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Jose Mourinho

How do you feel about Mourinho appointment

  • Excited - silverware here we come baby

    Votes: 666 46.7%
  • Meh - will give him a chance and hope he is successful

    Votes: 468 32.8%
  • Horrified - praying for the day he'll fuck off

    Votes: 292 20.5%

  • Total voters
    1,426

Real_madyidd

The best username, unless you are a fucking idiot.
Oct 25, 2004
18,792
12,448
1. In the full year of being terrible, we made it to the CL final and clung to 4th place to qualify anew. If we're only supposed to value the outcome, as many Mourinho fanboys argue, then that is historic achievement for our club, even without pretty football.
2. Poch had warned at length about the painful rebuild. Those senior players haven't exactly changed their tune without him, have they? So backing them over him seems to have been futile.
3. We've been in the CL 5 times. Poch achieved 80% of those. What the fuck are you on about not falling short of his own overachievement, "but the expected results of the club"?? If the club expects CL qualifying finishes, it can only have built that expectation in the last 4-5 seasons. i.e. during Poch's tenure. You write as though it was par for the course before then,

There was a downturn, but it was resolvable. Relegation talk is horseshit hyperbole. We spent a fortune on 3 players Poch barely got any game time out of. Levy abdicated from the "Poch-Levy" plan, and under the Levy-Mou plan we'll be achieving fuck all this season anyway.

The big question is will the huge shift in approach lead to prolonged decline relative to Poch's time, similar outcomes, or better ones? If you reckon the latter two are straightforward, then top marks for optimism/naivety.

1. Yes. But the full year spanned part of two seasons. Also, this need of yours to either be a mourinho fanboy or a Poch fan is pathetic. We are spurs fans, not manager fans.

2. This is the painful rebuild. Including losing Poch, who we all loved.

3. If you recall the original Poch plan, we were not planning on CL until this year (and we would /will miss out). He did overachieve and he was rewarded for that by being paid £7M per year and enhancing his job prospects. A club with the best stadium in the league, the best training facilities and a great team should be in the CL now.
 

Johnny J

Not the Kiwi you need but the one you deserve
Aug 18, 2012
18,123
47,887
another journalist who has always hated Mourinho.
What a nonsense article. Our "style" was dismantled when Dembele left. We've been turgid for at least 15 months. Yes, we have less possession now than under Poch, but we've been relying on magic from Kane and Son for years to cover up the lack of fluency in attack.
 

WiganSpur

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
15,974
32,682
I see people having their minds turned by the media again. It really is too early to judge and things can turn very quickly in football as we experienced on the other side over the last 18 months.

We were on a decent run despite a few wobbles, especially decent when you factor the manager had come in mid season to a busy schedule with a couple of key players missing.

Then Kane went down. We struggled for a bit, then got back on our feet with help from Bergwijn/Gedson to start stringing some results together. We were looking good for top 4 after the Villa match.

Then of course Son went down and after that point things become especially difficult. Not only because you are without your talisman, but also the physical and psychological implications of that don't forget. Sure you fight on, but then the other attackers start hitting their physical limits as Jose likes to say. This last few weeks from the Wolves game, you can see the confidence has started to go and that's very difficult to reverse without results on the pitch. Sure Mourinho isn't perfect and far from blameless, the whole team is trying but are clearly affected mentally. A big part of the defending is confidence i'm afraid and I think that's one of a few reasons why we're giving daft goals away.

I think a few will be surprised when we return to football. Fresh start, players back etc. With signings too it will give the team a huge boost. We needed this break from football big time.
 
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LeParisien

Wrong about everything
Mar 5, 2018
3,212
8,169
Thanks for the considered reply.

You’re still labouring under a false premise - that what you see on the pitch a) gives you enough information to draw a conclusion re what is precisely being done by the coaching staff; and b) that any of us are even remotely qualified to make judgements based on that; that, inevitably, leads to c) we cannot seek to place responsibility for that at the feet of the coaching staff given the myriad other factors that can come into play.

