Maybe AVB is the right man for Spurs?

I have never been through a week where my opinion on something has changed to drastically.

At the start of the week, I was very pro Redknapp and was feeling very nervous that he would leave spurs.
He then left Spurs and I was rather annoyed with Tottenham for letting him go
Harry then goes on about how the board didn’t like him. I am not getting bored with him moaning and looking towards a new era at Spurs. I wanted David Moyes.

Now I find myself quite interested in the prospect of Andre Villas Boas.But I feel I may be the only one (other than the board of course!).

He is 34 years old and a very good and clever manager. He learnt his trade from Mourinho and was very successful at Porto. The trouble with his run at Chelsea is he went in there trying to change the place over night and no one likes change. You try telling Frank Lampard he’s not the major player at Chelsea anymore and he should step back and let others develop. Now imagine telling him that when you’re the same age as him. Tough job.

AVB always went on about this long-term project he had for Chelsea. Chelsea on the other hand were after a short-term solution and will continue to live on the short-term fixes. Spurs on the other hand could well be the team where the project works.

Tottenham don’t have the Lampard and Terry at the club. None of the players have been there a really long time. I feel the Tottenham playing squad have a lot less egos than Chelsea and may actually buy into the AVB project.

The down side to appointing AVB may be that we sacrifice a little of this exciting football that we have been so accustomed to seeing the past two seasons. But if AVB is as clever as we were led to believe 12 months ago, then he may actually try to adopt this into his project.

I am sure next week I will have a totally different opinion on this but for now I actually like the idea of AVB. I just hope he does not cost £35 million or whatever it is Chelsea ended up forking out for him.

Redknapp leaves Spurs, whats next?

I was half way through writing a blog a couple of weeks ago on Spurs, stating how this summer is potentially the most crucial time Spurs have every faced. One of the biggest decisions they needed to decide on was Harry Redknapp’s future at the club. Now they release a statement at 4am saying he has left the club.

I am still sticking with this being the most crucial summer for Spurs, because it is the potential turning point. We could either push on to bigger things or we could fall back into mid table.

With Harry Redknapp, I think there must have been a lot more going on behind the scenes than we would know. Yes the results were not great towards the end of the season and I always blamed the players, but at the end of the day I guess the blame lies with the man in charge. Its tough but Harry has been through it before.

There is a couple of issues, which I reckon made this departure happen.

A: He hired Paul Stretford to negotiate him a new contract. Why? He’s done it himself or through his solicitor on many occasions in the past. Why has he suddenly employed one of the big football agents to do it for him?

B: I am sure his rant about being in the last year of his contract was a catalyst to him not staying on at the club. As much as Daniel Levy may have liked Harry, seeing that in the papers would have worn him very thin. Plus I believe a member of Daniel Levys family had just passed away, so having pressure on him to negotiate his employees new contract would not have gone down well.

I expect Paul Stretford was behind this little rant and I expect it will get Harry Redknapp his millions at his next club which will most likely be in Quata or one of the other mega rich nations.

As for Spurs, well it needs to be a clever appointment. We need a manager who will come in and steady the ship and continue the good work. You must remember that with Harry leaving, so will most of the backroom staff. Kevin Bond and Joe Jordan were very important to the set up, but being Harrys best and loyal mates, they will go too.

 

What Spurs do not need is some manager from a different country who has won the cup in their home nation and is ‘well regarded’ as the next Man Utd Manager. This will not work. They will cost millions, come with loads of pressure and change everything at the club.

The basic principles of the club work, hence why we have finished in the top 5 so many times in the past few seasons.

Harry brought in only exceptional foreign talent, but mainly brought in experienced Premier League players and this has worked wonders on the club. I suggest the club does the same when picking the new manager. There is only one name that can be touted and that’s David Moyes.

I am a bit fan of David Moyes, but you have to remember that his success is also down to having a very understanding and supportive boss in Bill Kenwright. Everton have had their ups and downs, yet David Moyes job had never been on the line.

Should he take over Spurs and by December the club be 12th in the league, I doubt Daniel Levy will keep him on that much longer. Expectations at Spurs are now that we must challenge for the title or atleast be sitting in the top 4.

