Dharmabum
Well-Known Member
- Aug 16, 2003
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It's a long article so I posted it before I read it 
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...-tottenham-to-european-glory-in-next-2-years?
Why Mauricio Pochettino Will Guide Tottenham to European Glory in Next 2 Years
By Thomas Cooper, Featured Columnist May 14, 2015
It has been a sad few months for those Tottenham Hotspursupporters witness to or in thrall of the tales of their club's glorious early-1960s period.
Dave Mackay, the skilful and relentless engine of that team, passed away in March. Earlier this month, Jimmy Greaves—Tottenham's all-time record goalscorer with 266 goals—suffered a severe stroke just a week before his induction to the north Londoners' Hall of Fame.
Both Mackay and Greaves were significant contributors to the European adventures that culminated in European Cup Winners' Cup glory 52 years ago on 15 May. The first UEFA tournament to be won by an English club, Greaves scored twice in a 5-1 defeat of Atletico Madrid. It was a victory that cemented Spurs' fondness for continental competition and the "Glory Glory Nights" played out on the floodlit White Hart Lane pitch for decades to come.
The prospect of the current Tottenham team targeting, let alone reaching, European glory in the next two years might seem fanciful, given head coach Mauricio Pochettino's limited excitement for the Europa League and another season without Champions League qualification.
However, the Argentinian's plans for the team are ambitious, and knowing how European success is so intrinsic to the kind of achievements to which he aspires, the following article details why Spurs are primed to deliver on that.
Where Tottenham Are at Right Now
Tottenham still have work to do to guarantee European football for 2015-16. Heading into Week 37's fixtures they sit in sixth place, only one and two points ahead of Southampton and Swansea Cityrespectively.
Staying put will see them return to the Europa League. Drop to seventh, and they will be reliant on Champions League-bound rivalsArsenal beating Aston Villa in the FA Cup final for that competition's qualification reward to become available.
Spurs' underwhelming finish to a previously promising campaign—one win in six ending lingering hopes of finishing in the top four—has seen their Premier League elite-bothering credentials come under question from a range of critics. Though valuing it as a learning experience, Pochettino has admitted his team has suffered for their inconsistency.
"This season we played very well in many, many games, but we’re not consistent, we didn’t keep our performance level up all season," he said in his pre-Hull City game press briefing, per Ham & High's Ben Pearce. "This is why we did not achieve the top four. I really believe that."
How much Spurs want to be in the Europa League next season has further convoluted matters. Pochettino has not been enthusiastic about it, saying prior to their recent defeat to Manchester City:
No I think that I prefer to play for the Champions League. But it's true that it's good too to play the Europa League for the club, but I repeat, my dream is to play in the Champions League. I think this is the best competition, with the Premier League. But if it's impossible to reach that, it's welcome to play in the Europa League.
The team has not played like they are desperate to return there, particularly in the 3-0 loss to Stoke City last time out.
Spurs' Europa League Apathy...
The idea certain competitions mean more than others is not new. In Martin Cloake and Adam Powley's The Glory Glory Nights: The Official Story of Tottenham Hotspur in Europe, then-Tottenham manager Bill Nicholson is quoted in 1972, shortly after Spurs won the UEFA Cup, contemplating the placement of European concerns ahead of domestic ones.
"Bill Nicholson looked forward with renewed confidence, telling Bernard Joy [journalist and former footballer] 'the side that wins the UEFA Cup very often goes on to take the League Championship, as Leeds and Arsenal did.' Nicholson even ventured that 'any club that feels confident...ought to withdraw from the FA Cup.'"
The disregarding of the FA Cup did not occur any time soon—indeed, it became a catalyst for Spurs' post-Nicholson revitalisation a decade later—but the idea Tottenham's most successful manager mooted 43 years ago has been taken on and adapted by some modern coaches in their treatment of the Europa League.
At Spurs, the excitement that greeted their return to the competition in its UEFA Cup guise in 2006 has been mangled since the turn of the decade.
Harry Redknapp cared little for it, viewing it as an unwelcome distraction to Spurs' attempts to get back in the Champions League. Although Andre Villas-Boas and Tim Sherwood took it more seriously, the mixed showings that accompanied their teams' run into the later rounds did not suggest the players were fully buying in.
Fan reaction has varied too. Those at White Hart Lane for Tottenham's 3-0 last-16 win over Inter Milan in March 2013 enjoyed a good performance. However, the atmosphere was muted in comparison to the night Spurs vanquished the Italian giants when they were defending the Champions League just over two years earlier.
