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Manager Thomas Frank

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Are you Frank Out or In?

  • Total voters
    623
Matt1882 said:
This is possibly down to perception.
Before Poch, the best we'd had in decades was 1 CL qualification under Redknapp.
Poch himself replaced Dim Sherwood who replaced AVB. Expectations were at an all time low.
Poch then raised standards and expectations. 2 title pushes. CL football 4 years in a row. A CL final. All as we moved out of a small stadium in a big new one.
Since he's left, that's what fans are expecting.
It's a bit like Man United fans still thinking they should be in a title race, if not outright favourites every year because of the Fergie era.
That era came after many years of mediocrity and years of mediocrity have ensued since.

It fees like that's us now. Trying to replicate the lightning in a bottle we caught with Poch and that squad.
Let's be serious too, it wasn't all Poch. Kane, Son, Deli, Dembele, the entire defence. It was all a perfect moment in time.
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Those of us actively on here in that period of AVB-Sherwood-Poch, with good memories, will recall this is exactly how it was going with Poch at this point.

Lots of people wanted De Boer instead, having been pissed at missing out on LvG. Didn't want the low-rent cheap option from the lower table side who was clearly out of his depth with senior players. No progression on the pitch (despite what people say) and poor performances from our expensive main striker.

The main difference this time round is that Frank isn't picking up a side that had finished in the top 6, and doesn't magically have a Harry Kane to dig him out of a hole. He does, however, seem to have a young core with a better attitude.

People shouldn't rewrite history to suggest that Poch was seen universally as the right guy at this point, and shouldn't be comparing the task of picking up a team that finished 17th with a headless chicken defence to that which past managers have started with
 
Eli said:
Johnson
Maddison
Porro
Van de Ven
Kulusevski
Draguis
Solanke
Gray
Bergval
Vicario
Veliz
Phillips
Odobert

Yang Min-hyeok
£344million worth
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Transfermarkt puts it at €457m worth - I'm not convinced the exchange rate is so generous as you put it

www.transfermarkt.co.uk

Ange Postecoglou - Purchased players

Diese Übersicht listet alle Spieler auf, die während aller Amtszeiten des Trainers Ange Postecoglou verpflichtet wurden.
www.transfermarkt.co.uk www.transfermarkt.co.uk
 
JimothyCF14 said:
When is the last time a Spurs manager was responsible for recruitment? Sure, Frank will tell the likes of Lange what he thinks the squad will need but as the end of the day I just don't think it works like that anymore.

Do we really believe that Frank coincidentally wanted Tel or was it just an easy deal as he'd been here last season? Do we really believe Ange wanted Werner a second season? Did Jose really identify Rodon? We all know the answer regarding Conte and Spence.

Our managers greenlight transfers but I think we all know it's "greenlight these specific signings or work with what you got".

Frank needs to be doing better with what he's got, no argument from me at all, but I don't think what's he's got is necessarily what he wants.
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Harrier said:
I’d lay that blame firmly at Lange’s door rather than Frank!

Our recruitment has been abysmal long before Frank arrived and it’s one of the first observations he made if you remember.
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I get what you guys mean.

But truth is - it is never that simple. I am not saying he could have went around pointing fingers and getting in first 3 players that he chose himself. But if he would have said that "I absolutely need a deep-lying playmaker to make my plan work, current options do not check the box for me" - would have he been 100% ignored? I doubt that.

Furthermore his own decision of starting Palhinha and Bentancur together from all the options just makes it more likely that he might not be even wanting that kind of ball-playing and line-breaking ability. Cause yea, he has to work with what he has but what he has is not worse than some bottom sides of the league in terms of incisive passing.
 
CJJ said:
Those of us actively on here in that period of AVB-Sherwood-Poch, with good memories, will recall this is exactly how it was going with Poch at this point.

Lots of people wanted De Boer instead, having been pissed at missing out on LvG. Didn't want the low-rent cheap option from the lower table side who was clearly out of his depth with senior players. No progression on the pitch (despite what people say) and poor performances from our expensive main striker.

The main difference this time round is that Frank isn't picking up a side that had finished in the top 6, and doesn't magically have a Harry Kane to dig him out of a hole. He does, however, seem to have a young core with a better attitude.

People shouldn't rewrite history to suggest that Poch was seen universally as the right guy at this point, and shouldn't be comparing the task of picking up a team that finished 17th with a headless chicken defence to that which past managers have started with
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Yes! You get it entirely.
Pedro Pascal Hug GIF by HBO


The fact Poch had a pretty meh start is a double edge sword.
On one side it should entitle coach a bit longer than a dozen games to make their mark.
On the other side, it doesn't mean every coach will make their mark (or that it would be a good mark)
 
CJJ said:
You might not think you are, but you are.

You're effectively saying we are at the Postecoglou lows already.

Frank did not have the same starting point. He's picking up the mess that was left behind. Starting a new season does not undo that mess
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If you can't read I can't help. We are not even this low last season at this point. But you do you.

We don't start this season at 17th continuing from last season points tally lol.
 
Matt1882 said:
I don't think it was as quick as people like to recall.
Certainly at this stage there wasn't much to get excited about.
I distinctly recall thinking he was little more than another AVB with a rigid 4231 "philosophy"
At this juncture, we don't know where this is headed. Frank might have a fork in the road moment in the next few games where it goes right or it goes wrong.
Many fans though, yourself included, were far more charitable with time for the last manager, who made us demonstrably worse the longer he stayed, time and patience.
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I loved the fist 10 games under Ange. The games were exciting and we were unbeaten. It gave him a huge load of credit in the bank for me. Especially considering the injuries we had after that run. We ended up playing without Romero, VDV and Udogie for a long run of games where Emerson, Davies and Dier were their replacements. I was probably too easy on him but he had won me over with them first 10 games. It probably took me until the following season to appreciate that he'd been tactically found out in this league.

