Handed the chance to manage one of England’s biggest clubs following the sacking of Ange Postecoglou in June, Frank’s reign in charge of Tottenham got off to a brilliant start, with the north Londoners tasting victory in six of their opening 10 games in all competitions.
Rewarded for an excellent spell in charge of Brentford in which he turned the Bees from Championship promotion hopefuls to an established Premier League side, Frank initially looked tailor-made for the Spurs dugout, with his new side sitting third in the table at the start of November.
However, the early, warm connection Frank was able to build with the Tottenham faithful soon went cold following a torrid end to the same month which brought about a heavy 4-1 loss to Arsenal in the north London derby, and defeats against Paris Saint-Germain and Fulham.
Spurs looked to have arrested their slide with successive victories over Frank’s former side Brentford in the league and Slavia Prague in the Champions League at the start of December, with summer signings Xavi Simons and Mohamed Kudus both finding the net in the latter result.
But Tottenham have been unable to build on those wins, suffering back-to-back league defeats against Nottingham Forest and Liverpool, with Frank’s side also being reduced to nine men against Arne Slot’s champions, with both Simons and captain Cristian Romero receiving their marching orders.
However, despite the inconsistency which has also led to a nervy Spurs squad being regularly booed off the pitch by their concerned fanbase, manager Frank insists the club are on the right track under his tutelage.
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When asked if he is currently auditioning for more time in charge of Tottenham, the 52-year-old told Sky Sports: "Yeah, I think that's fair. I think it doesn't work if you say, 'Ah, the pros are, by the way, are so good. We have so many nice underlying performance indicators, but by the way, we lost 15 games in a row'. It doesn't work like that, so we need to win, and we need to win, hopefully, a lot of football matches.
"But what I like is that we haven't had two bad performances in a row. Maybe we lost two games in a row, but not two bad performances. I think it's a big difference.
"We performed terribly against Arsenal, which is very bad. But we put in a very good performance against PSG, for example. As an example, bad performance against Nottingham Forest, but a good performance against Liverpool. I know we lost it, but that's what you need to look at. And that's a good indicator of how we bounce back, how we work with the players and the team. And I think that's signs of something going in the right direction.”
Having also inherited a Spurs side which finished 17th in the league last season, despite ending their 17-year wait for a trophy with victory in the Europa League final in May, Frank believes he took over the reins when the club were in a “transition phase”.
Frank added: ”Honestly, I think we are in a transition phase, because yes, we are a Champions League club, but are we a Champions League club? We only qualified because we won the Europa League. We didn't qualify because we were one of the four or five best clubs in the Premier League last season. We finished 17th. And now we need to compete in the Champions League while we're competing in the Premier League, which is the most difficult thing.
"The last time we did that was three years ago, when we finished eighth. That's reality. Something happened with the squad over those three years. Then the year after, with no Europe, some of the key players offensively were (James) Maddison, (Dejan) Kulusevski, Sonny (Son Heung-Min), who are not here anymore [Son has left club, while Maddison and Kulusevski are long-term injury absentees]. So that's just some of the reality.
"And then we need to build that competitive team that can compete every third or fourth day. And that's just an ongoing working process, no matter if we like it or not, to speak about it. That's what we're working very hard on every single day. I think we are building some of the bits behind the scenes that are good. So, for example, I think there is a very good win in how the coaching staff, performance staff, medical staff, are working together.”