I’m not assuming what I see on the pitch allows me to know PRECISELY what is being done by coaching staff. Just that it allows me to judge effectiveness. I’ve coached kids at a decent level (including at spurs) so whilst I’m not qualified to speak about the ins and outs of elite level football, I have a decent insight into how coaches think and work. That perhaps does make me remotely qualified.

And so I can say that given months to work with a team you would expect those players to exhibit an identity on the pitch. That identity is lacking at the moment.

There’s no long term vision for the club being effectively worked on with the squad.

If there were then that would be evident on the pitch. Because that work would be effective.

There’s no real need to overthink this. Sure there are reasons why progress might be slow and elements might not yet have started. I fully accept that. But the absence of a well drilled back line (exacerbated by persistant chopping and changing) and few patterns of play in midfield, suggest that the types of things the coaches COULD influence, are not in fact being influenced.

It’s possible for people with a better eye than I have to disagree with me - sure. Perhaps we’ve been unlucky defensively and there are the seeds of a good thing. It’s possible that there is a midfield identity on and off the ball forming that I haven’t spotted. These are things we could debate using evidence. That evidence is hardly forthcoming...


In essence, what you’re saying is neatly boiled down to: ‘I believe this, therefore that’ and you’ve no direct evidence to make that claim. It is the quintessence of confirmation bias. Your starting position is that you don’t believe that Mourinho is the right man for the job and so anything that happens that you feel supports your position is amplified. Even when using equivocal language you’re still damning with faint praise. You’re essentially saying that in spite of factors that we can say exist, and so provides direct evidence, your judgement of him still stands. You’re acting as your own source for confirmation bias. And citing ITK, with its inherent unreliability as a source of direct evidence (not bashing ITKs, just saying that they cannot, both for avoiding jeopardising their channel of information and because they aren’t directly involved in the things they provide information on) is probably the apotheosis of hearing what one wants to hear to back up one’s position. What’s worse is that I went back through various threads and tried to find this ITK nugget and can’t find anything that supports your contention.

For reference, here is what dragon1 said:

« He had one tactic let Davies sit deep and aurier roam, there is zero pattern of play not one player has been coached or improved. »

With respect, I don’t think you’ve thought carefully about the argument. An assumption I have made is that effective coaching will always be visible on the pitch. That’s because the key end to which coaching strives is improved match performance. Other factors can frustrate that but a clear coaching vision can be seen very quickly on the pitch, even if it’s imperfect. Klopp, Poch and Guardiolas general plan (much as they evolved and were adapted) became evident very quickly.

I could flip the question and ask you whether you discern any long term plan OR improved performance over the past 10 weeks.

If not (or very little) why do you think that might be? I fully accept the lack of a #9 will be frustrating efforts but that is a small component of a bigger plan...Coaches at an elite level work on entire team shape on and off the ball and at the moment it is hard to see what the plan is. How will we play when players come back and the plan starts to click?

If you don’t think good coaching/ clear strategy could have made a bigger impact than we are seeing right now, then that is the crux of our disagreement. Fair dos - in the absence of any compelling arguments, I’ll take solace in my experience working with coaches and talking to elite players.

For balance, the only coherent argument I’ve heard is that our players were burned out after years under poch. However there are enough players in the squad who spent 12 months or less under poch that this shouldn’t play a huge role in the absence of visible playing strategy.

My own position is that I can’t say at this early stage whether Mourinho will be successful or not. My feeling is that he will, but the only evidence I can draw on is what he’s done in the past, which isn’t enough to make a categorical claim and so I don’t. And were you to review my posts in this thread, I’m confident that you’ll find I’ve never made any such claim. I, for instance, didn’t look at the games against Man City and Liverpool and say because we won the former and could have won the latter that this was evidence that Mourinho was going to do well. In the same way as it’s too early to tell by the losses we’ve suffered whether he’ll be a success, it’s likewise too early to tell by the wins we’ve accrued whether he’ll be a success.

