Mauricio Pochettino resigns and joins Tottenham

[King Binny]

Southampton FC ‏@SouthamptonFC 8m
#SaintsFC has today accepted the resignation of First Team Manager Mauricio Pochettino ahead of his appointment by @SpursOfficial.

Southampton FC ‏@SouthamptonFC 14s
STATEMENT: First Team Manager Mauricio Pochettino resigns and joins @SpursOfficial – http://sfcne.ws/ManagerStatement … #saintsfc

 

[King Binny]

[article=http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/news/article/27052014-statement-first-team-manager-resigns-1575779.aspx#uGFq9XF3B3GWwdYd.99]Southampton Football Club has today accepted the resignation of First Team Manager Mauricio Pochettino, and concluded negotiations with Tottenham Hotspur over his appointment as their new manager.

Assistant First Team Manager Jesús Pérez, First Team Coach Miguel D’Agostino and First Team Goalkeeping Coach Toni Jiménez have joined Pochettino in departing St Mary’s.

Chairman Ralph Krueger commented: “The Club has been on a constant path of growth since the arrival of Markus Liebherr in 2009. This growth took place before Mauricio came, it continued strongly under his leadership, and it will continue into the next season. The Board’s job is to find opportunity in this challenge and to continue to move the Club forward.

“We have begun the search for a new high-calibre manager. We will be looking for a manager that shares our values, our principles and our philosophy; a manager who can continue to grow the First Team and build on our strong foundation – a foundation led by an ambitious vision and plan that continues to build on our world-class academy, our amazing 129-year heritage and our excellent staff, and rewards our loyal and passionate fan base.”[/article]

 

[King Binny]

[article=http://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/news/mauricio-pochettino-appointed-new-head-coach-270514/]The Club is delighted to announce the appointment of Mauricio Pochettino as our new Head Coach on a five-year contract.

Mauricio joins us from Southampton where he guided them to their highest-ever Premier League finish of eighth place last season.

During his 18 months at St Mary's, Mauricio also oversaw the progress of home-grown stars such as Luke Shaw, Adam Lallana, James Ward-Prowse and Calum Chambers.

Mauricio built his coaching reputation in Spain with RCD Espanyol, winning admirers across Europe for his high pressing attacking brand of football as well as for prioritising the development of young players from the side's youth setup before his departure in November, 2012 after almost four years in charge.

Mauricio enjoyed a highly successful playing career, making his debut in 1988 with Argentinian side Newell's Old Boys at the age of 16 and winning the Argentine Primera División with them in 1991. Two spells at Espanyol followed from 1994, sandwiched between time with Paris Saint-Germain and Bordeaux. He won two Copa del Rey titles with Espanyol and also earned 20 international caps with Argentina.

Commenting on the appointment Chairman Daniel Levy said:
"In Mauricio I believe we have a Head Coach who, with his high energy, attacking football, will embrace the style of play we associate with our Club. He has a proven ability to develop each player as an individual, whilst building great team spirit and a winning mentality.

"We have a talented squad that Mauricio is excited to be coaching next season."

Speaking on his appointment, Mauricio Pochettino said:
"This is a Club with tremendous history and prestige and I am honoured to have been given this opportunity to be its Head Coach.

"There is an abundance of top-class talent at the Club and I am looking forward to starting work with the squad.

"Tottenham Hotspur has a huge following across the world and I have great admiration for the passion the fans show for this team. We are determined to give the supporters the kind of attacking football and success that we are all looking to achieve."

Mauricio is joined by Jesús Pérez (Assistant Head Coach), Miguel D'Agostino (First Team Coach) and Toni Jiménez (Goalkeeper Coach) with whom he previously worked at both Southampton and Espanyol.[/article]

Alex Dimond ‏@alexdimond now
Spurs give Mauricio Pochettino a five-year contract. The last manager to spend that long at the club was Keith Burkinshaw (1976-84).

 

[Red Astaire]

Annoyingly I think he will do very well for them.

 

[cloggypop]

Glad it is not Frank De Boer myself

 

[Hansern]

Annoyingly I think he will do very well for them.

I'm not sure about him yet tbh. Think it will depend on how long time they'll give him.

 

[Rosco]

Spurs will finish fifth next year

 

[HC]

I'm massively meh over this.

No manager succeeds at spurs. You either excel and get cherry picked or you flop (read: perform acceptably well and get binnedby levy, the massive swob)

Either way it's not an end destination and unless something drastic happens, it never will be for players (90% of the time) or coaches.

They are basically grooming managers on behalf of the Euro elite

 

[Gerry_A_Trick]

He's gone from being a manager to being a coach. We'll see how long he lasts with the demotion.

 

[Mystic]

I'm massively meh over this.