Frank has no credit in the bank. Its been a slow start and the football has been poor. After grinding out some good results by simply defending deep and being competent at set pieces, we've been found out and are awful to watch. Its getting worse and worse each week.Maybe I have jumped on him early but he really needed to get a peformance against Chelsea and Woolwich. My biggest critism under ange was how we approached the Woolwich and chelsea games and just made it easy for them. Frank's anti football approach should have atleast made us competitive in them games but we played like cowards. Now I've no faith at all in him and i see no positives. I thought he'd atleast make us hard to beat in them games. It looks like we are easier than ever to beat atm
 
Silvio Dante said:
There's a lot more wrong with the club than Frank, has been for a long time.
Unless the players have totally given up on Frank he should be given plenty of time.
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I sort of predicted something like this at the height of Poch.
A lot of fans had fallen into the belief we'd made it to the top and at the same time, Arse had fallen away.
They'd finished above us for 20+ consecutive seasons. We did it for about 3 and the level of arrogance from our fanbase was worrying.
I suspect the fact we fell away as quickly as we rose, has left a lot of those fans extremely bitter and that's turned the atmosphere toxic as hell.
 
CJJ said:
and shouldn't be comparing the task of picking up a team that finished 17th with a headless chicken defence to that which past managers have started with
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Agree with your general point about Poch and expectations but the pedant in me feels like I have to pick you up on this.

Describing Spurs Back 5 as a "headless chicken defence" feels unfair because it's simply not backed by the numbers.

When that Back 5 returned to selection availability in March 25 they started together in 6 games (all Europa League) and only conceded 3 goals.

When that same Back 5 played at the start of the 24/25 season after 11 games they'd conceded 13 goals - the same as Chavs, City, and one more than Scum. So not great by any means but hardly a disaster.

Obviously between game week 12 and March 25 the back 5 wasn't available for selection and even when they were Romero and VDV only started together in the League as a partnership twice in 3 months despite being available (they were saved for EL obviously - where, as we can see by the numbers, they conceded only .5 gpg)

Frank took over a Spurs team whose single, outlier, strength was its defence. 🤷‍♂️

Edit: obviously it didn't feel this way because of clown games like Brighton away where our strength clearly cost us the game.
 
Don Pedro said:
I loved the fist 10 games under Ange. The games were exciting and we were unbeaten. It gave him a huge load of credit in the bank for me. Especially considering the injuries we had after that run. We ended up playing without Romero, VDV and Udogie for a long run of games where Emerson, Davies and Dier were their replacements. I was probably too easy on him but he had won me over with them first 10 games. It probably took me until the following season to appreciate that he'd been tactically found out in this league.

Frank has no credit in the bank. Its been a slow start and the football has been poor. After grinding out some good results by simply defending deep and being competent at set pieces, we've been found out and are awful to watch. Its getting worse and worse each week.Maybe I have jumped on him early but he really needed to get a peformance against Chelsea and Woolwich. My biggest critism under ange was how we approached the Woolwich and chelsea games and just made it easy for them. Frank's anti football approach should have atleast made us competitive in them games but we played like cowards. Now I've no faith at all in him and i see no positives. I thought he'd atleast make us hard to beat in them games. It looks like we are easier than ever to beat atm
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But Ange inherited largely the same team that Conte got 4th place in and was in the top 3 when sacked.
Technically speaking, Ange achieved less than his (full time) predecessor in his first season.

Not aimed at you - but a lot of fans didn't seem to notice that those first 10 games weren't all great. It tool 15+ minutes of time added on to turn a loss into a win at home to Sheff Utd. It took an injury time own goal and a disallowed goal to beat 9 man Liverpool at home.
After those first 10 it was one shocker after another.
88 minutes Vs Wolves and people were heaping praise on Dier and Davies for their CB display and ready to crown Angeloss the greatest of all time.
I literally said in the match thread at 1 nil up with minutes left that we'd lose that game.
We lost that game.


Some managers ride a wave from the former manager. Ramos rode the wave from Jol to win the league cup, but in truth, he was slowly destroying everything. Ange took over a team that was fairly confident in its ability to get top 4 and slowly dismantled it entirely.
 
We raised the white flag in 3 London derbies in quick succession. Frank needs to wake up and smell the coffee. I didn’t boo Vicario but I understand the fans outrage post Woolwich and Chelsea,. He needs to understand the magnitude of anger at such gutless performances
 
TheSpurEst said:
I get what you guys mean.

But truth is - it is never that simple. I am not saying he could have went around pointing fingers and getting in first 3 players that he chose himself. But if he would have said that "I absolutely need a deep-lying playmaker to make my plan work, current options do not check the box for me" - would have he been 100% ignored? I doubt that.
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Why do you think we targeted MGW & Eze?

The problem is we didn’t have an adequate backup plan and we ended up with Xavi.

That’s on the recruitment team IMHO!
 
Matt1882 said:
I'm not happy about our current predicament. But it feels like a(nother) transitional moment for us.
When Poch took over, he too lost 5 of his first 13 games. Those losses included a 0-3 at home to Liverpool, a 0-1 at home to West Brom, a 1-2 at home to Steve Bruce, pre money, relegation fodder Newcastle, a 1-2 home loss to Stoke.

We can all change history in our minds, but the facts are, we were shit at this stage under Poch. Arguably worse.
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Aka the Stoke/kane mutiny.

There was detailed Itk on the COYS forum at the time as to what happened after that defeat. I could search it out, it’s an interesting read.
 
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