Pochettino's own relative apathy to playing in the Europa League is in keeping with the maligned competition's reputation in some quarters in England, which was recently demonstrated by illustrator David Squires in the Guardian.
...And Why They Should Get Over It
The Independent's Simon Rice has a different, more measured interpretation of the Europa League than the cynical, unambitious opinion permeating through much of the English game.
"Despite the bad press Europe's second-tier competition suffers, a run to the latter stages of the competition can prove the highlight of the season (ask any Fulham fan) and with a Champions League place now on offer for the winners, there should be a real incentive to go the whole way."
The latter point is particularly pertinent to an aspirant club such as Tottenham. All four of this season's Europa League semi-finalists are also presently engaged in close-run contests for Champions League places in their respective leagues. Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk and Sevilla now have a chance to confirm it in the final.
Some would argue the semi-final losers', Napoli and Fiorentina, focus on the extra-curricular campaign has hurt their league work. But the prospect of winning a major trophy added excitement to seasons that might not necessarily have been any better without the long journeys abroad.
The Italian outfits can feel proud about having competed well and playing to win football matches rather than worrying about whether contesting them would affect them elsewhere.
It is impossible to know how Spurs would have done without the demands of the Europa League this season—they played an extra 10 games on the way to the last 32 in addition to domestic responsibilities added to by their run to the Capital One Cup final—as there is no defined formula.
Liverpool's Champions League qualification and title push last season was likely helped by predominantly being able to focus on the Premier League, yetManchester United had a similarly lighter schedule this season and have not had it easy getting in the top four. Spurs finished fourth in 2009-10 but, with domestic cup games still added in, played seven and six games more than either of the clubs just mentioned respectively.
No team knows what any season has in store, either from in their own house or elsewhere. Making accommodations for a packed schedule is understandable, notably squad rotation dependent on the opposition. But it is a disservice to one's professional pride to take any competition less seriously than another.
Translation
Developing Tottenham into a player in the Premier League is Pochettino's priority. He first made clear his ambition to one day take his team to the title within weeks of his arrival last summer, reported by Sky Sports.
More realistic in the next year or two is building a team capable of challenging the division's best for those much-prized Champions League places. Yet if they are to start doing that on a regular basis, they could also become the first Spurs side in over 30 years to triumph in Europe.
Spurs' recent performances certainly should not be discounted in the evaluation of Pochettino's first season. Nor should the coaching staff's thinking over the make-up of the squad for his second.
But given this current group's youthful nature and the challenges that come during a manager's first year in charge—again, use Liverpool and Manchester United with their current bosses, Brendan Rodgers and Louis van Gaal, for examples of that—the moments when they got it right in 2014-15 should not be forgotten, either.
Spurs at their best—notably from November through to February, with the highlights the derby defeats of Chelsea and Arsenal—have been resilient and uncompromising. Defensive lapses were less frequent and setbacks were not so much damaging as they were a call to arms.
Harry Kane and Christian Eriksen led an inventive and often inspired attack. There was energy in midfield and, in Hugo Lloris, an outstanding last line of defence.
When all those components and features came together, Tottenham hurt the Premier League's top teams. Finding the consistency Pochettino called for while refreshing the ideas that worked so well shows there is the makings of a team that can also cause problems for the best sides found in the Europa League.
Retiring goalkeeper Brad Friedel is certainly optimistic about the future of the group he is leaving behind.
The opening 35 minutes of Tottenham's Europa League last-32 first leg with Fiorentina was the team playing close to its best. They took the lead through Roberto Soldado, battering the Serie A club into a state of near-submission. Vincenzo Montella's men held on, though, sneaking a late first-half away goal through Jose Maria Basanta to change the complexion of the tie.
Spurs were successfully stifled by Fiorentina in the second half and then paid the price for a mistake-ridden performance at the Artemio Franchi, losing 3-1 on aggregate. The Italian side were good for their win, but it could have been a different story had Spurs squashed their more erratic tendencies.
That Spurs might have had the beating of one of the Europa League's best teams this season shows the fine margin between being knocked out and doing well in the competition's latter stages. La Viola went on to defeat a Champions League side in Roma and an impressiveDynamo Kiev outfit. Defeat to holders Sevilla in the semi-final was disappointing but no disgrace.