So it’s a MASSIVE summer for Spurs. I am hoping the board do the right thing. The more I think about it, the more I get the whole Redknapp leaving this. I was angry at first but we all know it was going to end sooner or later, I am just happy its ended at a time when a new regime can come in and actually make a difference instead of half way through October when we are battling relegation.

Dont worry fellow Spurs fans, we will find out Arsene Wenger or Sir Alex Ferguson eventually…

And sorry Everton if we steal your manager and you get relegated.

Redknapp vs Hodgson

As a Spurs fan, I am delighted the FA seemed up for irritating every England fan by not appointment the fan favourite for the England job. But you have to wonder what has actually gone on here and whether or not the FA has made the right decision.

So I have devised a little Redknapp vs Hodgson battle to see who is the right man for the job no one actually wants.

Experience:

Redknapp: Vast experience in picking teams up when they are down and turning them into something they would never of dreamed of. Portsmouth – bottom of Championship all the way to winning the FA Cup and giving AC Milan an almighty battle at Fratton Park in the UEFA Cup. Tottenham – relegation candidates, usually mid-table – turned into Title Contenders (for a bit) and now expecting Champions League football.

Hodgson: Where do you begin?! He’s been all over the world, he even managed Inter Milan twice! Kept out of the England radar while managing teams in Scandinavia, including taking Switzerland to a World Cup Finals and nearly qualifying again with Finland. Then comes to Fulham, saves them from relegation and gets them to Europa League Final. Off to Liverpool, does not quite work for him, straight in at West Brom and steady the ship there.

Winner: Hodgson – They have both done well at improving teams, but Roy has been all over the world doing it. The England job is something quite different to a premier league side where you buy more players when needed.

Fan Friendly:

Redknapp: Always been on the fans side where ever he has gone. He even went from Portsmouth to Southampton and back again and the fans still loved him

Hodgson: Fans sometimes find him a bit boring but they seem to be confident in what he does.

Winner: Redknapp. Hodgeson will bore the fans unless he gets England winning games in an attractive fashion live Harry would.

FA Friendly

Redknapp: When you been in and out of the tabloids for non football reasons, the FA will not be interested. Was never fancied last time he interviewed for the England Job so making himself some friends at Wembley was always going to be tricky.

Hodgson: everyone’s friend in football. He has worked for FIFA, UEFA and the FA. They know what he’s about and he knows what their about. Have you ever seen him in the front half of The Sun? (before today).

Winner: Hodgson –  He is safe while as Redknapp is liable to cause some havoc along the way.

Media Friendly:

Redknapp: Depending on how you refer to the term of media friendly. He has been quite bitter with the media in the past and they have not always go on. But then that makes great headlines, so in that respect the media love him.

Hodgson: Boring, keeps himself to himself. Journalists probably don’t even bother going through his rubbish as I bet that’s really boring too. He never gives the media that quote they want at press conferences and is very guarded. Hence all the negativity towards him in the papers today.

Winner: Redknapp – The papers need something to report on other than football. Hodgson will not give them that.

Potential:

Redknapp: There is not much else Harry can do to improve as a manager. At Spurs he has a tried and tested team of staff around him, he knows what players he needs and wants and everything works well for him. Never been a manager of a national team so perhaps that’s the only area he would want to grow in. He’s never going to manager Barcelona or Man Utd so perhaps that’s his next step.

Hodgson: He’s done pretty much everything but seemed to fall at the first hurdle in what was meant to be his first big job at Liverpool. No idea why that didn’t really work other than all the problems they were having behind the scenes with the owners. This is his chance to prove he’s not just a midtable manager.

Winner: Draw: They both have something to prove in terms of making the next step up in their careers.

So by my calculations, that makes them even in these terms, but I think whats more important to the FA and quite rightly is having someone they can work with. Imagine employing someone you were not sure you could work with. You would not do it and I think the FA have realised this and need someone who will come in quietly and get on with it.

Good Luck Roy!

The Downward Spiral know as Spurs

My reaction to seeing the score from the QPR vs Spurs match really sums up the season for Tottenham. I was not annoyed, I just let out a sigh and switched my phone off to continue drinking at the engagement party I was at.

