Today is a light edition of Tottenham Hotspur Links, enjoy.
With Christmas only two days away, Tottenham Hotspur Links might slow down just a bit. The amount of stories will vary as other online publications may put out less content ahead of the holidays. For today, there will only be two stories to read. Both involve Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino.
First up, the Argentine manager says Tottenham have a chance to challenge for the Premier League title. With the way this season has turned out, why not? And finally, Pochettino feels that his team isn’t getting enough credit for what they’ve accomplished thus far. Some people are giving credit, while others are reluctant to do so. These are the links, so let’s get to them.
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- Mauricio Pochettino believes Spurs can challenge for league title
- [via Mirror]
With Chelsea having a miserable start to their season as defending champions, it has left the door wide open for plenty of clubs to climb into the top half of the league table. Among them is Tottenham and while Spurs have managed to finish within the top-six for a number of seasons, this is their best chance to challenge for the Premier League title and provide a tough opponent for other clubs to face.
Why can’t they? If Leicester City are capable of powering their way to first place heading into the Christmas period, then surely Tottenham can go on a run and be right up there as well. Spurs’ 14-match unbeaten run helped propel them to fourth place and that’s with eight draws thrown in as well. With Manchester City only three points ahead of Spurs for third place, anything is possible. Here’s Mauricio Pochettino on the idea of a league title hunt.
"“In football all is possible. Most important thing is believe you can win every game.”“We are young but have a strong squad, and believe in ourselves and will keep working hard to try and win every game.”“For that it is always important to be focused in every game and training session but in football all can happen if you believe.”"- Spurs’ young squad deserves more credit
- [via Sky Sports]
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To coach a 25-man squad when the average age is 24.6 says a lot about the manager in question, Mauricio Pochettino, but also all of the players who get a chance to play.
The oldest-youngest players who are starters would be 25-year-olds Kyle Walker and Danny Rose. As the age of 25 tends to be the year before athletes reach their prime. Give or take.
Perhaps some pundits give Tottenham’s young squad not enough credit because there isn’t much data to go off of? Since there are only 17 games played? Or other teams are just having down years that Spurs are “lucky” to be where they are right now?
In any event, that’s only half of the equation. Sure some teams aren’t doing good this season who should be and sitting in the top four. Clubs like Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United. But at the same Tottenham also have to capitalize on other team’s misfortunes which they have.
So yeah, Spurs do deserve credit for the work that they’ve put in this season when you factor in everything that they’ve been through: a winless August, eight draws, youngest Premier League squad, 14-match unbeaten streak, one home loss, etc etc.
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To sum things up nicely, here’s Mauricio Pochettino:
"“Sometimes I think people don’t realise the effort that we make and how hard our players work because we are the youngest squad in the Premier League,” said Pochettino.“Sometimes they deserve more praise for the position we are in – and not only because we are fourth today but the way we try to play. Maybe the players, the team, deserve more praise than we’ve had so far.”"