Losing to Manchester United 3-0 at home and failing to register a single shot on target has seemingly pushed Nuno Espirito Santo over the edge at Tottenham Hotspur.
Spurs have had a painfully slow start to the season – very much like United, but we’ve always had greater expectations than the north London club.
Reliable hack Matt Law of The Telegraph claims Nuno “could be sacked” after the 3-0 defeat “promoted talks within Spurs over Nuno’s future.”
Daniel Levy would be choosing to jump the gun on this one but who would blame him after seeing how the fans responded at the stadium yesterday?
There were boos from the home section and many Tottenham fans left the ground early as goals from Cristiano Ronaldo, Edinson Cavani and Marcus Rashford ensured that United would take three points to respond to last week’s 5-0 humiliation against arch-rivals Liverpool.
Nuno’s choice of substitutions drew ire from the crowd, with the alarming withdrawal of Spurs’ most threatening player Lucas Moura for Steven Bergwijn, who offered next to nothing when he came on.
The fans were right to be angry with the change but to turn on their manager just 17 games in feels odd, especially when we know as United fans that recovering from the mess Jose Mourinho leaves behind takes time.
They knew that the Portuguese coach was defensive minded, like Jose Mourinho, from his years at Wolves where he had time and backing to build a brilliant side.
However, the football was never attracted and sacking him now would be flip-flopping. It feels like Tottenham fans are genuinely living in a cloud after Mauricio Pochettino’s reign because ultimately they have nothing to show for it after sacking him for a past-it Mourinho.
Even though he failed, miserably, to make United a brilliant side like his teams of yesterday, they backed him by replacing Pochettino, who is an upgrade in the modern game.
I stood in the Stretford End last weekend after that game and we sung our hearts out for the final 15 minutes. It was defiant United – a bunch of Reds getting behind the team, the way football should be.
That Spurs lot could learn a thing or two from a day out at Old Trafford, with all the brilliant work TRA has done in that section.