The last 2 months have really made me frustrated being a Spurs fan, not because of the whole Harry Redknapp

to England fiasco, but because the players are letting everyone down after all the hard work that has been put in.

Rewind to when Harry took over, bottom of the table with some of the best players in the league. Fast forward to November 2011 and those players are challenging for the title in the same Spurs shirt that saw them rooted to the bottom of the table. Harry didn’t make wholesale changes to the squad, just added a little experience.

Harry Redknapp got them playing a way that the league had not seen. It was 100 mph for 90 mins and no one could handle it. The last two months however, something has changed and no one seems to know what it is.

After last weeks defeat in the FA Cup Semi Final, I amazingly read on twitter some spurs fans saying Harry Redknapp should get the sack. What else could Harry have done? He has played that team, that system, that way all season long and it seemed to work. It’s the players that are to blame.

I have a feeling Spurs have hit the peak and are back on the way down. The players have tasted the highs of the Premier League and a sense of arrogance is coming in. Dare I say it, but now people expect this high tempo from Spurs, the pressure hits and the egos come out.

Whats more worrying is that this whole situation leaves no reason for Harry to turn down the England job. Do you want to represent your country and attempt the impossible job, or do you fancy playing in Poland on a Thursday night for the sake of ITV 4? If we had Champions League, it might be a different story but I cannot see that happening now.

Some of Spurs best players will be on their way, Van Der Vaart I predicted at the start of the season would be on his way at the end of this season and I still think that will happen. Adeybayor will probably find a pay day else where. Modric will have his pick of sides to go win the league with and suddenly Spurs lose the spine of the team. This in turn will see Gareth Bale tempted to go else where.

This will then trigger a panic in the Spurs Board Room. They will go out and get the biggest name manager money can buy, they will change the way spurs play and suddenly we are in the same position we found ourselves in before Harry came to save the day.

Sorry Spurs fans, but we have hit the peak, its time for another midtable battle with Aston Villa and Sunderland until someone like Bredan Rogers comes along and picks the team up again. Hey, it was fun while it lasted.

AVB GTG LOL WTF?

Don’t understand the title of this blog. I don’t understand the story behind it!
Translated, that title reads Andre Villa Boas Got to go, laugh out loud, what the f***

AVB got sacked on Sunday. What a mess Chelsea find themselves in. But why. Well here’s my thinking behind the situation. I could be totally wrong but reading between the lines, this is my theory and reasoning under a few headings:

COST

Andre Villas Boas was brought into Chelsea at a great cost to the club. Sums of money being quoted £18 million, £20 million. Either way, he’s cost Chelsea somewhere in the region of £1 million a game. Not bad work if you can get it.

MEDIA RELATIONSHIP

He was played out by the media to be the next Jose Mourinho and this was possibly his downfall from day 1. I rate him hugely as a manager, he has proven success and is younger than some of the players at Chelsea. He is a modern clever manager, treating the job as a project and looking at the whole thing long-term, not just next Saturday. Perhaps he was looking too far ahead considering he inherited an aging squad.

I get the impression he was an argumentative figure. He never really got the British Media. He never really joked with them and snapped on quite a few occasions. But unlike your Ian Holloways of the world of management, he seemed a bit more quiet and stroppy when he snapped. The media did not like this, he was no fun, he gave nothing away, gave them nothing to report. For this reason, they would write negative things about him.

RELATIONSHIP WITH THE STAFF

Whether there was ‘unrest’ in the playing staff or not, I got the impression he walked into the club and said ‘Its my way or the highway.’ Perhaps not the best way to deal with a group of players who have had it quite easy in the past. I do not agree with the players in their complaints about their manager. We have all at one point or another worked for a boss or company that we dislike or do not agree with. Do we go out of our way to ensure the company we work for fails? No. We continue on because they are paying us. If it is still unbearable, we then leave, go elsewhere.

Perhaps there could have been an even ground on this. What was AVB’s problem with Frank Lampard? Is this what upset other players? I get a feeling more happened than we are lead to believe on this
RELATIONSHIP WITH THE BOSS

Everyone is pointing the finger at Roman Abramovic. Lets not forget who put their money into the club to ensure this high level of manager could come to the club in the first place. This is the boss who will support you and give you the tools to succeed. Why wouldn’t he sack someone who was not coming up with the goods.

