AVB's inheritance

[Oscar22]

No not a thread about AVB claiming some money following the death of an elderly relative. I'm talking about the debate between Souness and Hoddle after the Chelsea game. It seems to highlight a point that a lot of the media appear to have been completely oblivious to this season and a lot of people who debate football in various forms.

For those of you who turned over/didn't see it Souness basically said that AVB had inherited a brilliant squad and so if he doesnt make champions league why did we sack Harry?

The amount of times that the media in different forms don't pick up on what we lost before this season is unreal, it's like they don't want to be seen to be crediting AVB.

Last season King, Modric and Rafa VDV formed a huge part of our team, they were the spine of it. We lost all three of them before this season. I've heard some mention that AVB was here when we lost those players and so cannot blame it, however King retired injured. Modric was always going (let's face it as much as we hated it we could see it a mile off early in the season) and if the stories are to be believed Rafa left due to more personal reasons due to Sylvie working in Germany and their relationship being trickier with the travel.

Add to that this season AVB has been without Dembele for a long time, Kaboul has missed nearly the entire season and Sandro has been out for a sizeable chunk too as has Defoe at times. Again that is nearly the entire spine of our team.

Yes, it hasn't helped that Ade hasn't been the same as last season, and yes at times Bale has carried us through. However i really don't understand why these issues never get mentioned within the media and these debates on television, it's glaringly obvious to anyone who has seen us play this year. Had Kaboul, Sandro and Dembele been fit all season how different do we think the table would be?.

We have brought in decent players. Siggy, Dempsey, Holtby they are all good players. I know the criticism dempsey gets but both he and Siggy have scored important goals this season even if they haven't got them by the bucket load. I think even the most ardent Dempsey hater would admit he has scored some important goals in tight games this year.

I know that King, Modric, Rafa > Holtby, Dempsey, Siggy I just don't see why the issue gets mentioned on here a lot but never acknowledged on a wider scale by other fans and pundits. I genuinely think that taking everything into account AVB has done a fantastic job with what he has had availiable to him, we have needed to go shopping and haven't but is that AVB or Levy?.

Either way, which side are you lot on? Do you think AVB has done very well with a lesser squad, or are you with Souness and think that he inherited a more than decent enough squad to be getting into the top four?.

 

[Sanj]

Agree totally Oscar22.
The spine of the team was ripped out and we have rebuilt the team with a fraction of the budget.
Sig, Dempsey, Dembele, Holtby are not as good as Modders and VDV and therefore we have lost a lot of creativity.

The press talk about the scums loss of RVP (despite signing corzola, giroud and podolksi), and talk about the chavs rebuilding (with £100m) but seem to think we have underperformed despite a squad clearly not as strong as last years.

 

[beats1]

We have a strong defence man for man but is we have Gallas missing for 6 months, BAE missing for similar time and Kaboul missing whole season. If you count gallas and bae as one defender due to them being missing so much that has left us with 6 defenders and half of them havent played with the other half before. This is clear when you see us play add in a ageing keeper and a new keeper who is learning the league, it is clear why we havent looked like a team tbh.

 

[cjsimba]

The media not mentioning it is one thing as they all have their own agendas. What's annoying is when a Tottenham legend such as Hoddle fails to mention these issues when in a debate with a complete moron on live tv about the differences between Spurs 12/13 and Spurs 11/12. I mean come on, my mum barely knows what a football is but she knows that Spurs went into this season having lost more than one of their best players!

 

[only1waddle]

The bit i didn't understand was Hoddle saying AVB was given the money and bought the players, Souness then said quietly "is he buying the players though" to which Hoddle just ignored him, very odd..

 

[3Dnata]

It came across as two bitter ex managers not liking a young upstart and it's sad that Hoddle has stooped to this.

 

[Shadydan]

This is one of the most annoying things that people don't seem to pick up on, had to explain this very same thing to my work colleagues and they were still finding excuses to back their point up.

But there's nothing more infuriating than media 'experts' and pundits refusing to acknowledge the fact that AVB has actually done a good job at the very least and knowing full well that if Harry was still in the hot seat they'd be absolutely licking his arse and it would be the first thing they'd point out.

 

[Gbspurs]

Lets see what he does after this pre season and summer. We have a great core of young, talented players (Lloris, Kaboul, Verts, Sandro, Dembele, Bale) backed up by others that could join this group (Walker, Holtby, Lennon, Siggy). If we strengthen further we can push on further I think.

 

[Legend10]

Whatever happens in the last 2 games AVB as don an excellent job.

