pochettino

positivenote

if its alright with admins to dedicate a thread to our new leader i propose to do so here...
lets start with a really interesting read on his style of play and what we might expect from him next season:
http://spursstatman.com/2014/05/29/mauricio-pochettino-the-definitive-tactical-and-statistical-introduction/

jiltloop

It's certainly going to be an interesting season. Last summer I was really excited with all the new signings but the season obviously turned out to be a huge disappointment.

Hopefully he can get Lamela going and Soldado scoring. I think we will need a left full and I don't think Dawson is going to fit into this high line defensive system.

I'd like to see Holtby playing in this kind of set up. I think it would really suit his intensity and energy and he's not lacking in desire to run around. It could really suit him.

I could certainly see Ade and at least one midfielder going in the summer but I hope we hang onto Vertonghen, Lloris and Erikson.

Dublin Spur

Mauricio Pochettino will be high maintenance at Tottenham
... but will Spurs finally break the sulky Argentine?

By Neil Ashton Published: 22:30, 28 May 2014 | Updated: 22:30, 28 May 2014

On May 13 2012, during a routine fixture between Espanyol and Sevilla on the final day of the Spanish season, Mauricio Pochettino’s journey into English football began.

Up in the stands, Southampton’s former chairman Nicola Cortese was on a scouting mission to watch Philippe Coutinho, who was on loan at Espanyol, with manager Nigel Adkins.

There was a touchline aura about Pochettino that convinced Cortese to make further enquiries about this Argentine coach.

When they spoke, soon after Pochettino was fired by Espanyol in November 2012, Cortese showed him a video presentation called ‘The Southampton Way’. In it he had borrowed ideas from Barcelona’s high-tempo pressing game. Cortese wanted his aspirational Saints, just promoted to the Barclays Premier League, to adopt the same tactics.

Pochettino, who is close friends with former Barcelona defender Carles Puyol, was sold on the idea. In time there may yet be a role for the Barcelona great at White Hart Lane.

Cortese’s departure — the pair have not spoken since the executive chairman left abruptly in January — created an excuse for Pochettino and his star players to agitate for moves elsewhere. Others want out now.

In April, Mino Raiola, the bellicose agent of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, touted Pochettino around France to Paris Saint-Germain, Monaco and Marseille.

The Southampton manager travelled to the Parc des Princes for the Champions League quarter-final first leg against Chelsea, ostensibly on a scouting mission. Everybody knew why he was really there. Had Laurent Blanc failed to win Ligue 1, the Qatari owners of European football’s emerging superpower would have replaced him at the end of the season with Pochettino. It was a mighty close call. He earned £2m a year at St Mary’s and will earn substantially more now he has a five-year contract as Tottenham’s latest manager.

Last week, when Spurs realised that their principal target Carlo Ancelotti would be staying at Real Madrid regardless of the result in the Champions League final, frantic phone calls began. The scales were delicately balanced between Frank de Boer and his four successive titles with Ajax and the credentials of up-and-coming Pochettino.

Spurs executives called pretty much anyone who had ever come into contact with Pochettino as part of their due diligence. Virtually all of them said the job had come too soon in the 42-year-old’s managerial career. But Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy pressed ahead.

Pochettino undoubtedly has special talents, particularly his relationship with young players. The expectation is that Tottenham’s £30million record signing Erik Lamela, injured for most of last season, will respond to his compatriot’s ideas. The Argentine’s training sessions are meticulously planned and he is usually stationed in the centre of the pitch making demands of his players — in perfect English.

Though Pochettino is credited with the recruitment and development of Southampton’s young stars, most of that was taken care of by Cortese and the club’s head of recruitment, Paul Mitchell.

The arrival of Dejan Lovren from Lyon last summer for £7m came after one of the most sophisticated analytical checks in club history. Lovren is now worth three times that fee.

The golden rule at Tottenham is to make sure you never humiliate the chairman Daniel Levy. Embarrass him by losing 6-0 at Manchester City or 5-0 at home to Liverpool or three times in a season to West Ham and your job will be on the line.

One of Mauricio Pochettino’s priorities is to shore up a defence that leaked 51 goals in the Premier League last season — 23 of them at White Hart Lane.

He must convince poor Hugo Lloris, probably the best keeper in the division last season, to stick it out for another season.

There is an issue in every area of Tottenham’s defence and Pochettino must decide whether to let Michael Dawson leave for Crystal Palace or keep him another year.

Fellow Argentinian Erik Lamela, who barely played a game under Andre Villas-Boas and Tim Sherwood because of an injury, must come good next season. The indications are that Lamela wants to prove himself.

