Tottenham Hotspur supporters were at least hopeful that replacing Thomas Frank with Igor Tudor would pay dividends for some of the younger players stuck in a rut or cast aside, and while no issues have been as obvious as the way Tudor snubbed Antonin Kinsky after his mistakes against Atletico Madrid, it is hard to see any young player getting into a better situation under the interim coach.
Take, for example, Mathys Tel. He, once again, was initially snubbed by Tudor but then shone off the bench as a rare bright spot for the Tottenham attack. So fans were hopeful that Tudor would ilsten and reward him, instead of stubbornly ignoring the young Frenchman like Frank, who even nearly drove him out via a loan transfer in January.
Well, while Tudor did give Tel the start against Atletico Madrid, no sooner did he sacrifice the 20 year old forward despite the fact that he was Spurs best player on the pitch. Tudor subbed Tel off as early as half time, so did the starting lineup appearance against Atletico Madrid then even count as a starting appearance?
The Conor Gallagher for Mathys Tel change was insanity
What made the decision even worse is that it made no sense from a footballing perspective. Spurs were losing and in need of goals, so Igor Tudor took out his best attacking player, by far, and replaced him with a box to box midfielder who has been horrendous with no creativity in Conor Gallagher. And Tottenham were predictably worse off for it, with Gallagher playing poorly yet again.
Before his substitution, Tel had two key passes and three dribbles completed in one half of football against the vaunted Atletico Madrid defense despite having no real help around him with Randal Kolo Muani delivering yet another disaster class and Richarlison also playing poorly. Those are sensational numbers in a big game, and yet Tel was punished for them.
Even Thomas Frank did not make an in game blunder with Mathys Tel this bad when Tel was actually starting for him. Tudor has no real track record of success in world football to speak of, and it's moves like this that simply reenforce the point that Tudor is a broken clock performing his functions randomly. He gets two things right but hundreds more wrong and has no idea how to manage personnel. Basically, he makes the same mistakes that Frank does, but his randomness and attitude in doing so are more grating. In just weeks, he has become as unlikable as Frank did over months.