In the end, it's not just down to the scouts as the ultimate decision lies with the manager - Pochettino in this case. And managers also watch the players and scrutinizes scouting analysis.
However much I fancy Pohettino (and I would have taken him back this summer) I have to say that his transfer record is rather so so...
Yes, had some really good hits:
Son and
Toby.
Dele and
Kierran were also good purchases. And I'd say, for the price, of £5m,
Dier for while wasn't bad either, nor were
Moura and
Davies.
Wanyama got his career wrecked by injuries. He was a monster while he lasted.
Spurs recovered the money from
Wimmer, and
Foyth, And
Llorente "got" Spurs into the CL semis.
Gazzaniga joined on a free and was a big hit....among the female supporters
He was ok, but never pushed Lloris for his starting spot.
Vorm did a decent job too as a backup goalie and did a job with the youth apparently.
Pau Lopez never played for Spurs in that 1season but 2 seasons later he was sold by Betis to Roma for €23.5. I bet that one hurt Levy in his pockets.
Yedlin,
Stambuli and
Fazio were cheap acquisitions BUT they were brought in to strengthen the starting XI. Which they didn't.
Sissoko's been a solid player and played regularly for 3 managers but he cost £30m! Not his fault that Spurs were desperate enough to pay that fee.
N'Jie and
Nkoudou were total flops.
The jury is still out on
Sessegnon and
Clarke.
However, when he managed to get Levy & Lewis to open the "purse" his record is poor. None of the big purchases were anywhere near what was expected of them.
Janssen. 2 goals in 32 games. At least Spurs got £10 back for him.
Lo Celso, has lots of potentials, but he arrived injured and has remained so for 2 seasons. He can still become an excellent signing, so the jury is still out on him...
Sanchez has never really taken to life in the EPL. At £42m this is something Pochettino & co. should have been able to anticipate.
Aurier. He's got talent yes but not the mental focus.
Ndombele.If he's had to the fighting spirit of Wanyama or Dembele he'd be a world-class player. But it's really really poor scouting when the world knew that he had an attitude problem; it was very well known. Why on earth did they still go ahead???
I know that retrospection is a wonderful thing.... but, while Pochettino was at Spurs .... they missed out on huge bargains like the players mentioned below. One would expect that Spurs at least have gotten 1 or 2 of these players. Leicester got 5 of them.
Mahrez – Le Havre to Leicester in 2014 for £500,000
Kante - Caen to Leicester in 2014 for £5,6m
Van Dijk - Celtic to Soton in 2015 for £10m. Spurs had watched him.
Ndidi – Genk to Leicester in 2017 for £17m
Salah – Chelski to Roma 2016 for £15m (I doubt Chelski would have sold him to Spurs anway); Roma to Liverpool in 2019 for £36.5m (rising to £43m)
Robertson – Hull to Liverpoor 2017 for £8m
Maguire - Hull to Leicester in 2017 for £12 (rising to £17m)
James Maddison – to Leicester 2018 for £20m
So, overall, when considering the players Pochettino spent big money on and the player he "missed" out on, I'd say he was rather poor. But he did "miracles" for Spurs still result-wise, and Spurs - for a while - played maybe the best football in the EPL.
