Ledley King Backs Tottenham to Finish Strong
Former Tottenham center-back, club ambassador and legendary player, Ledley King, has backed his former club to finish the season strong and finish in the top four.
Speaking to ESPN FC, former Tottenham center-back and now club ambassador, Ledley King has given his input on what he knows will be a strong finish for his former football club at the end of the year.
According to the 35-year-old King, there should be no reason why a top-four finish isn’t reasonable with this current squad under the guidance of Mauricio Pochettino. Even when compared to Harry Redknapp’s teams which Ledley King was a part of when Tottenham managed to finish in the top four twice in a three-year span.
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“They’ve proved it throughout the season,” King told ESPN FC at the launch of Barclays’ Spirit of the Game trophy competition.
“Throughout my time, even finishing in the top four twice in three or four years under Harry, we still weren’t as solid as this team. We didn’t have the same foundation.”
“We had talent — we could blow teams away on our day — but we could go away from home and still lose games we should be winning.”
“I don’t see that in this team. They haven’t lost back-to-back games all season. Every time they’ve lost, they’ve bounced back. They’ve shown they’re made of sterner stuff.”
Ledley King makes a good point about Tottenham this season in that they actually haven’t lost back-to-back games and have bounced back in a big way.
Because when Spurs have managed to lose, one of two things tends to happen, they either win or draw — although they have mostly won.
Case in point, in all competitions throughout the year, since losing to Manchester United, Tottenham have managed to record seven wins and two draws since the season started.
Which obviously means a lot, since Tottenham are in second place and seven points adrift of league leaders, Leicester City. Therefore this Spurs team is resilient and somehow finds a way to channel their frustration or disappointment from a loss (a total of nine this term) into a win for a 77 percent win percentage.
The main reason for Tottenham’s success this season is mostly down to their defense despite Harry Kane and Dele Alli spearheading Spurs’ success from an offensive standpoint and taking the Premier League by storm.
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For Ledley King, while he has been impressed with the solid defense that Tottenham currently has, as well as their spine with Eric Dier, Mousa Dembélé and Hugo Lloris (along with Alli and Kane), it’s something that he’s still taken aback when he used to play with his boyhood club.
“It’s not something you associate with Tottenham,” King said. “We’ve always had good individual players, but the strength is in the team at the moment.”
“Toby’s [Alderweireld] been excellent and the full-backs are improving, maturing — [Danny] Rose and [Kyle] Walker are coming of age.”
“It’s just such a strong foundation and spine. If you want to compete at the highest level, you have to have a good spine and foundation to build success on.”
In football, winning games has always been about scoring goals since that’s the objective. To score more than your opponent. But along with having potent goalscorers, clubs need to have a defense (goalkeeper included) to prevent teams from equalizing and eventually claiming a comeback win.
If a team can have a very solid spine, like Tottenham currently have, then that club can have plenty of success and challenge for some silverware.
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But in general, having players enjoying themselves is also key. If footballers aren’t having fun out on the pitch, there could be some problems. For Tottenham and Leicester, this is something that they haven’t had to deal with at all.
“You can’t downplay just how important it is to enjoy playing for a manager,” Ledley King added. “When you look at Spurs and Leicester, they look like teams that are not only solid and working hard but are also enjoying the game.”