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Tottenham And Their Europe Dilemma

By Elijah Abram

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Tottenham has a dilemma when it comes to figuring out what to do about the rest of the season. As we get closer to the end of another (boring at the top) EPL season, it appears as Tottenham has seen another false dawn. Despite being top of the table for about two weeks this season, Tottenham has fallen off and now on the outside looking in at a European place.

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With only seven points and goal difference separating sixth place Tottenham with fourth place Man City, there is still a chance that Spurs can do the impossible and get quality European football next year.

But do Spurs want it European football next year? Sure, Champions League would be nice, but going through the qualifying process would cut into much-needed vacation and training time for the squad. We have seen what the last ten years of Europa League football has done to Spurs?

At the least, psychologically, “Thursday Night, Channel 5” has been a determinant to Tottenham’s league ambitions. Tired legs, a lack of quality squad rotation, and injuries has torpedoed the late winter into early spring fixtures of past Tottenham seasons.

What if Tottenham tried something “different” again? As we have seen this season with Manchester United, last season with Liverpool, and the 2009-2010 season with Tottenham, sometimes you have to “lose” to win. A year without the earned distraction of European football has been a catalyst for some wonderful football in the last 8 years of the Premier League.

Without knowing how the money for certain places in the table gets X amount of dollars, with the new 5 Billion Pounds TV contract recently signed, it is a safe bet to assume that money lost from not playing in Europe will be recouped by finishing high enough in the table.

Now comes the hard part for Daniel Levy and Mauricio Pochettino. What to do in preparing for next year? Most Spurs fans want the team to go gung-ho and try to win every game remaining on the schedule, and do so in the swashbuckling style that is synonymous with Tottenham of the past, thus leading to another campaign in Europe of some sort. They hang on to the quote credited to Bill Nicholson “[i]t’s magnificent to be in Europe, and this club – a club like Tottenham Hotspur – if we’re not in Europe…. we’re nothing. We’re nothing.”

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They and Bill Nicholson are not wrong, but one hopes they can understand the reasoning behind taking a year off of Europe. Wanting Spurs to win every game in style is something we all want. However, Europe is quite possibly holding us back from something bigger. Tottenham has a young, squad, with a lot of homegrown academy graduates coming through.

Taking a year off from Europe, allowing the management team to sell off some older dead weight, allowing the kids to blood in with some early round cup games and substitute appearances, and a full on hands on deck run at the title would be much more beneficial and exciting then a playing a midweek game in the Arctic Circle again. Let’s take a year off from Europe next season Tottenham, and focus on winning the title. Lifting that trophy would be a lot more fun than shivering in Poland.

Next: What Can Tottenham Expect from Michel Vorm?

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