Sevilla's final opponents, Dnipro, were actually beaten by Spurs last season. Both clubs have undergone managerial changes and more besides. But again, it shows Pochettino does not have a group too far off challenging at this level.
"[It] Was my first season we needed to deal with the Europa League, I think we learned a lot," the Spurs boss said earlier this month. "I think that we need to use this experience for if [qualification] happens next season."
In the last decade, Spurs have had seven campaigns in the Europe's second-tier club competition and one in the Champions League. In the three of those in which they reached the quarter-final stage, the common denominator was a team of which the core had been in place prior to that year—albeit there had been a few more changes made to the 2012-13 team.
A similar situation awaits next season. With a kinder draw, a confident Spurs would have a good chance of progressing.
Spurs Need to Want It
To get to the point at which Tottenham can make good on their potential as a team in the competitive but not impassable environment of the Europa League, there will have to be a focusing of their mindset—a true appreciation of wanting to win every game and understanding of the prestige and rewards consecutive victories can bring.
If Pochettino gets closer to building the kind of team he wants, that comprehensive belief and desire to win will surely be a consequence. As regards Europe, it appears to be there in places already.
Players such as Kane and Andros Townsend somewhat made their name in continental competition in the last few years. Eriksen has spoken of its importance to him.
"I always want to play in Europe, to be seen on that stage or in the Premier League," the Dane said last month, per the Daily Express'James Cambridge. "It was a big chance and for me it was a nice thing when I came to Tottenham."
If it is there among his players, Pochettino will not be so shortsighted to deny the benefits of a deep run in the tournament.
To varying degrees, clubs such as Atletico Madrid and Basel have used Europa League success as a springboard to even greater achievements. Should it present itself in the right way, the opportunity for Pochettino to use it as a catalyst for his own team's progression has to be one he tries to take.
Not trying to win every match would not have gone down well with Mackay, who was a man well known and regarded for a competitive spirit that extended to every training-ground game and non-related activity in which he partook.
If Pochettino and Spurs start thinking that way, they might just replicate the kind of success Mackay, Greaves and their team-mates enjoyed. Predicting European glory within a couple of years for the current crop is a big call for sure. But if the Argentinian boss and the club's hierarchy get things right preparation-wise this summer, the talent is there for them to have a good go.
Quotes obtained firsthand unless otherwise stated.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...-tottenham-to-european-glory-in-next-2-years?
Why Mauricio Pochettino Will Guide Tottenham to European Glory in Next 2 Years
By Thomas Cooper, Featured Columnist May 14, 2015
It has been a sad few months for those Tottenham Hotspursupporters witness to or in thrall of the tales of their club's glorious early-1960s period.
Dave Mackay, the skilful and relentless engine of that team, passed away in March. Earlier this month, Jimmy Greaves—Tottenham's all-time record goalscorer with 266 goals—suffered a severe stroke just a week before his induction to the north Londoners' Hall of Fame.
Both Mackay and Greaves were significant contributors to the European adventures that culminated in European Cup Winners' Cup glory 52 years ago on 15 May. The first UEFA tournament to be won by an English club, Greaves scored twice in a 5-1 defeat of Atletico Madrid. It was a victory that cemented Spurs' fondness for continental competition and the "Glory Glory Nights" played out on the floodlit White Hart Lane pitch for decades to come.
The prospect of the current Tottenham team targeting, let alone reaching, European glory in the next two years might seem fanciful, given head coach Mauricio Pochettino's limited excitement for the Europa League and another season without Champions League qualification.
However, the Argentinian's plans for the team are ambitious, and knowing how European success is so intrinsic to the kind of achievements to which he aspires, the following article details why Spurs are primed to deliver on that.
Where Tottenham Are at Right Now
Tottenham still have work to do to guarantee European football for 2015-16. Heading into Week 37's fixtures they sit in sixth place, only one and two points ahead of Southampton and Swansea Cityrespectively.
Staying put will see them return to the Europa League. Drop to seventh, and they will be reliant on Champions League-bound rivalsArsenal beating Aston Villa in the FA Cup final for that competition's qualification reward to become available.
Spurs' underwhelming finish to a previously promising campaign—one win in six ending lingering hopes of finishing in the top four—has seen their Premier League elite-bothering credentials come under question from a range of critics. Though valuing it as a learning experience, Pochettino has admitted his team has suffered for their inconsistency.
