Thomas Frank | Tottenham Manager

Seems like a carbon copy of when Nuno was at Spurs. Think he had a similarly decent, if uninspiring, start before it all went to shit. Similar managerial histories too.
 
Things are definitely starting to get a little worrying for him. To be fair I think this is an incredibly mediocre Spurs team and he's had quite a few injuries to contend with.

Makes it annoying that we have struggled against them.

He needs a couple of wins either way.
 
It’s a constant source of comfort to me how Spurs continually spend a fortune and remain steadfastly mediocre. I am of course choosing to ignore the Europa League win for the purposes of my opinion.
 
A point away to Newcastle is no disaster seen in isolation, but he really needs a win soon. That being said, the player material is not great.
 
Not many referring to how managers like Frank & Slot can take over teams and have such an instant impact this season.
 
The results are one thing, the boring, negative football is another.
 
Posh Red said:
They’ve not been good at any point under him, really. They are bottom of the xG table along with wolves
Click to expand...

The Man. City win was a good one in fairness. Should've been the template but they just haven't been able to control properly any game since. And they've played Wolves at home.
 
Berbasbullet said:
I thought he was doing well? When did it all go to pot?
Click to expand...

The problem is their players are rubbish.

Defence is ok. Well the centrebacks are. Midfield is a load of nothing and then their forwards are arguably the worst in the league.

Not sure what they are expecting any manager to do. It was like this last season and they nearly got relegated. Frank at least for now, has them mid table, while juggling the CL, which they neither have the squad or first team to have any business being in.
 
noodlehair said:
The problem is their players are rubbish.

Defence is ok. Well the centrebacks are. Midfield is a load of nothing and then their forwards are arguably the worst in the league.

Not sure what they are expecting any manager to do. It was like this last season and they nearly got relegated. Frank at least for now, has them mid table, while juggling the CL, which they neither have the squad or first team to have any business being in.
Click to expand...

A lot of that squad did also finish 5th in 23/24 though. Udogie looked a brilliant LB that season but he's not really been that good since with many injuries.

They have missed Maddison and Kuluveski massively when you think Frank had Damsgaard playing well in that link role at Brentford.

All the attention on them missing out on Eze but I think Gibbs White would've given them that extra dynamism in midfield so him turning them down aswell has set the tone for their present struggles as Xavi Simons is currently not ready to lead the creativity of team trying to finish top 6 in prem.

He'd have probably started about five games at Chelsea if he'd signed for them instead.
 
FootballHQ said:
A lot of that squad did also finish 5th in 23/24 though. Udogie looked a brilliant LB that season but he's not really been that good since with many injuries.

They have missed Maddison and Kuluveski massively when you think Frank had Damsgaard playing well in that link role at Brentford.

All the attention on them missing out on Eze but I think Gibbs White would've given them that extra dynamism in midfield so him turning them down aswell has set the tone for their present struggles as Xavi Simons is currently not ready to lead the creativity of team trying to finish top 6 in prem.

He'd have probably started about five games at Chelsea if he'd signed for them instead.
Click to expand...

I think trying to go back two years and evaluate the squad based on that skews things though.

They started will under Ange partly because it took other PL teams a few months to work them out tactically, but also their top scorer was Son, who they've basically replaced with nothing. The only other player to get into double figures was Richarlison, who, I would suggest, it is stupid to rely on as your main attacking threat.

I don't think they're in the realms of a team that should be trying to finish top 6. Only their first choice CBs are at that level, and that's what's making it impossible for Frank because that's what he's being judged against.

They finished 17th last season, and the reason they finished 17th is because they were the 17th best team in the league.
 
noodlehair said:
The problem is their players are rubbish.

Defence is ok. Well the centrebacks are. Midfield is a load of nothing and then their forwards are arguably the worst in the league.

Not sure what they are expecting any manager to do. It was like this last season and they nearly got relegated. Frank at least for now, has them mid table, while juggling the CL, which they neither have the squad or first team to have any business being in.
Click to expand...

This, although I think Kudus is ok, but they are relying on him to beat a man and make something happen every game because the rest of them are just average. They also recruited far too many kids who are part of the main squad, Odobert, Tel, Bergvall, Gray, Udogie. Since Kane and Son have left the only player I thought 'ok that improves the starting 11' they have brought in is Kudus, maybe Palhinha, but he is just a more defensive version of Bentancur.

I will give Frank a pass for now as they are missing their whole frontline attack bar Kudus. The midfield is bang average, none of them can progress the ball, they are all pretty much the same player and as soon as anything goes into midfield it gets passed back to the CB's to push it out wide. Yeah Sarr has a great engine on him, ok sure, but they need some dynamism in their, Bentancur and Palhinha have probably got the worst progression from midfield in the league.

The main CB's are quality, Im surprised someone has not come in for them as they probably want out of the current train wreck that is Spurs.
 
He's been dealt a bad hand with injuries to all their best attacking players, but you would think he should've tried to change something in midfield at this point.
 
Underlying numbers are worse than their league position suggests. 3rd worst xG and 5th worst xGA in the league. Won 3 of their first 4, now they've won 2 in 10.

Frank was a pretty flexible manager at Brentford, so I do expect him to try different things in coming weeks. That might work. But it does look like he's struggling with the move to a bigger club, where he can't simply be reactive, and instead teams will try to stop him. Doubly so at home.

I think they'll get an uptick in performances once their attackers start to return, but given that they're overperforming their stats, they could easily improve their xG/xGA while sliding backwards in the league.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.