General Ange?

I wanted to give you my views, for what there worth, on why I think we might just be on the cusp of a new era at Tottenham.

Let’s state the obvious, this season has been awful. The results have been totally unacceptable at times, and the media have been relentlessly telling us how bad Tottenham and Postecoglou are.

But I’ve got a different view on what this might all mean for us.

Call me a hopeless romantic, optimistic, naïve or thick, that’s fine. My truth is that I’m seeing similarities in the seasons under Burkinshaw when compared to these two seasons under Ange.

So let’s place some reasoning alongside my optimism.

Before Pochettino left, he told us we needed a painful rebuild. Mourinho suggested he could get more out of the team and Levy agreed to the reboot.

Nuno didn’t get a chance to do anything and Conte suggested he could do better than Mourinho. Not one of them started a rebuild or challenged Levy to do so. 

So a rebuild under Postecoglou was green-lit and started with a bang. The clear out of players that didn’t fit a profile, wages were cut (in terms of the deadwood at the club) and a commitment to bringing in a particular type of player was established.

Question for you all; given that Levy won’t stick in £300 million to rebuild the team and has agreed young players with big potential is the model he wants to stick with – how many transfer windows will it take to get Tottenham to compete with city and Liverpool?

For me four transfer windows to compete at the very top of the league is just not achievable. Not after the amount of neglect the first team has had. Last season we all watched on in awe at the attitude and attacking intent, a far cry from the previous seasons. 

And this season, especially at the start, it felt like it was about to click and that we would finally see the promise of last year in full motion. 

But then we had injuries. We’ve imploded twice.

14 players, playing 3 matches a week for 3 months does not and champion team progression. I don’t think any manager in any league would have a good season with that going on. 

But I do think there was a reason for the relentless way of playing that so many have called naïve during that period. 

The sudden need to bed young and new players in, out of necessity became the focus, thus the return to the relentless style of play to make sure his new players understand the demands and expectations became the norm. Those players, much like Johnson was expected to be last season, would have been drip-fed into the team; but that wasn’t the option. 

So what does Postecoglou do? He can’t go full defensive as that team couldn’t withstand playing a low block constantly, and it’s not his football philosophy. 

So, go attacking right? That plays two parts, it helps the young/new players get used to how the are expected to play, and takes the onus off making a mistake in a defensive actions that a cobble together defence can’t help but concede. 

The interesting part to all of this is that we’ve seen the players rise to the challenge and become an important part of the team far quicker than expected, and that showed in Postecoglou’s alterations of tactics in-game. He’d get his point across, believing in their ability and played a double pivot, or made the wingbacks not push up the pitch to name a couple of examples of adjustments made.

So what does this all mean?

This team has been through the worst season possible, but even so, we still has a chance to get something memorable out of it. The whole team fully understands and knows how they need to play, and as we’ve seen (at least in Europe) that we can change things up. Moving the ball quickly, playing sharp passes and pressing – just as they’ve been trained to do. Postecoglou has the team a season further on than he expected purely out of necessity.

So next season, this idealistic and determined manager has a few more players to remove from the club, but overall has a team that he can trust to play his way, and without the injuries, I believe we could be back contending in the Top 4.

So why the comparison with Burkinshaw?

Well if you look at when he was brought back in as manager, it was to re-establish Tottenham as a top side, the team needed revamping and rebuilding. During that rebuild the league position was often lower end of the table, but as he re-established the style of play, and got the team he wanted, we started to get joy in the cups and Europe and became a established top of the league team with regular cup wins. All seems very familiar to what we’re seeing at the moment with Postecoglou.

They both had a strong belief in a style and way of playing that is full of attacking intent and flair. 

And while I don’t expect or want us to be relegated, I do believe we need to stick with Postecoglou, as I feel he is on the cusp of making Tottenham a regular top performer over a sustained period of years both during and post him leaving the club just as Burkinshaw did. 

But there is limitations. 

Levy and the board will only spend limited money, and the players we buy will probably be younger, and need time to adjust. 

So unlike Burkinshaw’s time, we might need to hold our nerve a bit longer.

Rambling over (for the most part), and I hope it wasn’t a waste of your time to read.

I don’t think there is a manager that will give Levy a golden ticket to succeed and not spend huge amounts of money other than Pochettino 2.0.

Postecoglou is our new Pochettino and Burkinshaw rolled into one. The question is, do we hold our nerve and take that risk? Do something we have rarely ever done; keep rolling with the punches until we stand up and deliver a KO of our own.