Up front Pochettino must get Emmanuel Adebayor, a notoriously difficult character, onside. That will not be easy. Pochettino wants to bring in Adam Lallana, but the England forward still prefers a move to Liverpool to play Champions League football.

In the manager’s office at Southampton’s Marchwood training ground, industrial-sized boxes of mate, the caffeine-rich tea that is a staple in Atgentina, would be delivered to Pochettino and his staff, who drinks gallons of it.

Pochettino would often invite one of his favourite players, such as left back Luke Shaw, to shoot the breeze. Shaw, a young, impressionable player, gets on brilliantly with the man who has left St Mary’s. Adam Lallana and Lovren are in the same category.

But it has emerged that at Saints, there were two distinct categories of player, with the favoured few appearing to be given preferential treatment by the manager. There was evidence of this at Espanyol too, where one of his former players shone a light on the way Pochettino handled players at a club he left in November 2012.

‘He wanted to control everything,’ claimed former Espanyol midfielder Moises Hurtado. ‘The first season was fine. He’d been a player and he understood, but then things changed.

‘He seemed to see conspiracy where there was none, and some good people had to leave by the back door. He wanted everyone to dance to his tune, for people to be entirely committed to him. The atmosphere ended up not being so good. But in purely sporting terms there was no problem. He got great results and we played well.’

Those who have worked with him claim Pochettino, who played at the 2002 World Cup, is high maintenance. He sulks if results go against him and was spending less time on the training field towards the end of last season. By then, this ambitious man had decided to leave Saints. It’s Spurs, as ever, who have gambled on him.

positivenote

Dublin Spur wrote: »

Mauricio Pochettino will be high maintenance at Tottenham
... but will Spurs finally break the sulky Argentine?

By Neil Ashton

says it all... idiot hack who still bitter against the club

mickman

jiltloop wrote: »

Hopefully he can get Lamela going and Soldado scoring. I think we will need a
I'd like to see Holtby playing in this kind of set up. I think it would really suit his intensity and energy and he's not lacking in desire to run around. It could really suit him.
.

Thats all hotlby does, run around aimlessly- didnt exactly do well on loan

jiltloop

mickman wrote: »

Thats all hotlby does, run around aimlessly- didnt exactly do well on loan

I didn't see how he got on on loan but I liked the look of him when he was playing for us and I think he would fit in well with Pochettino's system.

DubPerryman

This is a bit of a humourous piece...

http://bankruptspurs.wordpress.com/2014/05/26/levy-and-learning-to-love-poch/


Though one interesting line taken from it...

During the 2013/14 Premier League season, the team with the highest average possession was Pochettino’s Southampton at 58.6%, and defensively only Man City conceded fewer shots per game (9.6) than them. What this suggests, aside from nothing, is a well drilled team both on and off the ball, and that kind of organisation would be a welcome change for a Spurs team that last season saw Andros Townsend coming on as a sub and then having to ask the coaching staff where he was supposed to be playing.

DubPerryman

Direct quotes from Victor Wanyama;

“I learnt a lot from him, he taught me more and that’s why I have grown as a player. He played a big role in my career development,” Wanyama told the Daily Mail.

“I wanted him to remain because he had the passion for the club and I think the owners should not have let him go because the team can do better next season. It’s a big blow because he had a good connection with the players.”

What really impresses me is that every article about Poch, whether by an outsider or a player, talks about how well he gets on with his players.

SuprSi

Ah jaysus...

Spurs executives called pretty much anyone who had ever come into contact with Pochettino as part of their due diligence. Virtually all of them said the job had come too soon in the 42-year-old’s managerial career. But Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy pressed ahead.

This looks like Levy's call. If he doesn't work who will take the blame?

Ormus

SuprSi wrote: »

Ah jaysus...



This looks like Levy's call. If he doesn't work who will take the blame?

Standard procedure is that if it goes wrong, Levy gets blamed and if it goes right, he got lucky.

Dublin Spur

Ormus wrote: »

Standard procedure is that if it goes wrong, Levy gets blamed .

basic accountalbility

Ormus

Dublin Spur wrote: »

basic accountalbility

Haha, you conveniently snipped the second half of the sentence.

DubPerryman

I was happy with the hiring of Pochettino, though I grow more confident that he will succeed with each article with arguments supported by stats...

http://cartilagefreecaptain.sbnation.com/2014/5/30/5762396/tottenham-hotspur-stats-mauricio-pochettino-statistical-profile?