Anyone who, at this juncture, feels qualified to make categorical judgements about Mourinho’s Tottenham tenure is engaging in unwarranted and unsubstantiated analysis, firmly based in cognitive bias. We don’t have anything remotely approaching valid and substantive evidence to make any kind of judgement. Hence why I, and others, keep having to say, ‘wait and see’.

I agree with all this but it has no bearing on the strategy / coaching players are receiving currently.

As I have said, let’s give Mourinho a preseason. He will work really hard to come up with a plan and put it in place. Things will get better, I’m sure. But that doesn’t negate criticism of the weak leadership currently being shown.

There’s nothing inconsistent with saying that things are bad right now but will improve after a full preseason and some time.
 

WiganSpur

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
15,974
32,682
Not sure who some of these journalists were watching earlier this season .
Under Poch 2019/20 season up to his last game

Not a single away win for the season
12 league matches 14 points won
6 points from a relegation spot
11 points away from 4th place, in history of PL no team has made 4th spot when being 11 points behind after 12 games so CL qualification was gone already.
3 points behind The Woolwich
Record home defeat by 7 goals yes SEVEN, really don't know why the drinks company has not come in with stadium naming rights The 7-UP Stadium sounds quite good
Knocked out of League cup by a 4th division side

Jose might be the wrong appointment but Poch was going nowhere.
Pochettino had given up the ghost and something had to be done. Whoever's fault that was who knows - probably Levy. But in spite of that you can't just throw the towel in and he did imo. He would have resigned if it wasn't for the money. I don't blame him for not doing that by the way but I just think that was the situation in the end.

He was clearly right about a lot of these players and wanted them out. But even if you can't get what you want if you're not going to resign then you have to be professional and do your job. To be a football manager is surely a privilege.

In my opinion, had we suffered the same injuries whilst keeping Pochettino we'd have been relegated or at best scraping survival. I don't think this statement is extreme in the slightest considering our form was only hovering above that for a calendar year.
 

Wheeler Dealer

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2011
6,863
12,282
However much dis-satisfaction there is towards Mourinho, He will more than likely get another season to try and make us competitive again and maybe a bit of silverware. I will reserve judgement now until next Christmas.
 

Gb160

Well done boys. Good process
Jun 20, 2012
23,646
93,314
However much dis-satisfaction there is towards Mourinho, He will more than likely get another season to try and make us competitive again and maybe a bit of silverware. I will reserve judgement now until next Christmas.
This is the sensible approach mate.
The idea that Jose was the right/wrong choice just cant be intelligently assessed yet, people are just nailing their colours to the mast and guessing.
If we aren't seeing and upturn in both performances and recent results by then, the vast majority of us will all have doubts...and quite rightly so.
 

WiganSpur

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
15,974
32,682
This is the sensible approach mate.
The idea that Jose was the right/wrong choice just cant be intelligently assessed yet, people are just nailing their colours to the mast and guessing.
If we aren't seeing and upturn in both performances and recent results by then, the vast majority of us will all have doubts...and quite rightly so.
The best approach is to just give him next season. As long as we are not threatened by relegation, give him the season and decide whether to sack or keep. What we want to avoid is another change mid season if at all possible. If it turns out he's not up to it, then fine go back to the drawing board next summer and find his replacement.
 

Amorea

New Member
Mar 11, 2020
3
18
I really didn't expect to want to write another 'opinion' on Jose and our great club – but as a result of Jonathan Wilson's 'piece' in the Observer today I feel I DO want to!

Wilson is, like all of us, entitled to his opinion, no matter what is stated and his title today was , 'Jose won't solve the crisis; he is the crisis'.

I think this is unbridled nonsense and especially his use of the word 'crisis' at this particular time in our nation's experience!

But I would add (topically) that in Chinese annals, 'crisis' actually means 'opportunity riding a dangerous wind'.

I believe that opportunity is always present and right now Spurs and our fans and our players and Jose et al have created (one way and another) a 'situation' which, if used well to create a better way forward, will take us all into a new realm of expansion and expression, just as Pochettino did 5 years ago.

