Tottenham paying the price for Levy’s rigid thriftiness

The alarming lack of investment in the squad at Tottenham Hotspur is now becoming all the more evident week by week. Despite a notable improvement in their points tally since the appointment of Jose Mourinho, injuries and fatigue are starting to creep into the squad.

When Mourinho was appointed back in November to revive an under-performing squad and to take Tottenham to the next level of winning trophies, Spurs were languishing in 14^th place, a million miles away from the Champions League places the club were becoming accustomed to challenging for.

In the three months since, Spurs have made progress moving up to 5^th spot and twice getting themselves close to over-taking Chelsea who hold the final spot for Europe’s top competition, but performances are lacking in cohesion and desire, no different really to what Spurs fans were witnessing under Mauricio Pochettino earlier in the season. 

Daniel Levy’s reluctance to invest in around the last six transfer windows is now being to eat into the fitness and age profile of a squad that has come close to joining the elite but now seems a long way away. Spurs have spent money in the last two windows, but the damage has been done in those previous where Pochettino identified the squad needed younger and fresher faces to take the club onto the next level. With that being ignored Spurs are now paying the price massively.

Any club would miss a striker the calibre of Harry Kane, but the clubs that win things have a plan B and an adequate back up striker to compensate or another way to play to compound the loss. The loss of Heung-Ming Son to injury for seemingly the remainder of the season has further stretched the capacity of Mourinho’s squad, a player capable of picking up the goal-scoring mantle in the absence of Kane.

With Dele Ali subject to a suspension in the near future and Lucas Moura showing so far he is not the answer to the problem, it places a huge onus on new signing Steven Bergwijn and Erik Lamela, the latter unable to stay fit for a decent run of games to make a big impact.

The next two weeks will have a big bearing on the destiny of their season with cup games in both competitions and league games against fellow Euro chasers Wolves and Burnley, only nine games remain in the Premier League after facing the aforementioned two teams so there is time to still amass points for fourth spot but they are relying on a lot of results going their way, it’s out of their hands almost.

In reality the best Spurs can hope for is to not lose any more players to injury or suspension, remain competitive and finish in the European places, be that fourth or having to go through the Europa League. Whilst they are still in both the Champions League and FA Cup, there may have to come a time when Mourinho decides which is more important and targets that above all else.

Next season is the time to judge Mourinho and his Spurs, if he can get something this season out of a tired squad it’ll be a sound base to work off, however you can be sure that Mourinho will push every ounce from his players until the season is done.

Follow Trevor on Twitter @trevk37