18 Months to Build a Legacy | AVB Never Stood a Chance
Ah the summer. Things were different back then. It feels like a long old stretch ago that Spurs were bulwarking the attempts of the Qatar Investment Authority to take their youthful upwardly-mobile coach to fancy Paris in the abroads. With AVB’s status in the game reinvigorated, how Daniel Levy must regret the opportunity he had to cash-in one of his prized assets and invest the money into something worthwhile like Alan Curbishley or Some Guy Off Twitter.
What ever you make of the board’s decision to terminate the services of Andre Villas-Boas, it can hardly come as a surprise to Tottenham fans or the football world at large. Harsh, almost certainly, but not unexpected. A callous boardroom that finds no issue in binning Big Martin Jol mid-game (or at least did nothing to stop the Dutchman finding out via text) wouldn’t think twice about doing so after an alarming string of results, rounded off neatly with the weekend’s 5 Star home shellacking to Liverpool.
The numbers will tell you that the Portuguese manager was top of pile with his win percentage at Spurs and not too far off course another record-breaking season at White Hart Lane. Sadly for AVB, it was those big numbers- followed by zeroes- that sent the chaps upstairs spiralling into panic/sacky mode. However unreasonable, 3-0, 6-0, 5-0 are the least likely set of results to sedate the nervous trigger finger of Daniel Levy. The shipwrecks of other Spurs managers’ careers will show you the way. Levy is a shrewd but impatient operator.
While the majority of clear-thinking Spurs fans were desperate for AVB to triumph, and, could see the long-term value in backing an ambitious young coach- in truth, the writing had been on the wall for some time. Not only had the body count of stale performances piled up, AVB was windmilling in self-defence of his methods, taking aim at the Daily Mail (hooray!), sections of the home support and pretty much anyone whom looked upon him suspiciously. Beleaguered and world-weary, Villas-Boas was losing the good fight. Modern Football had broken him.
Villas-Boas is a likeable character and a talented coach. For every parochial media grunt and ex-player with ‘Arry Redknapp’s trouser potatoes lodged in their gullet, if nothing else, he was a hero for the underdog. And, in an ideal and just universe, he’d have been given more time to turn things around at Spurs, particularly as upcoming games look pleasingly winnable. But this is not the way of things. Successful legacies are required to built as quickly as it takes to download a Bill Bryson e-book these days. Now we have to realign our faith towards one Timothy Sherwood, for the foreseeable future, and who knows after that. It’s a real shame.
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