POTENTIAL FOR SUCCESS

Had he been given more time, I am confident he would have succeeded. I totally agree with the comments I keep hearing that he was the right person for the job at the wrong time. Had he got the job in 5 years time, you may have seen a totally and more successful period in Chelsea’s history.

FUTURE

People keep looking at him to be the next Jose or Special 1…. hes not. No one will be. Thats what made Jose Mourinho so special. There is no one like him and there never will be.

If you want to liken AVB to another manager, try Arsene Wenger. A manager who needed time to create a project which although not doing too well now, has been hugely successful in the past mainly down to Wengers project. AVB would be able to create a similar situation where ever he goes next.

WHATS NEXT FOR AVB?

I would love him to be the man who replaces Harry Redknapp at Tottenham. To continue the great work already done there but to add something a bit different to it. He won’t goto Spurs however as I cannot see Tottenham paying out the kind of money he would want.

He will goto Spain or Italy and he will be hugely successful. He will win the Champions League and he will come back to haunt Chelsea. He’s been given a rough ride this season but I think it will make him a better manager from the experience.

WHATS NEXT FOR CHELSEA?

Jose? Nah. I expect them to stick with Di Matteo to get the job full-time. It is strange of Assistant Managers to be kept on like this when the manager has been sacked but I do not think AVD and Di Matteo actually had a lot in common. They did not play together and I doubt they knew each other that well before Di Matteo was appoint AVBs assistant. I think it was a clever move by AVB to bring in a Chelsea favourite to assist him. Chelsea will be looking to spend very little on a new manager so to help with the financial fair play rules coming in. Di Matteo is more than capable of this and has proved it at lower levels. I think he can step up and save Chelsea’s season and would be interested to see how much he has to succeed to get the job permanent.

Chelsea FC – Never a dull moment

Good luck to Terry Connor

I guess this is not the conclusion many Wolves fans were expecting after the two-week break and the sacking of Mick McCarthy.

Firstly, sacking McCarthy seems like the wrong decision to me. No new manager can do a great deal different to what he was doing. I thought he would keep them up, no doubt he would he will go on to bigger things anyway.

Wolves wanted to bring someone in to help Wolves avoid relegation in the two week break and I have never seen so many managers suddenly hide away. Brian McDermot did well out of it by signing a new long-term contract with Reading, Alan Curbishly who was meant to be favourite for the role said no, Wolves went elsewhere then came back and he still said no. Neil Warnock took the Leeds job which I think is the perfect job for me. And what happened to Steve Bruce. Where is he? What did he say to put Wolves off?

Even Brightons Gus Poyet was mentioned. But if reports are to be believed, Wolves would not pay £2 million for Gus. Thats fine with us….

So Wolves wanted a manager with Premier League experience… They promote Terry Connor to the role.

 

I think this is a good appointment. Others say it’s a slap in the face to Wolves fans. Others are hailing the fact that a black manager if finally getting a chance in the Premier League.

First of all I want to tackle this subject of black managers getting the chance to work in the Premier League.

If they are good enough, they will work in the Premier League and all other divisions. This country has moved on from racism. There is no chairman or board of directors who would favourite a white manager over a black manager due to the colour of their skin. How on earth would that benefit anyone!? If you do not believe me, name 5 black managers or former players you reckon should have got the job at Wolves?

What I do like is that an assistant manager at a premier league club have promoted within. Any other business would do this. Giving those a chance who have already done the hard work. He does have Premier League experience. You think Mick McCarthy had a special room where on Premier League Manager stuff happens and Terry Connor was no part of this? Of course he knows what it’s going to take to work in the this role.

As a Spurs fan, I would not mind seeing a similar practise happen at the club. Only a few years ago, it was suggested Gus Poyet could be the next Spurs manager after coming in as Ramos assistant. Now look what Gus is doing at Brighton.

Also bringing in Martin Jol as Santini’s assistant. Although it happened a lot quicker than Tottenham would have wanted, Jol was then promoted to manager and perhaps started laying down the first building blocks to what is now an exciting time for Tottenham.

