The View from the Lane: Our favourite Tottenham managers and memories of covering them

New York Times

14-02-2025

Tottenham host Manchester United on Sunday, a clash View from the Lane host Danny Kelly this week compared to 'two bald men fighting over the hotel hairdryer'.
So with the fixture offering little in terms of reward, and because it's Valentine's weekend, Danny, editor James Maw and Spurs beat reporters Jack Pitt-Brooke and Jay Harris took a trip down memory lane on the latest podcast to conjure up an episode titled 'Everything we love about Spurs'.
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In this particular section of the show, Danny, Jack and James identified their favourite managers from the annuls and shared some unique anecdotes from their dealings with the men who have sat in the Spurs dugout.
A partial transcript has been edited for clarity and length. The full episode is available on The View from the Lane feed on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Danny: Why don't we start with you, Jack. Who are the Spurs managers that you've loved, because this is the love edition of the show?
Jack: I probably won't surprise anyone here to say that my favourite Tottenham manager who I've covered is Mauricio Pochettino. That's because I spent a lot of time thinking, 'What does it take to manage Tottenham? What do you need to be able to do to manage Tottenham successfully?' What it comes down to is that in this job, you've got all these competing impulses. You've got the financial restrictions inherent in the ownership model of the club, but you've also got the history and the expectations of a certain type of football which the fans want you to play. You've got no real recent tradition of success to build upon and you've got to build that identity up for yourself.
You also have to compete with teams who are financed differently from Tottenham – teams that have more money – particularly for salaries. It's just difficult to know how to pull these things all together. Pochettino really is the one and only man who's managed to make any sense of it. He's the only man who's managed to ride all those different impulses at the same time. And frankly, he's the only one who was able to bring everyone together for any extended period of time. I know that, if I think back, there were certainly good times under Harry Redknapp, under Martin Jol a bit before my career and then briefly under Conte and Postecoglou. But, really, Pochettino had years of unity and I think that's the hardest thing for any Tottenham manager to create. And he did it.
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Danny: Obviously, Pochettino is the most important one. Keith Burkinshaw had a brilliant team at Spurs when I was a younger man. I liked a lot of what Harry Redknapp did even when he started to bring in loads of ex-Chelsea and ex-Arsenal players, and you're kind of biting your lip. I've got to be honest, I said something about him on national radio and he rang the station to complain about me. The only defence I had was it was true.
But I guess, on a personal level, a day I spent at the old training ground in Turkey Street in Enfield with Martin Jol stays in my memory. He'd just started at Spurs and they told me to come up and spend some time with him. He was amazingly affable, incredibly down to earth and funny. I remember the players had all left except for Robbie Keane, who was bashing ball after ball into a net — practice makes perfect and all that.
We were in a room looking at him doing this and Martin was clearly very agitated, and eventually he shouted, 'Robbie, that's enough, go home.' So Robbie Keane trooped off and I said, 'What?' He then took out a packet of cigarettes, in the days when you could smoke indoors, and took the deepest inhale of a cigarette I've ever seen. Then he said, 'I can't be smoking in front of the players, but I can't wait for the last one to go so I can get this going.'
It was also absolutely well known that one of the reasons Martin was so well-liked by the press and why you could get such great quotes from him, was because after games he would take people privately into a cupboard so he could smoke away from the public. You'd get the full length of the cigarette smoking for your quotes. But he was a really decent man and that's why I felt the way his time at Spurs ended – whatever the footballing arguments were – was a disgrace. An absolute disgrace to the club that a bloke should be treated like that where everybody is talking about it in the stands. 'Oh, he's being sacked', and he's down there on the touchline.
So I'd go for Pochettino as the best manager we've had in my time — but no trophies, yes I said it. But I'll go for Martin Jol as being the best laugh. What about you, James? Which of the Spurs managers have changed your life? Who do you love?
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James: Do you know what… I've never met a sitting Tottenham manager. Oh no, that's not true, sorry. I met AVB (Andre Villas-Boas) very briefly. That was a very narrow window while he was in charge. I was very drunk, quite embarrassing actually. The good people at Football Manager invited me to Ledley King's testimonial dinner. And I just got very drunk on Football Manager's dollar and bowled over to Andre Villas-Boas.
At the time I was a very big fan of his and a big advocate of AVB. I told him what a great job he was doing, as a professional journalist should. And honestly – this feels a bit topical – I was literally about two yards away from Daniel Levy. I could have said anything to him.
Danny: I'm thinking about poor old AVB toying with the last of the salmon en croute and suddenly a drunken James… the thought of you looming drunk over me, unintroduced is pretty frightening. I know you really well and I'm frightened when you come near me so I don't know what he must have thought (laughs).
James: I'm sure I said something like, 'You've got a good manager here', to Levy. That was my one shot to talk to Daniel Levy and that's what I said. 'You've got a good manager here', talking about Andre Villas-Boas…
Danny: Yeah. Fantastic…
James: That's why I'm sat in an office and Jack and Jay are out asking the questions, I guess.
You can listen to full episodes of The View from the Lane for free on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
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