Pochettino: Tottenham are ready
Tottenham manager thrilled at ‘new home’ ‘We are the problem if we don’t win there’
Mauricio Pochettino has described Tottenham Hotspur playing at Wembley as “wow, a big wow”.
And he harked back to his youth, in the backwater town of Murphy in Sante Fe, Argentina, when the thought of going to such a stadium felt “like the moon, another galaxy” to an aspiring footballer.
The Tottenham manager reeled off Wembley memories including playing there in 2000 for Argentina and dining out with compatriots Ossie Ardiles and Ricky Villa to hear of their FA Cup exploits with Spurs in the 1980s. “They are like an encyclopedia,” he said.
And, going further back, the most iconic of all for Argentineans as Pochettino spoke of the World Cup quarter-final against England in 1966 when team captain Antonio Rattin was sent off in the first half for arguing with the referee.
As an exercise in dispelling the trepidation that is being felt around Spurs playing their home games at Wembley – starting tomorrow with a fixture against Chelsea – it was, therefore, utterly convincing.
But Spurs need to turn around a record of just two wins in their last 10 visits to the stadium – including last season’s disastrous Champions League campaign and losing the FA Cup semi-final to Chelsea – if they are to prevent it becoming an issue, with some seeing it as a bar to them mounting a title challenge as their new ground is being built.
“Wembley is not the problem, we are the problem if we don’t win, like last season,” Pochettino said. “Wembley is the most important place in the world and if we are not able to win there it is not because of Wembley, it is because of us. It is where football was born. For me, in Argentina and Spain [where he played], Wembley was a big dream and now a possibility to play there every two weeks, or maybe every week, or maybe three times in one week. A problem? Oh, come on, I love Wembley.
“I played in 2000, a friendly, England v Argentina, and it was in old Wembley before they changed to build the new one and it was a massive dream for me to play there,” he said of a 0-0 draw in which the defender was a first-half substitute.
“When I grew up I saw, always, Rattin. Remember the World Cup of 1966, Rattin, sitting on the red carpet? That is in my mind always and Wembley was wow, a big wow. I was in Argentina. I was so young but Wembley for me was like the moon, another galaxy. It was massive for me. Then one day you have the possibility to play. And now every week to spend time there.”
Rattin initially refused to go off, believing the German referee wanted England to win. Rattin even sat on the red carpet which led to the Royal Box. The official later accused Rattin of “violence of the tongue” and the incident was mired in controversy, with Sir Alf Ramsey, England’s manager, describing the Argentina team as “animals”.
Pochettino will tomorrow walk past the bust of Ramsey which sits in the players’ tunnel at Wembley, but it will be flanked by the iconic golden cockerels from the top of the East and West Stands at White Hart Lane. Ramsey, of course, also played for Spurs and was a member