If he has failed then what ave Arsenal and Chelsea done to be fighting it out with us on the comparative wage bills!

 

[offside_ruel_fox]

I was screaming at Hoddle to mention the loss of Modric, VdV and King to shut Souness up! He had a smirk on his face at the end because he felt his point was right and given his links with Spurs Hoddle should have been able reel off those 3 huge players whose loss has weakened our squad. On top of this he could have also mentioned the long term injuries to Kaboul and Sandro.

 

[WiganSpur]

OP is absolutely spot on. Villas-Boas has brought a different mentality to us I think, a few years ago if we went a goal down we'd give up but now we really fight and try to grind out a result, even when the performance is far from our best. Give him the quality he needs in the summer adding to Kaboul and Sandro coming back and we'll be class next year, i'm sure of it. It's up to Levy to back him, he's shown what he can do for me. Give him the players and we will be successful. Don't let this opportunity slip whilst we have an intelligent manager Daniel.

 

[Graysonti]

Talkshite think a better squad his year. ???

 

[NEVILLEB]

AVB has been good. It's Levy who sold those players. He makes the transfer decisions.

 

[camaj]

Souness was a bit unfair but maybe he doesn't know the facts and Hoddle made a stab at pointing this out but not a fantastic one. Essentially Souness suggested that it was silly to sack Redknapp if we're no better off under AVB. While it's sort of true it's a bit disingenuous. Firstly we lost VDV, Modric and King and despite Hoddle conceding that AVB was at fault for replacements that weren't as good I think many fans would tell you that it's very hard to replace those players

The biggest thing Hoddle neglected to mention was our injury situation. We've had a terrible time with injuries this season which has not only meant we've missed those players but that we may have rushed players back sooner than we perhaps should have. Even so, it would have put a bigger strain on the fit players who can't have a break because there's no cover.

There's also the question of whether we're better off and Hoddle didn't really address that well either. While we might be worse off in terms of league position I would argue that we're far better off in other ways. I think we're better off in the long term, I think that finishing in the top 5, if not top 4 under the circumstances is more than I would have expected under Redknapp. I'm also confident that AVB will make good signings and make the most of those players.

I just hope that people are wise enough to see the difference between performing badly and performing well under difficult circumstances

 

[shaqTHFC]

I think we have the fifth best squad overall so technically coming fifth is what we should be doing, but with the way the season panned out and having had a seven point lead over Arsenal, I would be bitterly disappointing should we miss out on the top 4. However, this has been a transition season and AVB has still done a great job and if he's backed in the summer we could become a brilliant outfit next season provided Bale stays.

 

[Wirral Spurs]

Sorry but Hoddle might be a playing legend but his comments tonight were a disgrace. Completely agree with all of the above. Souness must be close to Jamie and so he has a very biased view of it all. Redknapp has acquired 36 points in his last 37 games of which 18 or so were managing us. Hoddle is completely ignorant of the facts, any (non-playing) respect I had for him is now gone.

 

[pablo73]

I'm so glad someone started a thread about this, I was raging at the TV screen! It's incredible how TV pundits like Souness can get paid so much yet be so ignorant of the actual situation. I also hoped QPR being humiliatingly relegated might have put to bed this myth about Redknapp being an amazing manager but apparently not

 

[spud]

I know that King, Modric, Rafa > Holtby, Dempsey, Siggy I just don't see why the issue gets mentioned on here a lot but never acknowledged on a wider scale by other fans and pundits.

"In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king"

Football punditry is superficial. We, the fans of a particular club, always know more about our club than the so-called 'experts' on TV. They have a limited knowledge of all of the clubs that they are paid to watch (and probabaly little interest in any of them) but rarely know anything in depth. Hence ignorant comments such as that by Souness which are repeated ad nauseum in the written and broadcast media. It's disappointing, but unsurprising.

 

[JAYSTAR]

AVB's done really well this season - not perfect, but pretty close considering. I just posted this on another thread:

"Pretty decent show tonight lads, considering half the team are at best squad players. Really helps to keep some perspective and realise that the best squad in the league didn't beat us tonight and somehow we scored twice against them. I can't stand them, but there's no point pretending they're not packed with quality.
We on the other hand were missing:

Sandro, Kaboul, Dembele, a fit Lennon... add to that, the fact that we need a midfield general rather than Holtby, who is also at best cover and we have to recognise AVB has done pretty well so far with what he had to work with."

 

[jonathanhotspur]

"I can't remember Tottenham having such a good group of players."

I've no time for Souness' punditry. Arsehole.