"This season we played very well in many, many games, but we’re not consistent, we didn’t keep our performance level up all season," he said in his pre-Hull City game press briefing, per Ham & High's Ben Pearce. "This is why we did not achieve the top four. I really believe that."
How much Spurs want to be in the Europa League next season has further convoluted matters. Pochettino has not been enthusiastic about it, saying prior to their recent defeat to Manchester City:
No I think that I prefer to play for the Champions League. But it's true that it's good too to play the Europa League for the club, but I repeat, my dream is to play in the Champions League. I think this is the best competition, with the Premier League. But if it's impossible to reach that, it's welcome to play in the Europa League.
The team has not played like they are desperate to return there, particularly in the 3-0 loss to Stoke City last time out.
Spurs' Europa League Apathy...
The idea certain competitions mean more than others is not new. In Martin Cloake and Adam Powley's The Glory Glory Nights: The Official Story of Tottenham Hotspur in Europe, then-Tottenham manager Bill Nicholson is quoted in 1972, shortly after Spurs won the UEFA Cup, contemplating the placement of European concerns ahead of domestic ones.
"Bill Nicholson looked forward with renewed confidence, telling Bernard Joy [journalist and former footballer] 'the side that wins the UEFA Cup very often goes on to take the League Championship, as Leeds and Arsenal did.' Nicholson even ventured that 'any club that feels confident...ought to withdraw from the FA Cup.'"
The disregarding of the FA Cup did not occur any time soon—indeed, it became a catalyst for Spurs' post-Nicholson revitalisation a decade later—but the idea Tottenham's most successful manager mooted 43 years ago has been taken on and adapted by some modern coaches in their treatment of the Europa League.
At Spurs, the excitement that greeted their return to the competition in its UEFA Cup guise in 2006 has been mangled since the turn of the decade.
Harry Redknapp cared little for it, viewing it as an unwelcome distraction to Spurs' attempts to get back in the Champions League. Although Andre Villas-Boas and Tim Sherwood took it more seriously, the mixed showings that accompanied their teams' run into the later rounds did not suggest the players were fully buying in.
Fan reaction has varied too. Those at White Hart Lane for Tottenham's 3-0 last-16 win over Inter Milan in March 2013 enjoyed a good performance. However, the atmosphere was muted in comparison to the night Spurs vanquished the Italian giants when they were defending the Champions League just over two years earlier.
Pochettino's own relative apathy to playing in the Europa League is in keeping with the maligned competition's reputation in some quarters in England, which was recently demonstrated by illustrator David Squires in the Guardian.
...And Why They Should Get Over It
The Independent's Simon Rice has a different, more measured interpretation of the Europa League than the cynical, unambitious opinion permeating through much of the English game.
"Despite the bad press Europe's second-tier competition suffers, a run to the latter stages of the competition can prove the highlight of the season (ask any Fulham fan) and with a Champions League place now on offer for the winners, there should be a real incentive to go the whole way."
The latter point is particularly pertinent to an aspirant club such as Tottenham. All four of this season's Europa League semi-finalists are also presently engaged in close-run contests for Champions League places in their respective leagues. Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk and Sevilla now have a chance to confirm it in the final.
Some would argue the semi-final losers', Napoli and Fiorentina, focus on the extra-curricular campaign has hurt their league work. But the prospect of winning a major trophy added excitement to seasons that might not necessarily have been any better without the long journeys abroad.
The Italian outfits can feel proud about having competed well and playing to win football matches rather than worrying about whether contesting them would affect them elsewhere.
It is impossible to know how Spurs would have done without the demands of the Europa League this season—they played an extra 10 games on the way to the last 32 in addition to domestic responsibilities added to by their run to the Capital One Cup final—as there is no defined formula.
Liverpool's Champions League qualification and title push last season was likely helped by predominantly being able to focus on the Premier League, yetManchester United had a similarly lighter schedule this season and have not had it easy getting in the top four. Spurs finished fourth in 2009-10 but, with domestic cup games still added in, played seven and six games more than either of the clubs just mentioned respectively.
No team knows what any season has in store, either from in their own house or elsewhere. Making accommodations for a packed schedule is understandable, notably squad rotation dependent on the opposition. But it is a disservice to one's professional pride to take any competition less seriously than another.
Translation
Developing Tottenham into a player in the Premier League is Pochettino's priority. He first made clear his ambition to one day take his team to the title within weeks of his arrival last summer, reported by Sky Sports.
