re: Official Tottenham Hotspur 2020/21 Season Thread: Finished Ahead Of tScum

Helder Postiga TYFYS

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He scored 51 goals with Jota, Traore, & Jiminez as a front 3 in 2019-20. We are literally sacking Mourinho to replace him with a worse version. A defensive-minded coach that gave up 52 goals in 2020-21 season. 6 more than the coach we just fired. This is a cheap, lazy, comfortable hire. We should have just backed Jose with 2 CB's if this was gonna be the move.

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The dust has settled and we have a manager. I have some concerns over the style of play as mentioned earlier, but after learning a bit more about his last year at Wolves I'm not sure it's fair to judge the appointment just on that season. I've done a pretty deep dive into Nuno and have some pros and cons.

Pros

Man-management - It's hard to find a single instance of a player speaking poorly of him. He seems to build a tight-knit family everywhere he goes and establishes really solid relationships centered around hard work and respect. This is exactly what Spurs need coming out of the Mourinho era. There is a difference between expecting a lot from your players and throwing them under the bus every chance you get. Nuno seems to be the complete opposite to Mourinho in this category.

Fitness Levels - One consistent attribute of all his teams is fitness. This reminds me a lot of peak Poch. Spurs would often grow into games and dominate towards the end just from being in better shape. This squad has been seriously lacking in this department for years now (End of Poch run and through Mourinho)

Flexibility - Although he set up mostly in a back 3 at Wolves it sounds like he has experience setting up in different ways and is willing to adapt to his squad.

Player Development - His experience at Wolves required him to develop young players and a huge part of their success can be attributed to him gettting the most out of what he had to work with.

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Cons

Pressing Stats - A big part of the identity created under Poch was his high pressing. Wolves have been mid to bottom of the table in pressing statistics every year that Nuno has been in charge. I don't really see him changing that. Pressing is either the number 1 objective (Poch, Klopp, Pep, Tuchel, Potter) or not a big part of the identity. What concerns me most is that all of the teams that play a press-oriented system are also teams that have had long runs of success in the league. Inviting elite teams to have the ball in your defensive third for large parts of the game is miserable to watch and rarely gets results.

Style of Play - On top of the low pressing numbers the Wolves also were top 3 in the league last year in long balls. I'm not advocating for passing the ball around with no intent just to keep possession(I see you Arteta), but the high percentage of long balls also reminds me of the system under Mourinho .

Playing Favorites - I've read some stuff from Wolves fans that suggest Nuno sticks with a really small squad and often has favorites. This normally wouldn't be a problem, but I have PTSD from Mourinho so it concerns me a bit.


There is still a lot to unpack, but I'm going to back Nuno 100% and give him a chance to prove himself. He wasn't my first choice, but we have been crying for someone like Paratici to come in and take football responsibilities from Levy so we need to embrace them both and give them time to work. This squad needs a serious rebuild and Nuno has a history of going into clubs and turning things around. COYS