, is pushed out to Liverpools player to score.

We can dissect last nights game or every game to pieces, but Liverpool are a good team regardless of past form, and it took 2 minutes for them to expose us and score 2 goals, in the most damaging times of a game.

Look, I am no Mourinho fan, I never wanted in him to start with, but have accepted it and will back him and criticize him when see fit. However, I am not in the viewpoint that he needs to be sacked or another manager can do better. He needs time, like all managers and I will give him what I give every manager, 3 seasons to have a clear view on where we are. However, I can see what he is trying to achieve, and to me it is glaringly obvious where our frailties are, when you have to change formation and use a right footed player at LWB because you do not trust our backup left back to handle their wingers/fullback, aswell as playing 3 CBs for the same reason. Playing an inexperienced Centre back, because of lack of trust in other centre backs ability or pace with a left footed left back, because we have no left footed centre backs.

I don't care what manager you are, the best tactician, man manager, playing attractive football. If you have players that have a habit of switching off at crucial times, and making individual mistakes time after time, you can be 2 or 3 nil up and still have that doubt or trust that a game is won, as with these players 2 goals can be conceded within 2 mins.

 

[DiVaio]

The fact that Jose wanted to spend £100m+ on Dier and a rapidly declining Toby while at United should have seen Levy throw his application in the trash folder of his laptop. The fact is, post-Real he's struggled to put together a really good defence.

He wanted Toby in 2018, then he was one of the best CBs in the league and he wasn't declining at all. Dier until his mystery injuries was good too.
In 13/14 - best defence in the league
In 14/15 - best defence in the league
In 15/16 until he got sacked - 6th worst in the league, their expected goals against were at least decent
In 16/17 - 2nd best defence in the league, 3 goals conceded more than Tottenham
In 17/18 - 2nd best defence in the league, 1 goal conceded more than City
In 18/19 until he got sacked - 5th worst in the league, their expected goals against were bad
In 19/20 since he joined - joint 5th the best
In 20/21 - joint 2nd the best

 

[morris25]

If mourinho doesn't start Vini, I cant see the fans standing for it.

 

[morris25]

Everytime we don't won he will just blame Kane not playing

 

[13VanDerBale13]

I wanna change my vote

 

[Dougal]

But do you not agree there's a bigger picture? Should we win this cup, that's his legacy "look what I did. Redknapp/AVB/Pochettino couldn't win a trophy like I did"

I won't be judging Mourinho on whether we win the League Cup. Don't forget we finished something like 12th in 2008 as League Cup holders; I wouldn't class that as success.

And that’s exactly where the split in the fan base lies. The only way everyone (ish) is happy is when we win trophies in style. But when was the last time we did that?

 

[danielneeds]

He wanted Toby in 2018, then he was one of the best CBs in the league and he wasn't declining at all. Dier until his mystery injuries was good too.
In 13/14 - best defence in the league
In 14/15 - best defence in the league
In 15/16 until he got sacked - 6th worst in the league, their expected goals against were at least decent
In 16/17 - 2nd best defence in the league, 3 goals conceded more than Tottenham
In 17/18 - 2nd best defence in the league, 1 goal conceded more than City
In 18/19 until he got sacked - 5th worst in the league, their expected goals against were bad
In 19/20 since he joined - joint 5th the best
In 20/21 - joint 2nd the best

The sacrifices he makes to protect those defences leaves the team so negative it’s just not worth it. The Chelsea title-winning team being the exception, where Hazard and Costa did what he hoped Kane and Son would do here.

 

[spurs mental]

And that’s exactly where the split in the fan base lies. The only way everyone (ish) is happy is when we win trophies in style. But when was the last time we did that?

1961?

 

[Dougal]

I wanna change my vote

Then we should save this for posterity before we open it again...

Whoops, I’ve revealed my vote. Never mind.

VOTES OPEN!

 

[Gingernut]

Jose hasn’t panned out as I hoped it would, I was excited by his arrival but now in hindsight (I know hindsight is easy) I wish we could turn the clock back.
He seems to be repeating the same mistakes here that he did at utd.
pogba and Luke Shaw were his whipping boys there. Shaw in particular was 1st class bullying.
He started off with rose who was a great servant to this club and it infects the fan base so badly that just about nobody on this forum has a kind word to say about him now , next was dele and the same is happening there, I can’t imagine bale is very happy either. Fair enough we are in cc final but we hardly had to break sweat to get there considering our fortunate draw.
Jose always airs his dirty washing in public and that can only be detrimental to the mindset of the dressing room.

To the end of Poch's era?

 

[nedley]

Well how come its the 29th of January and we've still not brought that player in?

We're we really hangling over 5-10m euros for Skriniar?

But yet spend 200k per week on what appears to be a has-been who now gets no game time.

You can see how people are questioning?

I'd also question as to whether Bale was a Jose signing.

Levy shouldn't be signing players. End of.

 

[Gingernut]

But do you not agree there's a bigger picture? Should we win this cup, that's his legacy "look what I did. Redknapp/AVB/Pochettino couldn't win a trophy like I did"

I won't be judging Mourinho on whether we win the League Cup. Don't forget we finished something like 12th in 2008 as League Cup holders; I wouldn't class that as success.

League cup and top four would be progress.

 

[EastLondonYid]

Most of us secretly feared we would end up with the broken Jose.....lets hope not, but fuck me we are heading that way.
This could end up very messy.

 

[stormfly]

The football under Harry Redknapp was great. I enjoyed Martin Jol as well.

AVB wasn't great, Graham, Santini no thanks.

The 90s were terrible but we knew we were so bad we could have a laugh about it. Jol era was my favourite as we still had low expectations but then started beating teams we hadn’t in 100 years (Chelsea) you were always entertained as well (watching Atouba take on 6 players in our penalty area) and singing England’s number 1 to Paul Robinson. Kanoute would play like a world beater now and then and it was actual comedy mixed with the sublime.

Then Ramos won us a cup but then we went on holiday straight after. Redknapp era was a great time and for the first time in my life I thought we might just win the league after a superb run of form. Then Harry flirted with England and Spurs were boring again until a year into Poch’s reign. I still never really believed we would ever win anything as we still had that soft underbelly when it came to the crunch. I did allow myself to believe when we got to the CL final though.

Then came my lowest time as a Spurs fan... Taking my son to Newcastle at home when we lost 1-0. I knew Poch was done and that we needed to change up the entire squad. I was going to step away from Spurs for a while but seeing Jose getting appointed convinced me to stick it out as we could possibly get rid of our soft underbelly and finally win things. So far, not so good but I’m obviously addicted to Spurs and keep coming back for more pain haha.

 

[EastLondonYid]

If mourinho doesn't start Vini, I cant see the fans standing for it.

Yes, i can see attendances really plummeting.. ?

 

[morris25]

League cup and top four would be progress.

Top 4 should be guaranteed with everyone struggling. In a normal year we would be 15 points behind 4th

 

[KikoSpurs]

Something that really annoys me is the lack of movement of our players without the ball. When one of our players have the ball we never see the other moving or trying to create triangle of passes.

Yesterday was abysmal. No players movement what so ever.