With the fans beginning to turn on Thomas Frank, the new Tottenham Hotspur manager is attempting to save face. Publicly, he's denying that this is the case, vastly underestimating that only a small percentage of Spurs supporters are changing their minds about his ability to manage this football club.
At the same time, everything else he is saying points to a manager desperately trying to change his perception and save face, as opposed to, you know, actually managing the team better and winning some games. The lack of leadership emanating from Frank at the top is bleeding into the players, with supposed leaders like Guglielmo Vicario and Pedro Porro playing poorly, yet blaming teammates openly and not realizing why the fans are so unaccepting of their beyond putrid performances.
In his latest attempt to try and make himself look better, Frank didn't just hearken back to last season and throw Ange Postecoglou under the bus, he pretty much threw his current crop of attacking players to the wolves, too.
Thomas Frank is full of excuses
He said, via The Spurs Express, âWe are coming from a season where we finished 17th and did fantastically to win the Europa League. Now we want to compete in both places, which is natural and will take a bit of time without the normal front players, the four front players who scored the only goals.â
Yes, the injuries to Dominic Solanke, James Maddison, and Dejan Kulusevski 100 percent hurt. And so did losing Son Heung-min to MLS without a replacement on the left wing. Every Spurs supporter recognizes this. But Tottenham didn't leave Frank hung out to dry completely, and they honestly gave him more transfer support that much bigger managers like Antonio Conte and Jose Mourinho got in years passed.
Mohammed Kudus, Randal Kolo Muani, and Xavi Simons all joined Spurs this past summer transfer window and have been successful players in European football. Kudus was a top player for West Ham and has been excellent for Spurs this season. Simons was a superstar for PSV and RB Leipzig, yet Frank does not even try to get him involved and has gone as far as to bench him in the last three games.
And then Kolo Muani has come on really strong recently since becoming healthy, notching three goal contributions against parent club PSG. Last season, he was great for Juventus and before joining PSG, he was one of the top strikers in Europe at Eintracht Frankfurt.
These are three very talented players, and by saying that Frank has lost so much talent from last season and that's why his team stinks, he's throwing these guys under the bus by not even acknowledging the players he has gained. Head to head, Kolo Muani is better than Solanke, Kudus is better than Kulusevski, and Simons is better than Maddison.
Or, at least, they should be comparable. Frank couldn't get the most out of these three so far, and what makes anyone think he could do the same for the others? Frank is not being a real leader here, and he needs to take a long look at the man in the mirror before making flimsy excuses.