Three things happened in 2019 that set the course for the modern future of Tottenham Hotspur.
First, the opening of the new stadium on April 3. Then the defeat in the Champions League final to Liverpool on June 1. And, finally, the sacking of Mauricio Pochettino on November 19.
Over 2019, the club was transformed, striding into the new decade unrecognisable from how it started that year. This was the year that made the modern Tottenham and nothing that has happened to them since — no hiring, no sacking, not even selling Harry Kane — can remotely compare.
You can view any of those three events in isolation, but put them all together and they are three sides of the same triangle. Pochettino’s dismissal only makes sense because Tottenham had moved stadium and then lost the Champions League final just months before.
I am sure some readers will say: no, please, anything but this. Anything but yet another pensive reflection on the Pochettino era. Anything but another relitigating of the events of 2019, or the strategic choices made by the club at that time. Anything but another discussion of the summer 2019 transfer window, and whether Tanguy Ndombele and Giovani Lo Celso were the wrong players or the right players at the wrong time. Anything but this. Surely Spurs fans have suffered enough recently. The defeat to Ipswich Town was only nine days ago.
And yet despite all that, this fifth Pochiversary is still worth marking. Whether you want to think about it or not it is still real, the unavoidable shadow, the sound still ringing in your ear. It is something that has to be confronted and understood, even if that feels like staring directly into the sun.
How do we even begin to assess an event this big? The simplest way would be to look at what Tottenham have achieved in the five years since sacking their greatest manager of the modern era. And the answer, frankly, is not very much.
Pochettino speaking to the media in November 2019 (Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
Spurs’ best league finish in these last five years was fourth, in 2021-22, when Antonio Conte arrived in November and then supercharged the team up the table into the top four, but burnt them out in doing so. They came fifth last season, having faded at the end of the campaign. But they have never truly been consistent or competitive in the league. Certainly nothing to compare to their run under Pochettino himself (fifth, third, second, third, fourth).
Well, what about the cups? Spurs have at least reached one final in the last five years, in the Carabao Cup in 2021. You can be forgiven if you don’t remember it as clearly as you feel like you should. It was played in front of only a few thousand fans at Wembley, at the beginning of the end of pandemic restrictions. It also took place at the end of a week in which Tottenham had signed up for the European Super League, sacked Jose Mourinho, appointed Ryan Mason and then withdrawn from the European Super League. It almost felt like an after-event.
Beyond that? Spurs got to the semi-final in the League Cup under Conte in 2022. They have done absolutely nothing of note in the FA Cup for six years now. They did lose two semi-finals under Pochettino, to Chelsea in 2017 and Manchester United the year after. Both were painful defeats that have left a lingering sense of frustration. But at least they made it there.
And in Europe? Spurs have had two utterly forgettable Champions League campaigns since Pochettino was dismissed. The first one, which Pochettino himself started, ended with last-16 elimination to RB Leipzig in 2020, just before the pandemic. The second, under Conte, ended with him replacing Dejan Kulusevski with Davinson Sanchez, the moment that lost him the faith of the crowd. Spurs lost 1-0 to AC Milan in the last 16 without ever making any impression on the tie. It made you wonder what the whole point of being back in that competition even was.
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Put it all together and the total is not very much. Of course, the last five years have not been plain sailing off the pitch. The pandemic hit at the worst possible time, less than one year after the opening of the new stadium. It cost them an estimated £200million ($250m) in lost revenue before the stadium fully reopened in August 2021. While the pandemic impacted clubs at every level, it was especially painful for one who had just opened a new £1.2billion stadium and was relying on increased matchday revenues.
But this is more than just a bad-luck story. And November 19, 2019, was about more than just replacing one manager with another. The change was necessary and inevitable by that stage. The vibes at the club had been broken by the defeat to Liverpool. No one had returned from pre-season with any enthusiasm or motivation. The team had gone stale and the summer signings (including Ndombele and Lo Celso) had arrived too late to make a difference. The players were fed up and Pochettino had lost his energy. The milk had gone sour and there was little Daniel Levy could do to make it good again.
Some fans argue that Pochettino should have been backed and retained, but the moment to back him was the summer of 2017 or 2018. The whole Pochettino project effectively ended with Moussa Sissoko’s handball in Madrid. With hindsight, it would have made more sense to part ways that night, win or lose. Ending it six months later was a blessing for both parties.
Pochettino is now trying to steer the USMNT to World Cup success (Simon Barber/Getty Images)
Perhaps the mistake was not in sacking Pochettino, but in throwing out the logic of Pochettino. It was more than just a managerial change, it was a pivot in the organisation’s whole strategy. After five years of patience and organic building, Tottenham started to act differently. They had just opened the best modern stadium in world football. They had just reached the Champions League final. They saw themselves as a ‘superclub’ and wanted to act accordingly. How better to achieve those goals than to replace their manager with Jose Mourinho?
So much of what has happened at Tottenham in the last five years can be viewed through that prism. The Amazon documentary, the European Super League, the appointment of Fabio Paratici and then Conte — these are the moves of a club that wants to be among the biggest in Europe.
It has only been in the last 18 months that Tottenham seem to have remembered how they got to 2019 in the first place. The appointment of Ange Postecoglou in 2023 was an attempt to get back to some of the values of the Pochettino era. Appointing a manager for whom this job was the peak of their career, rather than a payday after their earlier achievements. Trying to play a style of football that the fans wanted to see. Generating the unity between players, fans and club that had been missing.
At points under Postecoglou, you can sense some of that energy and togetherness is returning, but there have been plenty of moments recently — not least Ipswich — when the team has failed, and it has felt as if all the angst and frustration of the last five years has risen to the surface. No one knows how the Postecoglou era will work out but it has no chance if the players, decision-makers and fans do not show patience.
The question is whether the last few years have left everyone too restless to try. Is there any way back onto the path they turned off five years ago?
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(Top photo: Pochettino in November 2019; by Justin Setterfield via Getty Images)
