Spurs must forget their title pain and join European elite
TOTTENHAM have only themselves to blame for failing to take their opportunity last season to record what would have been the club’s greatest achievement since the Double of 1960-61. Mauricio Pochettino’s team could have gone down in history.
Title races are a little like the Grand National; if you’re in sight of the leader with two furlongs to go, you know you may never have that chance again. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime moment. That’s how it feels with Spurs and the title last year. It seemed like it was a unique season, when the major powers were re-grouping.
Tottenham did amazingly well to take advantage, but when they faltered, dropping points against Arsenal, Liverpool and West Brom, there was always that fear that Spurs fans and players might be looking back with regret for years to come.
So as they prepare for Wednesday night’s return to the Champions League against Monaco — a special night for me with two of my former clubs playing each other — I feel they need to reset their goals.
Publicly, they might say they want to go one better this season and win the league. That’s only natural after the disappointment of losing out to Leicester.
But what would be a fantastic season for them would be a good run in the Champions League to the quarter-finals and to finish in the top four. That’s not being defeatist. It’s about building the club for the future. Tottenham need to establish themselves as a Champions League side.
You can criticise Arsenal’s failure to make an impact on the tournament, but what you can’t take issue with is the fact that they established a dominance over Tottenham in the past 20 years by hitting the Champions League season after season. That is what has allowed them to establish a reputation and to attract better players.
In that time, Tottenham have managed it only once, under Harry Redknapp in 2010-11. They seem to have ended with more fifth places than anyone else and when they did finish fourth in 2012 they still did not qualify because Chelsea claimed the spot as winners despite ending the season outside the Premier League’s top four.
These next two seasons are massive in Tottenham’s history. They will have a new stadium in 2018-19 with 61,000 seats. If they can reach that season with two more years of the Champions League behind them, they will not only have started to accumulate the finances to compete but also a reputation abroad as serious contenders.
Then, as a major force in Europe situated in London, they will on top players’ agendas. They will be able to compete with Arsenal and Chelsea for the elite.
I worry they may not seize this chance. There is a fear that the transition years before they get into the new stadium may hamper recruitment — although the board spent more money in the summer than I expected. Whether they have recruited well remains to be seen.
They’ll play at Wembley in the Champions League and it will not be like White Hart Lane, where the classic European nights generated a fantastic atmosphere.
My memories are of playing Johan Cruyff’s Feyenoord in 1983 and, although I didn’t play because I was injured, the 1984 UEFA Cup final against Anderlecht. The intensity of the crowd close to the pitch really spurred you on. You won’t get that at Wembley, but then you don’t normally have 80,000 fans cheering you on. If supporters can create something special then the team could use the ground to their advantage, even though Arsenal struggled there in Champions League games in 1998 and 1999.
And it will give them time to acclimatise to a big stadium before moving into their new ground. Being away from White Hart Lane might be difficult, but Spurs cannot afford to let up.
They have a chance to put themselves on the map in Europe. No-one expects them to win. But a good run and that top-four place can help establish them among the European elite.
And if they do that then challenging for the title might not be something they do every few decades, but every few years. The opportunity needs to be seized; the next two seasons are so important. I can only hope Spurs grasp that chance this time.