Relegation in 1977; Christian Gross; Sol Campbell’s defection; Arsenal under Arsène Wenger; Spurs under Jacques Santini; the fading to London’s third force behind Chelsea; bad lasagne. So when Mauricio Pochettino invites his club’s fans to dream of a first league title in 55 years, he is asking for a major leap of faith.
No one expected a title charge from Spurs. No one expected second place, two points off a leader with no title pedigree and 12 games to play. The last time they were second at this stage, in 1985, Peter Shreeves’s team faced a formidable Everton side who ended up winning the old First Division by 13 points. There is no outstanding side in the Premier League this time.
This was supposed to be another season of careful building at a club who have turned a profit over the last four transfer windows. Perhaps a tilt at one of the domestic cups, a more reliable source of glory for the club since 1961, or even a run in the Europa League under their smart Euro-facing South American coach. The Uefa Cup victory in 1984 was, after all, Spurs’ small stake in the English European dominance of the late 1970s and early 1980s.
For Spurs, this season was about resolving their one-season homelessness in 2017-2018 while the new White Hart Lane – naming rights out to tender – rises to the north of the old stadium. It was about securing a Champions League place for only the second time. The denial of a place to Spurs at the end of the 2011-2012 season – because Chelsea’s improbable Munich triumph trumped their rivals’ fourth spot – was an outcome so utterly typical of Spurs’ chronic misfortune.
But a league title? For Spurs, finishing above Arsenal in the league for the first time since 1995 would have been the logical next step, a millstone that becomes harder to bear with every season they fail to cast it off. The way the title race is unfolding it could be that the north London rivalry turns out to be more than just a local dispute, and instead becomes the rivalry that decides the champions of England.
As for Pochettino, he can do no wrong. Sir Alex Ferguson is said to believe the Argentine is the best manager in the Premier League, although that does not change one crucial thing: Pochettino is still the manager of a club with a deep‑rooted culture of choking. So deep-rooted they turned it into a word: Spursy [adj.], to fail consistently to live up to expectations, a general flakiness. As Roy Keane famously recalled when he considered Ferguson’s pre-match speeches, the old United manager once saved his briefest and best team-talk for White Hart Lane. “Lads, it’s Tottenham” might once have been the most profound three-word truth in football. Not any longer, though, and Pochettino, unburdened by old insecurities, appears to see just another big club who need to be shaken awake.
Other clubs have emerged from decades of underachievement – like Atlético Madrid in 2014, or Inter Milan post-Calciopoli – and however long the bad times endure there is nothing like the day that they come to an end.
Spurs winning the title can feel as absurd as Leicester doing it. The latter are the classic sporting fairy tale, a team from nowhere with naively optimistic owners, no history of league title wins and no pretensions of glory. Spurs are different. Spurs have baggage. Spurs know they should be doing better and, for the past 20 years, Spurs have not even been the best team in north London, never mind the rest of the country.
Then there is Daniel Levy, the Spurs chairman whose player trading and managerial appointments have occasionally inspired and often bewildered. He is a secretive man who seems to yearn to be loved by the fans. Along with the club’s ultimate power, the billionaire-in-exile Joe Lewis, the plan always appeared to be to build the now-completed new training ground, then the stadium and then sell it off for a fortune.
Yet along the way, Levy has learnt from his many mistakes, and in 2014 poached a very good manager from Southampton just at the time the Premier League elite started faltering. Suddenly, Spurs are seriously competing for a title, or at least they are for the time being. Even second place would be their highest finish since 1963. The last 50 years have taught them to prepare for disappointment – after all, to quote Ferguson: Lads, it’s Tottenham. But not as we know it.
The 10 games that will decide Premier League title race
- Telegraph