More realistic in the next year or two is building a team capable of challenging the division's best for those much-prized Champions League places. Yet if they are to start doing that on a regular basis, they could also become the first Spurs side in over 30 years to triumph in Europe.
Spurs' recent performances certainly should not be discounted in the evaluation of Pochettino's first season. Nor should the coaching staff's thinking over the make-up of the squad for his second.
But given this current group's youthful nature and the challenges that come during a manager's first year in charge—again, use Liverpool and Manchester United with their current bosses, Brendan Rodgers and Louis van Gaal, for examples of that—the moments when they got it right in 2014-15 should not be forgotten, either.
Spurs at their best—notably from November through to February, with the highlights the derby defeats of Chelsea and Arsenal—have been resilient and uncompromising. Defensive lapses were less frequent and setbacks were not so much damaging as they were a call to arms.
Harry Kane and Christian Eriksen led an inventive and often inspired attack. There was energy in midfield and, in Hugo Lloris, an outstanding last line of defence.
When all those components and features came together, Tottenham hurt the Premier League's top teams. Finding the consistency Pochettino called for while refreshing the ideas that worked so well shows there is the makings of a team that can also cause problems for the best sides found in the Europa League.
Retiring goalkeeper Brad Friedel is certainly optimistic about the future of the group he is leaving behind.
The opening 35 minutes of Tottenham's Europa League last-32 first leg with Fiorentina was the team playing close to its best. They took the lead through Roberto Soldado, battering the Serie A club into a state of near-submission. Vincenzo Montella's men held on, though, sneaking a late first-half away goal through Jose Maria Basanta to change the complexion of the tie.
Spurs were successfully stifled by Fiorentina in the second half and then paid the price for a mistake-ridden performance at the Artemio Franchi, losing 3-1 on aggregate. The Italian side were good for their win, but it could have been a different story had Spurs squashed their more erratic tendencies.
That Spurs might have had the beating of one of the Europa League's best teams this season shows the fine margin between being knocked out and doing well in the competition's latter stages. La Viola went on to defeat a Champions League side in Roma and an impressiveDynamo Kiev outfit. Defeat to holders Sevilla in the semi-final was disappointing but no disgrace.
Sevilla's final opponents, Dnipro, were actually beaten by Spurs last season. Both clubs have undergone managerial changes and more besides. But again, it shows Pochettino does not have a group too far off challenging at this level.
"[It] Was my first season we needed to deal with the Europa League, I think we learned a lot," the Spurs boss said earlier this month. "I think that we need to use this experience for if [qualification] happens next season."
In the last decade, Spurs have had seven campaigns in the Europe's second-tier club competition and one in the Champions League. In the three of those in which they reached the quarter-final stage, the common denominator was a team of which the core had been in place prior to that year—albeit there had been a few more changes made to the 2012-13 team.
A similar situation awaits next season. With a kinder draw, a confident Spurs would have a good chance of progressing.
Spurs Need to Want It
To get to the point at which Tottenham can make good on their potential as a team in the competitive but not impassable environment of the Europa League, there will have to be a focusing of their mindset—a true appreciation of wanting to win every game and understanding of the prestige and rewards consecutive victories can bring.
If Pochettino gets closer to building the kind of team he wants, that comprehensive belief and desire to win will surely be a consequence. As regards Europe, it appears to be there in places already.
Players such as Kane and Andros Townsend somewhat made their name in continental competition in the last few years. Eriksen has spoken of its importance to him.
"I always want to play in Europe, to be seen on that stage or in the Premier League," the Dane said last month, per the Daily Express'James Cambridge. "It was a big chance and for me it was a nice thing when I came to Tottenham."
If it is there among his players, Pochettino will not be so shortsighted to deny the benefits of a deep run in the tournament.
To varying degrees, clubs such as Atletico Madrid and Basel have used Europa League success as a springboard to even greater achievements. Should it present itself in the right way, the opportunity for Pochettino to use it as a catalyst for his own team's progression has to be one he tries to take.
Not trying to win every match would not have gone down well with Mackay, who was a man well known and regarded for a competitive spirit that extended to every training-ground game and non-related activity in which he partook.
If Pochettino and Spurs start thinking that way, they might just replicate the kind of success Mackay, Greaves and their team-mates enjoyed. Predicting European glory within a couple of years for the current crop is a big call for sure. But if the Argentinian boss and the club's hierarchy get things right preparation-wise this summer, the talent is there for them to have a good go.
Quotes obtained firsthand unless otherwise stated.