Nigel Adkins had the club playing sub-.500 football. That's good enough to stay in the Premier League, but it's lower mid-table stuff. Within just a few weeks of Pochettino's taking over, the Saints were putting up the expected goals numbers of a borderline top four contender. If you want something that can clearly separate Pochettino from AVB, this is it. This is one of the best possible markers of a manager's quality, that he can take over a club and effect quick but lasting improvements in their quality.

While Adkins was manager, Southampton's opponents completed a roughly league average 80 percent of their passes. Pochettino took that number down to a league leading 71 percent.

2nd Row Donkey

These articles and many many more knocking about Facebook are all very positive but have to be taken with a pinch of salt... its ain't that long ago that every man and his dog was on the record blogging about AVB is a similar rune.

tippspur

positivenote wrote: »

says it all... idiot hack who still bitter against the club

If I had seen first that the article was written by Neil Ashton I wouldn't have read it.

Glebee

tippspur wrote: »

If I had seen first that the article was written by Neil Ashton I wouldn't have read it.

Whos Neil Ashton may I ask???

KingdomYid

Glebee wrote: »

Whos Neil Ashton may I ask???

He was the journalist who basically harassed AVB at press conferences until he finally got what he wanted and AVB got the sack.

Glebee

KingdomYid wrote: »

He was the journalist who basically harassed AVB at press conferences until he finally got what he wanted and AVB got the sack.

Cheers, excuse my ignorence:) I remember the chap now.

DubPerryman

2nd Row Donkey wrote: »

These articles and many many more knocking about Facebook are all very positive but have to be taken with a pinch of salt... its ain't that long ago that every man and his dog was on the record blogging about AVB is a similar rune.

After the season we just had I'm happy to cling to any positivity.

I honestly couldn't wait for the season to end from about April onwards. This change offers new hope. If we keep building that positivity I should be able to face a whole new season come August!

Glebee

Anybody else sort of starting to loof forward to the new season already. All full of hope and optimisum and then our hopes will be bitterly dashed once more....:P

I hope this time that Pochettino is given at least 2-3 years to try and build something, unless things go complete pear shaped (bottom of the table at Christmas) he has to be given a chance.

tom1ie

well if he plays with a high line and we don't get a replacement for dawson we are in trouble. I'm happy we've got him

2nd Row Donkey

tom1ie wrote: »

well if he plays with a high line and we don't get a replacement for dawson we are in trouble. I'm happy we've got him

Hopefully he's got more strings to his bow than just the high line. AVB was never flexible in that area. If we don't have the personal to play the high line then let's hope Pocchy can adapt appropriately.

Ormus

2nd Row Donkey wrote: »

Hopefully he's got more strings to his bow than just the high line. AVB was never flexible in that area. If we don't have the personal to play the high line then let's hope Pocchy can adapt appropriately.

Bit of pace in defence, team playing as a unit, that's all we need to be able to play the high line.

In Pocchy we trust.

DubPerryman

Good to see ex players coming out and saying he improved them. 'Hon Poch!!

http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/2896/premier-league/2014/06/08/4868576/-?

Everything went my way at Southampton and each manager that came in improved me massively and especially Mauricio. He taught me how to be a different kind of player and I think that’s helping now.

I never really got taught to be a striker in the first place and then I never got taught how to be a lone striker. He taught me how to be the lone striker and the thing that I was doing wrong most was the fact I thought I had to show for everyone on the pitch.

Whoever had the ball, I felt I had to run over and show for the ball, get on the ball. He was saying 'take your time' and 'wait until the right people have got on to the ball' like Adam Lallana and others further up the pitch. After that, I had an understanding of how to play that position a lot better.

same ol sh1te

In his interview, Mauricio confirmed that he has made Steffen Freund part of his first team coaching staff

http://m.tottenhamhotspur.com/news/mauricio-on-spurs-tv-110614/

Hatch99

his English ain't bad either

Hatch99

Any word on Chris Ramsey's future?

Hatch99

http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/27599165

I read an article about his time in Spain too, and both that one and the above both point out that if you were not one of his stars or top players, then you are not made feel part of the group to a certain extent, interesting.

DubPerryman

Hatch99 wrote: »

http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/27599165

I read an article about his time in Spain too, and both that one and the above both point out that if you were not one of his stars or top players, then you are not made feel part of the group to a certain extent, interesting.

It's best that all of the players play out of their skin and become one of his stars.... Right?

Eamo71

Hatch99 wrote: »

Any word on Chris Ramsey's future?

Daniel Levy intends to use him as a drugs mule to help finance the new stadium...

Sugarlumps

http://www.london24.com/sport/football/clubs/tottenham/spurs_defender_reveals_pochettino_phone_call_and_says_former_southampton_boss_is_a_great_appointment_1_3657485

At least the players seem excited to play under the new manager.