No manager succeeds at spurs. You either excel and get cherry picked or you flop (read: perform acceptably well and get binnedby levy, the massive swob)

Either way it's not an end destination and unless something drastic happens, it never will be for players (90% of the time) or coaches.

They are basically grooming managers on behalf of the Euro elite

Grooming? Have any of their managers ever gone on to better clubs??

 

[Mystic]

He's gone from being a manager to being a coach. We'll see how long he lasts with the demotion.

His job is a new middle ground, he's first team manager, what the heck is that?

 

[iseered]

I'm massively meh over this.

No manager succeeds at spurs. You either excel and get cherry picked or you flop (read: perform acceptably well and get binnedby levy, the massive swob)

Either way it's not an end destination and unless something drastic happens, it never will be for players (90% of the time) or coaches.

They are basically grooming managers on behalf of the Euro elite

Which one of Martin Jol, Juande Ramos, Harry Redknapp, Andre Villas Boas, and Tim Sherwood would you say Spurs groomed for the Euro elite?

 

[red_maradona]

Annoyingly I think he will do very well for them.

agree, thinks he could bring out the best in Lamela too.

 

[Leo]

Lallana and Shaw are off for sure now.
Not worried about Pochettino joining those cunts.
He didn't do anything special at Southampton.
He'll be lucky to see January.
He'll probably start well enough then fade away.

 

[Buddha]

Expectations are way too high at Spurs and he seems to have a style that overachieves with smaller clubs.

Another huge risk by Levy - and he won't give him enough time.

7th next season and he'll be gone by December '15.

 

[Judge Jules]

A Spurs fan said on TalkSport earlier that Levy basically wants a "yes" man who will keep his head down and be willing to work under a DOF.

That said, I thought Pochettino did well at Southampton and was building something worthwhile. This could go either way IMO.

 

[peterhague]

I could see this coming ages ago. Not sure why, just seemed like a natural fit.

I think it's a bit of a concern. Spurs are well run in almost every respect except actually appointing the right football people to coach the team and sign the players. For years bad or lacklustre appointments have held them back, so it's hard to say how far they could go in the right hands.

I rate Pochettino, though, I think he was great at Southampton. They surely need to get CL next season, though, because otherwise the gap could become nearly impossible to bridge, and that's a really tall order.

 

[barrymac20]

[article=http://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/news/mauricio-pochettino-appointed-new-head-coach-270514/]The Club is delighted to announce the appointment of Mauricio Pochettino as our new Head Coach on a five-year contract.

Mauricio joins us from Southampton where he guided them to their highest-ever Premier League finish of eighth place last season.

During his 18 months at St Mary's, Mauricio also oversaw the progress of home-grown stars such as Luke Shaw, Adam Lallana, James Ward-Prowse and Calum Chambers.

Mauricio built his coaching reputation in Spain with RCD Espanyol, winning admirers across Europe for his high pressing attacking brand of football as well as for prioritising the development of young players from the side's youth setup before his departure in November, 2012 after almost four years in charge.

Mauricio enjoyed a highly successful playing career, making his debut in 1988 with Argentinian side Newell's Old Boys at the age of 16 and winning the Argentine Primera División with them in 1991. Two spells at Espanyol followed from 1994, sandwiched between time with Paris Saint-Germain and Bordeaux. He won two Copa del Rey titles with Espanyol and also earned 20 international caps with Argentina.

Commenting on the appointment Chairman Daniel Levy said:
"In Mauricio I believe we have a Head Coach who, with his high energy, attacking football, will embrace the style of play we associate with our Club. He has a proven ability to develop each player as an individual, whilst building great team spirit and a winning mentality.

"We have a talented squad that Mauricio is excited to be coaching next season."

Speaking on his appointment, Mauricio Pochettino said:
"This is a Club with tremendous history and prestige and I am honoured to have been given this opportunity to be its Head Coach.

"There is an abundance of top-class talent at the Club and I am looking forward to starting work with the squad.

"Tottenham Hotspur has a huge following across the world and I have great admiration for the passion the fans show for this team. We are determined to give the supporters the kind of attacking football and success that we are all looking to achieve."

Mauricio is joined by Jesús Pérez (Assistant Head Coach), Miguel D'Agostino (First Team Coach) and Toni Jiménez (Goalkeeper Coach) with whom he previously worked at both Southampton and Espanyol.[/article]

Alex Dimond ‏@alexdimond now
Spurs give Mauricio Pochettino a five-year contract. The last manager to spend that long at the club was Keith Burkinshaw (1976-84).

Hahaha.....five year contract! Will Spurs never learn

 

[Mors]

I'm not convinced by him, but I think the southampton players liked him. He's a got a job on at spurs as they've got some right wankers.

 

[Squiggles]

Clearly done a decent job at Southampton, but had the nice mix or good, hungry players who were willing to learn coupled with low expectations. I'm not sure he'll have it as a good as that at Spurs, TBH.

