If Martin Jol Loves Tottenham So Much, Why Won’t He Stop Taking Shots At Them?

Guest written by ETP of TottenhamMassive.com

There seems to be this shared feeling sweeping around the internet at the moment, pervading the minds of spurs fans young and old. That Martin Jol, great manager and all-around-nice-guy, was “shafted” in the way he was treated by the board. That somehow, he was “owed” more.

Let this be the first and possibly last time I will ever defend Levy and the board. They owe him nothing. Tottenham Hotspur Football Club made Martin Jol an indecently rich man. They made him a household name. They put him in one of the top jobs in the country (even in light of our recent decline since our glorious heyday). Whatever the results of this season, they also cemented his reputation as a relatively decent head coach and ensured that he will remain employable even after the admittely poorly handled last two months before the axe fell.

Martin Jol claims to “love” Tottenham. So much so, that he claimed he would stand in the Paxton just like the rest of us if the sack came. So much so that, when it did come, he still claims he will be back as manager one day (”I’ll be back [at Spurs]. I still have that feeling that you never know in the future… I was thinking of Hitzfeld at Bayern”). See The Sunday Times, the Observer – in fact get hold of just about any newspaper. We get it. I love Martin Jol, Martin Jol loves me. So why can’t he see that what he is doing now – sniping at the board, going after Ramos, shamelessly giving interviews all over the place, claiming that he would tear down the Emirates if he had the money (”I’d make a big parking place from the Emirates and make a new stadium for Spurs”), revealing embarrassing things told to him in confidence by Damien Comolli (“I wanted Elano, Distin, Petrov – Damien didn’t”) and Dimitar Berbatov (”Berba came to me after the first two defeats this season and said: “Boss I want to achieve something. I’m not worse than Eto’o or Rooney or Tevez”) – is simply destabilising at best and borderline treacherous at worst?

Martin Jol will go down in Spurs history as a thoroughly likeable chap who gave us some of our best moments in the last 20 years of Tottenham supporting. Maybe he does feel it is time to tell his side of the story. But sooner or later, one hopes he realises that his current media onslaught, which he somewhat bizarrely claims is due to a gag being forced on his during his time on Spurs (”I’m the only one in the whole Premier League who never talked to a journalist”), is not characteristic of “love” – it is simply the deluded talk of a drunken, spurned lover. Under immense pressure, the soundbites became more and more vain, conceited (”nobody else got us 5th…”) and misguided (”…not even Mourinho could”) as his time at White Hart Lane ran out. Now they are running thick and fast, and flipped right around – portraying himself as being a victim (”I was so lonely”), a helpless cog in Levy’s master plan. If what he feels for us is still love, he should forget the craftily forged quotables, and concentrate on getting a new job – so that when the day should come when he rightly returns to the Lane with another team, he will get the welcome he so richly deserves – based on his achievements, not some Levy-baiting soundbite.

Good luck Martin, but I am sure I speak on behalf of many when I say – let the Juande Ramos era begin. Perhaps it is just as well our new man prefers to let somebody else do his talking, for now.