Manchester United, Tottenham
Tottenham Hotspur: what is going on?
The controversial sale of Dimitar Berbatov leaves Tottenham weak and the club's top four ambitions will have to be put on hold, says Bryan Sanchez.
Fan’s view: Tottenham Hostpur
There is something that lurks the halls of White Hart Lane that is denting my confidence in my beloved club. The story of the summer was all about where Dimitar Berbatov would go come transfer deadline day. I, along with almost every Tottenham fan, knew the Bulgarian striker would be leaving the club with Manchester United being the most likely destination. At first everything seemed civil. Tottenham had a price tag, Manchester United had a plan.
Headlines of Cristiano Ronaldo wanting to leave Old Trafford for the white lights of the Bernabeu were ever-present on the back pages of all national newspapers during the Euro 2008 tournament. The ever-increasing persistence of Real Madrid president Ramon Calderon was unsettling Manchester United to the point where a public outburst between the two clubs escalated when the Red Devils reported Real to Fifa, sparking those remarkable comments, Ronaldo stating that he felt like a ‘modern slave’. His situation makes me wish I was a ‘modern slave’.
The Berbatov story is somehow similar and typically hypocritical of Man United. They have persisted with Berbatov all summer long and at the beginning all was well. Alex Ferguson never directly named Berbatov referring to him as ‘a striker we are interested in’, and Berbatov never actually said he was leaving. He constantly said he was focused on the job at hand at Spurs.
The deadline was getting closer and Daniel Levy’s stance on a £30m price tag and United’s failure to meet that prompted a slanging match where Ferguson called Levy ‘different’ and Berbatov was caught signing a United shirt just as the season had started.
An eleventh hour bid of ‘in excess of £30m’ by Manchester City was accepted by Tottenham and it seemed he may be signing for the Blue instead of the Red side of Manchester. By watching the pictures being aired on television you would have thought that Berbatov was kidnapped by United as it was reported all day that they did not have permission to speak to the Bulgarian even though he was having a medical and talks with United officials. Finally Berbatov was signed for in the region of £30.25m with promising young English striker Frazier Campbell moving to the Lane on a year-long loan period.
Once Tottenham sold Berbatov the decision to complain against United for ‘tapping up’ was dropped and in the end the whole saga doesn’t put Daniel Levy and Tottenham in a good light, the words ’egg on their face’ comes to mind. It seems Spurs’ recent dealings not only with how transfers are handled but also their ‘tapping up’ of Juande Ramos and disposal of Martin Jol last season has started to make them sound hypocritical and is tainting their once holy reputation. Damien Comolli has been the heart of all these dealings and his position is in jeopardy if Ramos or any signings do not perform as expected (we are still waiting to see what Darren Bent can really do). A top four finish is expected but can they genuinely contemplate that when things haven’t really changed?
Last season Spurs had probably the best strike-force in the league with one of the worst defences. Now the strike-force is non-existent (Pavlyuchenko and Campbell aren’t proven in the Premier League) and the defence hasn’t drastically improved (Vedran Corluka alone isn’t enough). Reports earlier in the summer hinted that the Spurs board may be willing to sell up, which is typical of the state of football today. Investors can pick up a club like toy and throw them away and I’m disappointed that this may happen to Spurs next summer. Although I do wish that Spurs had the Abu Dhabi United Group on their side…
Tags: Damien Comolli, Daniel Levy, Dimitar Berbatov, Manchester City, Manchester United, Tottenham Blog, Tottenham Hotspur
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Adu Dhabi? What a joke. Good article up until that point. Would you seriously want Spurs to become a billionaires plaything?
ADUG cannot seriously have any desire to recoup their investment if any of the names in the press are to be believed, £135m for ronaldo? Let alone the wage bill.
That is no way to run a club, it is not sustainable. As soon as they have had enough Man City will turn into Leeds united before you know it.
The Spurs board may have shown a lack of ambition but at least they balance their books and provide a sound base for the club to run on.
Abu Dhabi United? Be careful what you wish for my friend.
