Sunday Supplement: Spurs face short-term pain before feeling benefit of new stadium
"They're in that zone where every time Poch builds something, something else is going to become a problem," Jonathan Northcroft tells Sunday Supplement
Sunday 27 January 2019 14:35, UK
Tottenham are paying the price for their lack of investment in the squad and face a period of "short-term pain", according to the Sunday Supplement panel.
Recent defeats in the league to Wolves and Manchester United, followed by the Carabao Cup semi-final loss to Chelsea have led some to question how far Mauricio Pochettino can go with this current crop of players.
Despite challenging for the league title in recent years and reaching successive FA Cup semi-finals, they remain without a trophy, and Jonathan Northcroft of The Sunday Times believes Spurs are going to suffer before they feel the benefit of their new 62,062-seater stadium.
"You can see Pochettino is getting everything out of the players physically, mentally," he said. "The standards have been set consistently and probably only Manchester City over the last three years have been a better team than them in the Premier League.
"So you're looking at a team where the manager is wringing every last drop out of them and the chairman has been wringing every last drop financially as to what he can provide, to build a stadium and fund them in a transfer market.
"Then you look at the team and on the one hand you look at Harry Winks, a brilliant young player who has been great and is going to be an important player for Spurs, but then you look at Jan Vertonghen and Toby Alderweireld, who are probably starting to recede and one of them might leave in the summer.
"They're in that zone where every time Poch builds something, something else is going to become a problem. It's hard for Real Madrid to sign players, never mind Tottenham and that leaves Spurs trying to find genius bargains, but then other clubs are doing the same.
"All you can see is pain in the short term of getting in the new stadium, trying to get to a point financially where they can compete and then maybe in 10 years become one the truly big clubs.
"But by then Pochettino will be gone. This sounds gloomy but it's just come at the wrong time for them."
Andy Dunn, Chief Sports Writer for the Daily Mirror, believes the demands of playing at the highest level across a number of competitions are finally catching up with Spurs.
"In the summer Spurs did not strengthen and after the mad Christmas period, they then went into an intense cup semi-final, and now an FA Cup tie which will be a highly charged affair that they will want to win.
"Not long after that, they will be in the Champions League. To have a squad strong enough to be at your best during that run of fixtures is a massive ask. City can do it because of their squad. Spurs don't have that luxury, and once you throw in a couple of injuries you are really struggling to match the standards that you have shown.
"They haven't dipped really dramatically, nine times out of 10 they beat Manchester United in that game.
"They will go into the Dortmund game in February having played 21 games in the previous 12 weeks. Dortmund will have played 13 times. That is a huge advantage. The demands have caught up with Spurs."
