Breaking my heart again

So it's true! Mauricio Pochettino has resigned from being Saints manager to be the new manager at Spurs and taken all the coaching team with him. (The fate of the translator/interpreter is less clear!!)

And with that news all the hope and dreams that our club might be really really on the edge of greatness evaporates, All we need now is for Adam Lallana, Luke Shaw and a couple of other key players to leave and all the good work of the 5 years may be for nought. Tonight feels pretty bleak.

What really annoys me is that he's gone to Spurs. They finished 6th in the Premier league only two places above Saints (albeit by 13 points). But if we are to progress above the best finish we've ever had, then you don't let your manager go to one of the teams stopping you get higher? We are now in that "second tier" of the league below the Champions league places but battling for Europa league spots and Spurs are also in the tier.

Now they have ambitions of a top four finish, indeed MP's stay at Spurs will depend on his achieving that. Is he mad?? The season just finished was the chance Spurs had to break into the top four but they blew it and big time. As three of the top four clubs from the previous season changed managers then there was a real chance that a gap might appear, as it did by United faltering, but that space was taken by the newly reinvigorated  Liverpool.

So next season the existing top four will only get stronger (Chelsea and City have unlimited funds, Liverpool have European income to spend and Arsenal always have a healthy bank balance).  United have a new manager who will sort them out and they will be real contenders again. Add to that Everton who if they add to their squad sensibly will continue to be an outside bet for a top four finish and you have 6 teams already well ahead of Spurs for a top 4 finish.

That's a tough job for a team with a settled squad which needs a couple more quality players to mount a challenge (like Everton) but Spurs are a long long way from that position. They only scored 55 goals and they let in 51. That's a lot less scored than the top 5 and more conceded than the top 5 too. (To be fair Liverpool only let in one less goal but as they scored 101 so that didn't matter!!)  So both the defence and the attack need major surgery. Spurs sold Gareth Bale last summer and they then spent c£90m on new players so they have a full squad already, which needs to be trimmed to then grow (or they could  fall foul of the Financial fair play rules). So that's not a quick fix, that's a long transition. Spurs seem to have understood that as they have given MP a five year deal, but and it's a big but they don't have a track record of giving any of the last 10 managers long enough to deliver that golden chalice of a Champions league place. (It's not helped by Arsenal doing it year after year, but they have stuck with their manager!!!) MP will have some time develop his team but if Spurs are not in the top 6 at Christmas then the clock will be ticking and it will get louder and louder if they remain no better than they are now.

All of which will be a crying shame as MP is a good bloke who has developed a team at St Mary's into probably the best team we have ever had and with a couple of good signings could have been on the edge of true greatness.

Maybe he should have read Glen Hoddle's CV before jumping across to Spurs??