Massively overhyped. And people are worrying about nothing, if we’d really wanted to keep Berba and Keane we would have. We’ve made some great signings in the window and we are overall stronger i think. All 5 of our regular midfielders can and will score goals. Pavlyuchenko scores goals for fun. We’ll see but i truly do think Ramos has got it right. In the banking department and on the pitch. Just give him time. Give it til February and you’ll be wondering what the big deal was.
I can’t believe that so many Spurs fans are ready to whore the club out to the highest bidder.
Be careful what you wish for guys… you might get what you want and end up like an NFL franchise.
I cannot believe we got rid of 60 million pounds worth of strikers and only spent 12 million and to top matters we are going to help our good friends M UTD by giving their young inexperienced striker premiership experience for a year and then send him back.Still should not moan could have that class striker emille heskey in our squad.
I am getting fed up with all the whingeing over that bulgarian. He is gone and not wanted. He did not contribute after the cup final. We will be better off without him, moody git. If I played with him he would have got a swift kick up the xxx. Oh how I wish Billy Nick or Dave Mackay was still here We have a far stronger squad with the additions we have. We have cover at full back and centre half. Plenty of midfield, three strikers all who want to play for THFC. Give them a break and see what happens after ten games.
I watched the 1991 FA Cup final with mixed emotions. Superstar 1 (Gazza) got carried off before he was sent off and Superstar 2 (Linker) missed a penalty. How did we win? Good solid teamwork. We may have just lost 2 established Superstars but I believe the signings we have made will produce a proper team ethic so stop being so “my glass is half empty”.
You know what? Both keane and Berbatov were fantastic when it suited, let Utd & Liverpool deal with the dressing room sulking, might do Spurs a favour!!
To me, we were stupid for not getting Arshavin, he would have been perfect to play with Pav and he would have lit the premier league similar to what Robinho will do. But I also think i’d prefer to be league one strugglers than be Man City. Lets face it, Spurs have improved their team and gained 8 million, whereas even if City win the title next year, how much pleasure can they take from it when they spend a billion pounds or whatever, its daft. Tottenham Hotspur is a project. In 3 years time we will be gunning for it, we’ve bought 8 players, its not going to happen overnight
We haven’t ‘whored’ our club out to the highest bidder you fool. Keane wanted to go, so did Berbatov and his attitude stunk. Ramos is a good manager and wants his own players to play his style of football. £50million for two 28 year old striker…I’d say that’s good business. If people are prepared to pay ridiculous money, who are we to stop them. Pavluchenko and Bent are exceptional strikers and will prove their worth this season. It takes a good team to make a £7million profit at the end of the transfer window and have purchased players such as Bentley, Gomes, Modric, Pavluchenko, Corluka…
Perhaps you should be complaining about the likes of M.Utd and Liverpool who bully their way into getting whoever they want iwhtout any repercussions from the FA. Or perhaps the likes of M.Utd who use ‘borrowed’ money to ensure they get whoever they want. In Italy this sort of thing is banned - why should ‘any’ club be allowed to do this in the Premiership?
Manu always get what they want.The premiership is finito
BUGGER WHATS GOING ON ” SPURS MUST BE SOLD TO THAT ZILLION ZILLION BILLIONAIRE ” WHO CAN TAKE SPURS FORWARD OR TO THE NEXT LEVEL IF YOU LIKE BUT ONE THING IS FOR SURE ENIC CAN`T COMPETE WITH THE BIG BOYS , THE TRUTH BEING LEVY LEWIS AND ENIC ARE HOLDING SPURS BACK FROM PROGRESSING WE MUST BE SOLD NOW !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I hate to have to say it, but without the billions i very much doubt that we will ever break into the top 4 let alone the top 5 now that mancity have the the financial backing. I think in the end all this money will kill the game. It has already started. I believe Keegan left for several reasons. One of them being because he knew it was near impossible to be able to get into the top 4 and now with city’s luck top 5 was out of reach. What was the point of carrying on??
I think if fans boycotted games then FIFA/UEFA could end all this nonsense, and Berbatov might have stayed. English football might end up in a real mess, beginning to feel my interest in the premiership start to seriously go off.
If you love the game, then don’t subscribe to sky!! If you subscribe you are MAD!! I have never paid sky a penny, don’t watch chpl has no interest for me, maybe IF SPURS ever got there that would change, but i still would not pay them!!