Former Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp has laid the blame on the players after the club confirmed that Mauricio Pochettino had been sacked.
As noted in their official statement, the Argentine tactician’s exit was confirmed by chairman Daniel Levy, ending a five-year stint in charge for the 47-year-old.
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It comes despite guiding his side to the Champions League final last season, although results have been poor so far this year as they sit down in 14th place in the Premier League table after 12 games.
Domestic results were specifically mentioned in Levy’s statement, and so it appears as though Tottenham’s slide down the table has been a key factor behind the decision to make a change.
However, Redknapp mostly didn’t blame the manager himself and instead blasted the players for simply not performing well enough to save his job and keep him on the bench.
“When people talk about the players all loving him, if they love him that much, maybe they should have all started playing a bit better,” Redknapp said, as quoted by Sky Sports.
“They’ve got him the sack, at the end of the day. They haven’t performed well enough, that’s why he’s lost his job. If they all loved him so much, perhaps they should have done a bit better for him.
“That’s why you get the sack. They’ve had one Champions League final; if you look back at the run, everything went their way a little bit. They’ve not won a trophy in five or six years with an incredible set of players.
“People say they need a better squad; have a look at them, they have four international full-backs, internationals all over the place, England internationals, all kinds. And up front they’re not short either. They’re massively underachieving at the moment.”
Redknapp has arguably contradicted himself slightly though in those statements, as surely if Spurs have underachieved and continued to fall short of winning trophies, then that would arguably mean that Pochettino has failed too in getting the best out of this group and ensuring that they got their rewards.
Nevertheless, with some of the performances and results in mind so far this season, it’s fair to say that he has a point that the players simply haven’t been good enough either as defeats to Newcastle at home and Brighton away are simply not acceptable for a club looking to kick on to be more than a top-four side.
Pochettino has paid the price for that with his sacking, but Redknapp is clearly eager to ensure that the players are criticised too for their role in contributing to the decision being made by the hierarchy.