So to summarise. Give Terry Connor a chance. Not because he is black and representing the minority, but because he has just been promoted into a job he has been aspiring to do. He’s done the hard work, lets hope it pays off.

Nows the time to Invest in Scottish Football

A strange title for a blog I do agree but with Rangers going into Administration, an interesting situation has arisen.

Suddenly there only looks to be 1 dominant team in the league. So for all those millionaires who read my blog…

ITS TIME TO BUY A SCOTTISH TEAM AND INVEST IN ITS SQUAD

I cannot see Rangers going out of business but with examples of Portsmouth and Leeds to go by, they will take some time to get back to being one of the top 2 teams in the league.

In the summer, their best players will go elsewhere and they will be languishing in a mid table situation for at least a season or two. Especially as it appears their finances may even rule out their place in European competition.

So what is to stop a Motherwell or a Hearts from investing in some of these Rangers players and others from further afield and making the Scottish league less about Glasgow and more about Scotland?

I am not a fan of the Scottish league because I have found it very boring. All it seems to be about is ‘When will Celtic or Rangers lose a match?’ This only seems to happen when they play each other, but nothing is achieved from any other games being played in the league. No ones really bothered about relegation, the only place to be is 1st or 2nd and that’s out of reach for everyone else, that is until next season.

Even this season, Rangers 10 point deduction has only meant that A: Celtic have won the title and B: 3rd place MIGHT be able to catch them as long as Rangers lose pretty much every game from now until the end of the season which is unlikely.

So although a sad time to see a large traditional football super power fall from the top of the hill, this must be the moment for other teams to seize what could be a massive opportunity to change and improve Scottish Football.

The FA Cock Up

This time last week we were asking ‘will Harry go to jail?’ Now we find ourselves asking whether he will stick around his current job to finish off what could be his biggest achievement to date.

This has been brought about by the most bizarre collection of events over the past few days and I will do my best to make sense in this blog.

The Culprits

John Terry: he believes he innocent in the racism abuse case. Fair play to him, it does not look good in my opinion but I can understand in his mind resigning as captain would suggest his guilt in the case.

The FA: should have put more pressure on Terry to resign as captain. The media frenzy around him is what has worried them and rightly so but they then undermined their manager.

Capello: perhaps not bothered about England anymore? I totally back his feelings on the FA going behind his back. As an Italian he was never going to go back on his feelings towards the matter. Bit stupid slagging your bosses off on TV though, even if it is in Italy. If they can pay you £6 Million a year, they can certainly afford a subscription to sky Italia and a half decent translator.

My theory on what will happen next:
Harry Redknapp will not take the job until after Euro 2012. Let Stuart Peace steady the ship and let Harry start afresh.

All spurs fans are reserved to the fact that Harry will go if England came calling this summer. If anything it’s nice for spurs to have a manager in demand rather than sacking them.

But I cannot see Harry leaving his job at sours unfinished.

Next spurs manager? Someone with premier league experience, not some random foreigner. David Moyes or Brendan Rogers would make me happy.

Racism in Football

An eight match suspension and pending criminal record. These are the results of naivety and heat of the moment.

I am of course referring to Luis Suarez and John Terry and their separate cases of racism. The Liverpool striker has been handed an 8 match ban for whatever he said to Patrice Evra. From the reports I have read, Suarez actually owned up to what he said, but in his defence the language he used is not offensive in his home nation.

Well it’s also acceptable to drive on the other side of the road in Uruguay, but still I think you will end up in a spot of bother if you decided to try it on the M6. I’m sure it’s also classed as racism in Holland, where he was at Ajax and Groningen for a combined 5 years.

But is 8 matches really the correct punishment? Previous cases have proved that punching another player during a match will get you less of a ban. Is saying a word really worse than punching someone? In the real world, if I went and punched someone outside Tesco, I think I will end up in more trouble than calling them something.

The other trouble I have with this is now he has appealed this decision. The FA have backed themselves into a corner. Can they really be seen to soften up after showing such a hard stance to the matter. They are obviously using this to stamp their authority on the matter.

