LEVY MAY HAVE TO APPOINT SMALL TO ACHIEVE BIG
PERHAPS the main obstacle Daniel Levy faces when trying to recruit a new manager is that the Tottenham job is not as attractive as he thinks it is. The chairman might have to accept that before he makes the right appointment.
Managers are wary of the modern Tottenham. They see a magnificent stadium and training ground. They see status.
But they also see a level of expectation that exceeds what they can realistically be expected to deliver given the budgets for wages and transfers compared with other clubs at the top end of the Premier League.
That, for example, is what is putting Brendan Rodgers off and when we think about what Tottenham might do now it’s worth going back to the day the Northern Irishman joined Liverpool from Swansea in 2012.
Back then, Rodgers was still in his 30s, a coach on the rise at Swansea. He was widely admired but was not a big name and there were some who doubted the appointment. A huge section of the Liverpool fanbase wanted Rafa Benitez back.
But Liverpool were in need of a manager to plot a clear way forward, a coach with a long-term view.
Having finished eighth, sixth and seventh in previous seasons and listing dreadfully under Kenny Dalglish, Liverpool desperately needed a reboot. Rodgers gave them that and, in 2014, almost delivered the Premier League trophy, too.
This is what Tottenham need now. A reboot. Maybe even a season when further steps are taken backward on the field if it’s all part of a plan to move them forward again.
That was never going to be the Jose Mourinho idea and that’s fine. Mourinho is an open book when it comes to the shorttermism of his management.
But it very much feels like that is the way it needs to be now. Spurs are loaded with debt after building their stadium and the Covid pandemic has cut off most of the income streams designed to pay that back. They will not be spending big money on footballers any time soon.
So Tottenham need to find a strategic way back into the top four and for that they will need a strategic coach.
That is one of the reasons the club’s technical performance director Steve Hitchen has Graham Potter, the Brighton manager, on his list of recommendations. There are others at Tottenham who admire Potter, too, but Hitchen’s list is the one that goes upstairs for consideration by Levy.
Potter would be a gamble. Brighton, for all the attractiveness and method of their football, are 14th in the Premier League. The Tottenham job feels as though it might have come 18 months too early.
But Levy must be persuaded to see the merit in young, forward-thinking coaches.
He must learn to see the value in men like Potter and former Bournemouth manager Eddie Howe and, in order to do that, Levy has to be persuaded to recognise where his club is right now.
This is what Liverpool did nine years ago. Yes, they were still Liverpool — but they were also the eighth best team in the country, level on points with Fulham. Levy is hubristic. He sees his club as being on an equal footing with Chelsea, Liverpool and the Manchester clubs. He loathes the very thought that other English clubs feel they can buy Harry Kane, for example.
But this is a time for realism in north London. Levy needs to think about where he wishes Tottenham to be in five years and how best to get there.
He might have to appoint small to eventually achieve big. The question: does he have the courage?
LAST week’s mention of little Penrith from Northern the League prompted chairman Billy get Williams to in touch. Like at many non-League clubs, life has not been up in Cumbria. easy still But Penrith manage to run astonishing an 32 teams serving men and women of all ages and the disabled. Scratch beneath the surface our game and of remarkable things are happening.