It’s STILL hard to follow Tottenham
There has not been much to cheer about Tottenham Hotspur recently.
Except for the 2021/22 season’s 4th-placed finish and subsequent Champions League return, the 2020s were poor.
Poor at least compared with the mid-late 2010s — when Mauricio Pochettino’s high-press, hard-running team entertained fans and brought Spurs from middling stumblers to 3 consecutive top-3 Premier League finishes & 2 Cup Finals, albeit losing both, with the 2019 Champions League Final loss to Liverpool especially hard to take (non-handball penalty awarded to Liverpool, with everyone non-Spurs affiliated wanted Liverpool to win).
The club has floundered since the late-2019 sacking of Pochettino.
I had written“It’s hard to follow Tottenham” in 2018, and remain very realistic about Spurs’ prospects in a today’s money-ed professional football world.
Large sums of money are needed to build 2 quality first-teams to compete in the top football leagues today. Only the most well-backed teams like PSG, Real Madrid, Manchester United & City, Liverpool, Chelsea (with new manager Pochettino) and now Newcastle have a realistic chance to do well on a sustained basis. Maybe Wrexham in the not-too-distant future too, with the savvy of their Hollywood owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney to bring the cash in, like they did from new shirt sponsors United Airlines.
Just take this past season. Manchester City’s virtually-limitless balance sheet enabled them to build 2 top-quality first teams to reel Ars*nal in during the final 10 games of the English Premier League.
Some might have laughed at the Gooners as bottlers but it was impossible for them to sustain the momentum; their first-teamers are only human, and would tire and pick up injuries as the season progressed. So 2nd place was fair and after 6 seasons, they stepped out of Spurs’ shadow into the 2023/24 Champions League. I write this last statement with pain, but credit where it’s due. They’d outdone themselves.
Chasing shiny new objects?
Traditionally, Tottenham Hotspur owners ENIC practiced prudent financial management in their running of the club.
Some label this approach as stingy — but taking a more magnanimous view, most of ENIC’s funds was spent on infrastructure investment that would presumably pay off in the longer run. This included building a state-of-the-art training facility for the players, where even the England football team would train at. ENIC also built an amazing stadium where the old White Hart Lane once stood, at a cost of over £1 billion.
These days however, the stadium seems to be known for everything except quality football. From staging the NFL’s UK games, to Formula One affiliated go-karting, to boxing matches, to Lady Gaga, Guns N’ Roses and Beyoncé concerts.
The stadium looks lot of fun and excitement... just not on matchdays.
Where White Hart Lane was once a fortress, today’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium hardly shouts invincibility. Teams come to North London with a good chance of beating Spurs, except maybe Pep Guardiola’s triple-winning Manchester City — there, I’ve just jinxed it for next season.
ENIC would also typically not splash out huge money for marquee transfer signings. Pochettino’s time as manager saw Tottenham becoming the only Premier League club to NOT make a signing in the transfer window.
Yet, Spurs punched above her weight for years through buying promising players in their youth (e.g. Gareth Bale, Dele Alli), and blooding well-performing youngsters from their academy (e.g. Ledley King, Oliver Skipp, and of course — THE Harry Kane).
This changed in the past few years when increasingly-large sums of money were spent to bring in ‘proven’ players in a bid to buy more immediate success. 4 of Tottenham’s 5 most expensive signings were made in the past 4 seasons. Arguably, only Argentine defender Cristian Romero was worth his transfer fee, and only when he’s fit to play (on the other hand — in Bale-like fashion, Cuti is always fit for Argentina games).
Spurs’ transfer policy U-turn came after Tottenham Hotspur chairman Daniel Levy’s appointing of first Jose Mourinho and later Antonio Conte as Head Coaches. Traditionally not known for patience and faith in youth, both managers pushed for signings; Conte’s 1st-season revival of the team’s fortunes even drew a £150m cash injection from the owners for transfers.
Mourinho and Conte have both since departed North London, their serial-winning ways not rubbing off Tottenham Hotspur. Unfortunately, their negative football did.
Spurs are worse in 2023 than where they were in 2019.
Taking the eye off the ball?
A football club is a business. Businesses require cash to run.
Without petro-dollar backing like the fore-mentioned clubs have, the Tottenham Hotspur business had always been run by ENIC to ensure positive cashflow.
Pre-COVID, Spurs had set a world-record for annual profit by a football club — not common in professional football. It was remarkable too, that Spurs’ then-record profits were on revenue far lower than the rest of her Premier League’s Big 6 peers.