I am rather disappointed by the whole t-shirt thing that happened at the Liverpool match. The players said they were in full support of Luis Suarez. What exactly were they supporting? The language he used? The fact that he’s suspended for 8 matches? If he did actually admit to saying what he said then I cannot work out why they are wearing these t-shirts. You do however have to think there is something in this that the whole team and management are aggressively supporting him. I think there may be a lot more to come from this saga.

And then came the John Terry case which is now a police matter. As I have said in previous posts, I dislike John Terry as much as the next sensible person, but is this really the correct punishment?

He is under immense pressure to perform. I know we all go on about them all being on £100,000 a week to play football but imagine if your wages were published to all your colleagues and/or customers and it turned out you earn a considerably higher wage compared to them. You are under much more pressure. If you make a mistake, they will pick up on it much quicker than usual. Then throw a few million people in who have paid part of your wages, watching your every move. This is what footballers put up with every day.

This is certainly not an excuse to racially abuse someone but I think it goes some of the way to explaining what has gone on. Banter on a football pitch will always happen, I personally find it offensive when the crowd shout ‘The referee is a W@nker”. Can the police please charge the 20,000 people seen shouting that on Sky Sports 2 last week? I think not, its part of football. Whether its right or wrong, its part of the pantomime of it. Racism is one step too far and for that John Terry should be punished, but I am not sure getting the police involved is the right method in which to do it.

Both cases, the players used racist language. But in both cases, I really do not think either is a racist, nor shares the opinions of some the extreme racists out there. How can they? They work with footballers from all over the world. I just hope this very unpleasant issues goes away very quickly and we can concentrate on the actual football and moan at these players for the performances of their feet rather than their mouths.

Sepp Blatter Kind of talks some sense

First of all I know this is going to cause a bit of outrage and shock but I actually felt that maybe Sepp Blatter was on to something when he discussed the racism issue earlier this week.

He said a lot of racist abuse could be resolved with a hand shake on the pitch. I think he’s right and I think it already happens. Obviously I am not referring to the major incidents where sections of the crowd make disgusting remarks, but I am talking about the odd comment between players on the pitch.

To put this in perspective. IF John Terry did say what he is being accused of saying then would this who issue have spiralled out of control had John Terry gone up to Anton Ferdinand after the final Whistle, shook his hand and apologised for saying something out-of-order in the heat of the moment. I expect we would have heard nothing more on the incident.

Its funny also how no one has questioned how this incident came about. Can you really imagine John Terry made a point of going up to Anton and using a racist remark. Did Anton say anything to him. Was it just a bit of banter that went a bit over the top? You know the situation, your all making a joke then someone says something just slightly over the line and everything goes silent.

I expect this happens all the time in football from Sunday League all the way up to Premier League. The art of distracting an opponent. Making a joke like comment about their mum, tweaking their nipple (suggested to me by a manager in Sunday League football). It’s the pressure and heat of the moment. John Terry gets paid £100,000′s for playing a game of football and as easy as that sounds, the pressure must be immense, especially when your captain of Chelsea and you’re struggling to beat OPR. 

John Terry isn’t a racist. I highly doubt he thinks ‘they’ should leave our country or ‘they’ are taking all our jobs etc… I do not even think this type of racism realistically exists in this country and society any more. Jokes are made, but I have yet to find someone who genuinely means it when they crack a racist joke regardless of how distasteful they are.

If John Terry was a racist, how must he come with working with some many footballers from all over the world? Wouldn’t they be the first he targets? Plus, Anton Ferdinand in English!

Please can no one think I like John Terry, I think the guy is a piece of scum but not for being racist but for being arrogant and cheating on his Mrs and all that rubbish. I don’t want him representing England because I think as a role model he just isn’t one. He’s no racist though. 

So going back to the original point. Sepp Blatter is a complete idiot. there’s no denying it and saying ALL racism could be solved with a handshake is plain stupid. But I think the point he was getting at was that incidents could be stopped from spiralling out of control with the most simple of phrases – ‘Sorry mate, little bit of heat of the moment there.’

I will however be more than happy if this is the comment that gets Sepp Blatter out of FIFA.