Spurs invested so heavily last year that I reckon he'll be told to bring the best of what he's got, which is partly why they targeted him.

 

[Mystic]

Levy is the problem, if he sits back and takes the role of chairman and not that of wannabe director of football, then Spurs might get somewhere, until then they'll keep pissing away there chances. This has been obvious since a year before Harry went, but back then everyone was too busy jizzy off over Levy because he got an extra million here or there on transfer deals.

 

[Mystic]

Clearly done a decent job at Southampton, but had the nice mix or good, hungry players who were willing to learn coupled with low expectations. I'm not sure he'll have it as a good as that at Spurs, TBH.

They invested so heavily last year that I reckon he'll be told to bring the best of what he's got, which is partly why they targeted him.

Aren't Southampton big spenders themselves? Respectively that is.

 

[Shadey]

He won't see no where near that 5 year contract haha

 

[Squiggles]

Aren't Southampton big spenders themselves? Respectively that is.

Southampton spent, but he's left because the club will never be able to keep hold of it's best players when a big club comes calling.

Bit like Spurs really.

 

[keniget]

Annoyingly I think he will do very well for them.

Yeah, I think he did pretty well at Southampton all things considered. He's got a good football philosophy and at a more ambitious club could do pretty well.

Interesting.

 

[Mors]

I'm not sure how great a job he's done, he was there for nearly 2 seasons, inherited a squad, and they spent 40mill in 2 consecutive windows. From that he got a 14th and an 8th. I'm not sure what is to be expected spending that amount of money, and inheriting most of their best players (I think Adkins brought in Rodriquez and Clyne?)

 

[Dreambeliever]

I think he will be an instant success, they have some really talented players and now has a coach who can bring a winning style to the team.
I expect them to be close to top 4 next season

 

[Ryan]

Lallana and Shaw are off for sure now.
Not worried about Pochettino joining those cunts.
He didn't do anything special at Southampton.
He'll be lucky to see January.
He'll probably start well enough then fade away.

He got them to 8th in the league, their highest ever top flight position. He also got them doing that by playing a style of football not before seen for them.

Regardless of your thoughts on the second point, the first one is in fact "something special".

 

[Ryan]

I think he will be an instant success, they have some really talented players and now has a coach who can bring a winning style to the team.
I expect them to be close to top 4 next season

They finished 6th this season, and your "instant success" and "coach with a winning style", aligned with their "talented players" will get them to finish 1 position higher. What a feat.

You never cease to amuse Dreamy.

 

[hamstrung_pigeon]

I'm not sure how great a job he's done, he was there for nearly 2 seasons, inherited a squad, and they spent 40mill in 2 consecutive windows. From that he got a 14th and an 8th. I'm not sure what is to be expected spending that amount of money, and inheriting most of their best players (I think Adkins brought in Rodriquez and Clyne?)

Southampton finished 2012/2013 with 41 points and a -11 GD. They finished 2013/2014 with 56 and a +8 GD. That's a swing of 15 points and 19 goals in a season. The argument about whether it was his team or not is one I've seen used to argue both ways, so I'm not sure about that.

But on whether finishing 8th after spending 40m was worth it:

This is a team that just came from the Championship in 2012/2013 after having been out of the top division for a fair bit of time - 40m is probably needed just to have a squad capable of (comfortably) maintaining a place in the league.

This is a chart I took from transfermarkt, looking at the total purchase values of the players in the current squads of Premier League clubs in the 2013/2014 season. Ignore the cost per win value, but just look at the colour codes I've put in. This should give some perspective on what 40m has bought them.

All the clubs that finished above them, with the exception of Everton, have spent at least 3x more than them. All the clubs that spent less than them were fighting relegation for a fair bit of time or all the time. Some clubs that spent about equal or a fair wedge more than them finished below them. Sunderland is wrongly colour-coded, they should be orange having spent 20m more than them - and look where they landed.

Now, whether Pochetinno did it with half a team he inherited is besides the issue - Adkins built half that team and had Southampton picking up 1 point per game on average in the Premier League - that's 38 points for a season and too close to relegation for comfort. Pochetinno had them picking up 1.38 points per game over his Southampton career, which is 52 points over a season, and about 8th place.

Was it Pochetinno doing a great job, Adkins doing a bad one, or was Southampton's finish just a natural result of the amount they've spent? Well, if it was just all (or mostly) about money, then Southampton should've finished about 10th to 12th. I think we can somewhat suggest that the value of the players they bought + a better managerial job put them where they are. We would probably be in a better position to judge if he had a longer tenure at Southampton, but I think their style of play on the pitch and where they finished this season might suggest Pochetinno has a more than modest ability.

Should we expect him to go to Spurs now and finish top 4? Just based on the spending on the squad alone, you'd expect them to at least be in the mix for places from 4th to 6th IMO.