With the world returning to COVID-endemic normality, Tottenham’s FY 2022 revenue rebounded 22% to £444m:
- Matchday receipts of £106m accompanied fans back to the stadium
- Commercial revenue (sponsorships, merchandising, events like previously-mentioned NFL, staging concerts and boxing matches etc.) rose 20% to £184m
FY 2023 looks to be even better financially with UEFA Champions League prize money adding to the mix (Spurs made the last 16 — and exited meekly), not to mention the inking of the F1 go-kart deal and the stadium staging concerts of A-listers Lady Gaga, Guns N’ Roses and Beyoncé.
So the club’s financial position remains very strong.
Yet if i remember correctly, the Spurs’ full name is Tottenham Hotspur FOOTBALL CLUB.
Football Club. That is what the organisation ultimately is. I would imagine that the north star of any football club should be football success. At least that’s the view of every fan.
This should make commercial sense too, at least that’s what I learn from my experience as a founder running a business — always meet the customer need, so they are happy to pay me money and I can make my product better, to meet customer needs better. A virtuous cycle.
Success on the football field makes football fans (aka customers) happy. Happy customers buy team replica jerseys, renew season tickets, buy food and drink at the stadium, and in no small way contribute to the coffers of the club. The higher fan numbers and eyeballs means stronger positions when negotiating for sponsorship deals, i.e. higher commercial revenue.
Win-win, no? (hmm, i sound like Pochettino).
Spurs fans haven’t had that happiness for a while.
By not focusing on footballing success, i.e. not focusing on the customer (fan), have Tottenham Hotspur Football Club taken their eye off the ball?
For me personally— in my 29 years following Spurs, I’ve contributed to Tottenham Hotspur revenue by watching Tottenham many times while living in London, thrice in Singapore, and buying several jerseys and Spurs memorabilia. I also paid to be at Wembley with fellow long-suffering fan Joseph in 2008, and thankfully celebrated them lifting the League Cup — the only title won in 22 years under the ENIC’s ownership.
But at this point in time, I’m personally loathe to send any more cash to Tottenham Hotspur by buying jerseys, or attending the Tottenham-Roma friendly at Singapore’s National Stadium (a joint decision by the daughter and I, despite not knowing when Spurs will be in Singapore again).
Because I’m not getting what I paid for.
It’s especially hard to take when we read of the chairman Daniel Levy awarding directors £3m more in fees for FY 2022, including £3.265m to himself.
No wonder so many Tottenham fans are crying for #LevyOut and #ENICout.
Will Spurs’ customers (fans) go “wow” again?
Since Conte’s acrimonious departure, Tottenham have appointed a new Head Coach: Ange Postecoglou, who had guided Scottish club Celtic FC to 5 trophies in 2 seasons, as well as leading Australia to the Asian AFC Cup and World Cup qualification.
Ange is relatively unknown to many Spurs fans, who judging from what I did, presumably hit search engines with a vengeance to learn more of the incoming Aussie manager — the 1st Australian to manage in the English Premier League.
Spurs chairman Levy said appointing Ange was “a conscious decision that we wanted a coach who would understand what we really wanted as a club, which was to play attacking football, to enable everyone to enjoy coming to a match and be entertained, and also someone who understood the importance of the academy”.
It’s an obvious PR-speak attempt to distance himself from the (bad) appointments of Conte & Mourinho. Because I think Levy and ENIC are truly worried Spurs fans would vote with their feet (and money) if they didn’t do something drastic and give the customers something they would pay for.
Because Tottenham Hotspur’s business would then fall apart.
So while relatively unknown, the appointment of Ange seems to hark back to 9 years ago, when a similarly-unknown Argentine was brought in. Having previously managed only “smaller” clubs like Southampton and Espanyol, the Russell Crowe doppelgänger impressed fans with his attacking style of play, turning a Tottenham Hotspur team with no marquee names into world-beaters whom fans and neutrals enjoyed watching and were entertained by.
I’d never known more entertainment on a consistent basis as a Spurs fan.
It’s STILL hard to follow Tottenham
Detractors point to Ange’s lack of experience in the top European leagues. But having now read more articles of Ange Postecoglou and seen some video clips of Celtic, there might be some reason to be cautiously optimistic for next season.
Because what I detest is paying money and watching no effort or desire on the pitch — which we saw in spades during the second season of both Conte’s and Mourinho’s managerial eras, neither of whom embodied the club’s “To Dare is to Do” ethos.
A terrible time, where Spurs fans did not get what we paid for.
So if the new coach keeps to the style of play I see of Celtic on YouTube in the past 2 years, then even should Spurs lose, the team would at least have been entertaining and shown fans fighting spirit (that we pay money for).
It’ll never be easy to follow Spurs, and I know my 30th year as a Tottenham fan will be the same.
Yet… Football fans have irrational love for their clubs, so maybe there is still hope. And maybe, just maybe — this time, it will be different. 🫣
Come on you Spurs.
#COYS
