Thomas Frank has been sacked and is no longer the manager of Tottenham Hotspur.
Thomas Frank repeatedly brought up the strengths of Tottenham’s North London rivals Arsenal in team meetings, which left some players extremely frustrated.
The irony of Frank being sacked just ahead of next week’s game against Arsenal will not have been lost on those who were surprised by his constant praise for the Premier League leaders.
A source told Camel Live: “He wouldn’t stop going on about Arsenal to the players, and they got sick of it very quickly. Even before and after the game at the Emirates, he was telling the players how good Arsenal were. Some of them were just thinking, ‘Can we just not talk about Arsenal?’”
It is no surprise, then, that players were as frustrated as supporters when pictures emerged of Frank walking around the Vitality Stadium with an Arsenal coffee cup before Tottenham’s 3-2 defeat to Bournemouth.
The social media images that followed mocked Frank, portraying him as an obsessed Arsenal fan – and they were circulated not just among Tottenham fans, but also within the club’s staff and players.
Unquestionably, Frank and Tottenham’s struggles came at a time when Arsenal sat top of both the Premier League and Champions League tables, making his position even worse. Chief executive Vinai Venkatesham can also be accused of making rookie mistakes that did nothing to help Frank or Tottenham. The club was gazumped by Arsenal for Eberechi Eze in the summer, while the decision to officially reappoint Fabio Paratici as joint sporting director in October last year backfired badly on Venkatesham. Three months later, the club announced the Italian would leave in early February.
From almost his first day in charge, there was a feeling inside the squad that Frank focused too heavily on the opposition in training and preparation. “Most of the work was focused on what to do without the ball and how to limit the opposition, rather than working on how to hurt them,” one source said.
This was reflected in early-season performances and results, with some success – Tottenham won three of their first four Premier League games, conceded just one goal and beat Manchester City.
Frustration on and off the pitch boiled over in early November with a home defeat to Chelsea. After that loss, players held internal meetings to discuss their relationship with the fans. It can now be revealed that new summer signings were shocked to hear senior players speak out about what they saw as a long-standing “disconnect”.
Amid the chaos, Frank tried to stay calm. He would read for half an hour before bed to take his mind off football and his troubles, and he went for a swim in the Mediterranean on the morning of Tottenham’s Champions League away game at Monaco.
But he could never shake the feeling that he had inherited a lopsided squad unable to compete domestically and in Europe, and that he was seriously lacking leaders.
Following Son Heung-min’s departure, Cristian Romero was appointed club captain on the pitch under Frank. But doubts had been raised over his suitability for the role long before the Argentine’s emotional outburst after the transfer window closed.
Some believed Romero was given special treatment at Tottenham’s training ground and was not the type of player to set standards with his own behaviour. This feeling was reinforced when the club’s highest-paid defender was not punished after publicly criticising the club’s hierarchy.
Romero’s disciplinary issues were one problem, while punctuality troubles also plagued players under Frank, both veterans and youngsters.
Frank arrived at Tottenham with the “no assholes” policy he had built at Brentford, but enforcing it in North London proved far harder than he had expected or hoped. The cultural problems he encountered were not limited to the players – they existed in other areas of the club too, and kept emerging.
