first things first then. juande ramos has been sacked as spurs manager. at this stage, this is undoubtedly a good thing: jonathan woodgate's comments in the wake of yet another defeat, this time a comprehensive mauling by udinese, made it imperative. clearly the side was a mess, and whatever plan ramos had at the beginning of the season had fallen to pieces. in any case, the existence of any sort of plan is something that appeared doubtful once the season was underway: ramos chopped and changed, never allowing the side to settle, never allowing new players to properly acclimatise to the premiership, and most crucially never sending out a particularly complimentary or balanced line-up. the root of the problem was the mess in central midfield - without a proper defensive player consistently picked to anchor the side, the team was invariably inept at the back and imbalanced in attack, especially with modric, probably the most talented member of the squad, being played too deep. similarly heinous was his treatment of david bentley, who excelled on the right for blackburn yet found himself shuffled around match to match until he ended up on the bench and out of the england squad. to misuse one £16m player is probably unwise, but to misuse two is probably sackable. there is also the farcical ledley king saga to factor in, as the de jure captain is wheeled in and out for a game every 3 weeks, leaving jermaine jenas to lead the side in his absence. and say what you will about jermaine jenas, but one would presume even his biggest supporters wouldn't be suggesting him as captaincy material. because ramos refused to deliver a proper solution to the matter - the proper solution being to strip king of the captaincy and hand it to jonathan woodgate, the only senior player who is guaranteed a place in the side at this point - spurs have lacked any semblance of leadership on the pitch.
clearly, as the side lurched from defeat to defeat against a plethora of sides with inferior talent within their ranks (apart from chelsea, and potentially aston villa, that applies to every premier league outfit spurs have faced so far this season), the buck needed to stop with ramos. there can be no doubt, however, that he had been dealt a poor hand by damian comolli, who handled the berbatov departure poorly and failed to recruit a proper replacement or a true defensive midfielder of any quality. he has consistently misused the vast resources at his disposal - younes kaboul for £7m or kevin-prince boateng for £5m anyone? - and has generally proved a reasonably dismal judge of talent, which is a problem for a man whose job it is to judge talent. he too now finds himself quite rightly sacked.
what is likely to be said in some quarter tomorrow is that comolli and comolli alone should have been held accountable - from the departure of jol to the end of this season's summer transfer window, he has done an appalling job as sporting director of tottenham hotspur. this isn't in doubt, but spurs are rock bottom of the league and surely not even comolli's detractors would have the gall to proclaim that he has provided ramos with a championship-quality squad. regardless of the shenanigans behind the scenes, this spurs team has grossly underperformed on the pitch this season, and that can only be attributed to the manager.
so, unequivocally, i believe that sacking ramos was the right thing to do. some may quibble at the timing - it has come, in classic spurs fashion - a mere 16 hours before the club's next game, but one can only imagine that the implicit discontent emanating from various players in recent days turned into a full blown dressing room mutiny, undermining ramos and making the timing irrelevant.
what is more worrying, however, is the appointment of harry redknapp. simply put, there is no more overrated manager in the premiership than redknapp, a man whose ability to hypnotise public and media alike to ignore the stunning mediocrity of his record, including relegation with southampton and near-relegation with portsmouth that can both be placed squarely on his shoulders , is one of the most amazing things in english football. paul doyle summed up the case against harry better than i ever could at ten to one in the morning, and i agree: redknapp is nothing to be excited about. his achievements at portsmouth are negligible - the flukiest fa cup triumph in recent history is not being counted as a particular achievement here - and their football isn't particularly good, with a rather poor goalscoring record last season that served to illustrate the rather stodgy, narrow approach they generally seemed to take. and this season, pompey have been a defensive shambles (uh oh) only saved really by the efficacy of that defoe-crouch strikeforce against middling sides (double uh oh). which, if i need to make it any clearer, is an approach that doesn't really play to tottenham's current strengths.
let me be clear about this: i didn't think tottenham would get relegated this season, even after the stoke game, and i still don't now. the side is simply too good, and you got the sense that levy would bail out whoever was in charge with extra funds in january. nevertheless, be prepared for a rather radical scaling back of ambition for spurs - i don't think the combination of redknapp and the current playing staff would be anywhere near good enough to qualify for europe, even if they could wind the clock back 8 games. what is odd is that when martin jol departed, i was almost overjoyed; ramos was the last piece of the puzzle, a man who would sort out a rather ill-disciplined, unfit squad and marshal them perhaps into the top 4, a rarefied atmosphere jol was always going to struggle to reach. yet the 12 months in which juande ramos has been in charge have instead resulted in the end of all hope; the brief, wonderful time during which being a spurs fan wasn't such a problem, in which we achieved something of real value (and yes, regardless of what anyone may say, consecutive 5th place finishes in the premier league is indeed an achievement - one that i would genuinely place far above a spurious fa cup triumph), now seems as if it has definitively ended.
bugger.
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