Tottenham Hotspur lost at West Ham today, their fifth defeat in their last six games. Since the beginning of the new year he has only added seven points out of 24 available, placing him solidly in the middle table and virtually guaranteeing that his only path to the Champions League next season is to win the Europa League.
After that, Spurs’ coach, José Mourinho, gave even more news for all the wrong reasons, blaming his players for the poor sequence of results and defending his training methods, even as Spurs slipped further down the table.
Here’s what he told the BBC shortly after the side game that caused such confusion.
“I feel that we are not in a position in relation to our potential. Even though I think for a long, long time that we have problems in the team that I cannot solve alone as a coach.
“Our potential is greater than where we are, so it is clear that there is frustration. We must be in a better position. “
It looks bad at first, right? It sure sounds like he’s not just throwing his team under the bus, but backing up a few times to make sure.
But hey – if you want to read those quotes generously, and for the sake of argument let’s do it, you can squint and nod your head to say that what Mourinho was trying to convey is that the team was not reaching its potential even with some staff shortcomings, but it also didn’t maximize the talent he does have at your disposal. He is said with art, but he is also not a native English speaker. So, perhaps in a strange way, he is taking some responsibility for the results under his leadership
But then, at the press conference in front of the assembled media, he said this when asked about his own methods:
What gives you so much faith [in your methods] at the moment, considering the sequence of results?
“Because sometimes the results are a consequence of various situations in football, and the methods of me and my technical team are unmatched worldwide.”
Lol doesn’t matter. This revolves around him throwing his players under the bus. Why should he take responsibility, when his players are clearly not good enough to do what he is asking?
Now, if we are going to continue to be generous with Mourinho and get here, then we are sure why not, he is not completely wrong. Tottenham have been plagued by individual mistakes in this series of bad times, mistakes that have had very disastrous results. He is also not entirely wrong in the sense that some of the players at his disposal may not be good enough for what he wants to accomplish with this Spurs team. This is not a totally crazy thing to think about, especially since the Spurs seem to be still recovering from the “painful reconstruction” that never occurred during the entire year without buying players. Tottenham is in desperate need of help, especially in defense! It is an area of concern, no doubt.
But speaking publicly to the media and saying it while defending the same tiresome tactics and methods that resulted in Mourinho’s resignation from his last three jobs is, at this point, only intentional ignorance and the height of arrogance. Throwing your players under the bus will do nothing to motivate those same players to magically change things in any way. And I am not the only one who thinks so.
This does nothing but try to serve your own image at the expense of the players. Putting yourself before the club.
Have a little respect for yourself, Spurs fans.
– NathanAClark (@NathanAClark) February 21, 2021
Furthermore, it is curious that some of the same players who are currently having contempt for their performances – Davinson Sanchez and Eric Dier are the bosses among them, but even Toby Alderweireld has not escaped criticism this season – were considered solid supporters on the rise. with Mauricio Pochettino. In fact, you can extrapolate and observe that the whole team looked less like an organized unit and more like a collection of individual players who are instructed to “go out and make the magic happen”. When that organization breaks down, it increases stress and pressure on the defense, and any mistakes made are magnified.
Good players rarely become bad players all of a sudden. It can happen, but it is unusual. Strange that it keeps happening to José in his last jobs, isn’t it? The changed variable in this case is Mourinho himself.
I got tired of shouting for José Mourinho. I wish I didn’t have to do that so often. People, for their part, will yell at me in the comments about this and possibly say that I am being unfair and prejudiced against a manager with whom, I admit, I never wanted to start. But anyone who thinks of situations like this – criticizing the players when the results don’t work, abdicating personal responsibility – is exclusive to this season, has not paid much attention to José Mourinho’s career. This same thing happened over and over.
When Mourinho was signed, he explicitly said that he was happy with the squad at his disposal, that he was an excellent group of players who, under his guidance, had the potential to win the Premier League. He was hired as the head manager who can maximize this talented group and get him where they can win things, right away. Fifteen months later, he is again fighting with the players, throwing his team under the bus and saying “hey, my methods are great, these idiots are performing poorly.” And if that’s true, then why did Mourinho take the job to start, and why are we paying this master strategist £ 15 million a year when we could have hired literally anyone else to start a new five-year project and rebuild the team under very different expectations?
Apparently, Mourinho will have until the end of the current campaign of the Premier League to save something that has turned into an absolute train disaster of a season. He has the Europa League and the Carabao Cup final in April as the best opportunities to win the gold medal. Maybe he can do it. Honestly, I legitimately hope he can and I will be hoping he does that. But he is not making it easy.