Before Poch we had created, over many years, the 'persona' of being a stylish, talented, attractive team which would almost always underachieve but which would be 'appreciated' by many other fans for its creative, almost happy approach to not winning anything!

The 'serious' and serial trophy-winners, when asked about playing Spurs, would smile and suggest we were a 'pretty' team, quite nice to watch but that we could always be 'bounced' out of winning – every time.

Heck, some of us fans even believed it ourselves!

Poch changed that completely – well, almost!

His tremendous efforts and alternative 'vision' changed the attitudes of even the best players and teams when they came up against us and that was fabulous – for us. But still, we didn't actually win anything!

So – if WINNING zero is ever a 'crisis' then Poch brought us to the brink of that new possibility but not even he could quite push us over the line.

The Poch 'push' went only so far and no further but it put us right here, right now, where we are today.

Now is a new moment of truly great opportunity for Spurs – and for each one of us – if we care - and we need to use what Poch helped us create and add that crucial, miniscule percentage that only 'winners' know how to add in the tightest, most challenging of situations.

All I can say about that is that, in my limited experience of competitive sports, that tiny percentage difference comes through NOT accepting anything which is not one's best effort and that being 'nice' and 'politically correct' and gently 'persuasive' rarely produces one's best in the critical moments.

Sometimes we just have to shout at ourselves and drag what we know is inside – OUT – and SHOW it! And THAT is the primary difference between Jose – and a lot (not all) 'modern' coaches – in every sport. (No doubt my view only!).

It's way too easy to just call one guy the problem and say that he is the 'crisis' and especially when he has only recently walked through the door and into our truly fantastic history.

This club, like ALL others, has been through many 'situations' and I refuse to call any of them a 'crisis'. They are situations – opportunities - which ask us to respond, in a way which helps us expand ourselves and become 'better'.

In the case of Spurs this 'better' now means 'WINNING' and I absolutely believe that doing THAT will mean slightly adjusting a few attitude criteria and some mental habits and possibly the development of a more seriously focused desire – to win!

The 'crisis' that Wilson talks about might really be the 'crisis' for him should Spurs actually develop those tiny but momentous differences in the next 18 months and go on to win the PL and, who knows, even the UCL!

I'm up for that because I know that 'nice guys don't lose – unless they WANT to'!
 

stevenurse

Palacios' neck fat
May 14, 2007
6,089
10,022
It's really unfair to judge Jose without a single player capable of holding the ball up front. Its no coincidence that our possession suffers when we dont have a focal point, but we also come under wave after wave of attack because we keep giving the ball away.

If Kane didnt hold the ball up, he won free kicks, slowed the game down and allowed us to get higher up the pitch.

If you couple this with midfielders not being interested in progressing the ball, and throw in a shit load of goalkeeper fuck ups, what on earth do you expect?

I've gone from writing the season off, to believing that CL qualification might still be possible when we get Kane and Son back. Games wont be played until May I'd expect, so not only have we got a lot of time to work on things, but also to have our best players back.
 

S0S

Active Member
Dec 11, 2019
74
136
I am surprised by how much negative press Jose is getting in the media
I always thought of him as a bit of a media darling, he always has time for them and gives them lots of headline worthy content

I suppose he is a polarising character with press and fans alike
 

Wheeler Dealer

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2011
6,863
12,282
I am surprised by how much negative press Jose is getting in the media
I always thought of him as a bit of a media darling, he always has time for them and gives them lots of headline worthy content

I suppose he is a polarising character with press and fans alike
I'm not surprised by the negative press. He is still carrying loads of baggage from his United days, which is still fresh in the minds of most Journo's and football people alike. With United being the biggest supported club in the land, the vast majority of fans were pleased to see the back of him, and this negative view has been transferred onto the media and other members of the general public who can get their voices heard. For Mourinho, and whatever the mitigating factors have been, he's done very little at Spurs so far to displace this negative perception many have of him..
 
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