Director of Football at Tottenham Hotspur David Pleat
gives a fascinating and revealing interview to Jimmy Hill. He
talks candidly about the supporters, salaries, Sugar ... and
Sol.
Jimmy Hill:
Welcome. Spurs fans have unhappily been
making demonstrations at the ground and all kinds of things like
that, and you say well what’s happening all of a sudden at
White Hart Lane?
David Pleat:
Well, I think that demonstrations are
part of the social scene and you’ve got to look at the ages of
those that are demonstrating. They are getting restless because
they want to win, everyone wants to win, patience isn’t a
virtue of the football supporter. Strangely enough, we’re
getting full houses and out of that 35,000, there are 100 people
that are unhappy.
I wasn’t at Saturday’s game, but the boo-boys have taken
a lot of credit away from three outstanding efforts from Dublin,
Carbone and Wright.
Hill:
Obviously you’ve seen them since?
Pleat:
Yes, I’ve seen them since and they were good
strikes. Of course, Stewart Houston
who was in charge of the team in George’s absence, feels that
there was an element of doubt about the first goal which was a
penalty.
Hill:
Well, I was there at that match because of a
grand-daughter who’s a Spurs supporter. One, it wasn’t a
penalty without a doubt, but the other goals, as you say, were
quite spectacular. But it’s more than that, isn’t it at
Spurs? It’s wasn’t just Saturday, there’s been a lot of
unrest recently?
Pleat:
They’ve had a losing sequence for almost
three months now, it’s a poor record and there are all sort of
factors involved. I‘m not looking to make excuses on
anyone’s behalf, but it’s been particularly hard on the
front players, who believe it or not both are in double figures
in Premiership goals. They’ve suffered a little bit with
injury and, at times, loss of form this season and we haven’t
had players to replace them.
I think one of the major disappointments is that we have a
lot of injury problems to players for long periods of time.
These involve players that we’ve paid a lot of money for, such
as Les Ferdinand, John Scales, and sometimes it’s hard to get
on the right track because of that.
Hill:
I can remember Manchester
United and, in particular, Alex
Ferguson when he took over at Old Trafford. For the first
two years, he was public enemy number one as far as the
supporters were concerned and the elements were against him.
Where does this lunacy come from?
Pleat:
Well I think there’s a great expectation at
Tottenham. Alright, you’ll immediately say to me that you’ve
won nothing since 19 whenever...
Hill:
’61.
Pleat:
’61, a wonderful year when they’ve of
course done the Double. I think they’ve won the cup since and
they won the league cup last year but they expect higher
standards. There’s the great rivalry with Arsenal down the
road, and they have performed very consistently. They’ve been
like a blue chip company in the last six years, regularly in the
top three and the supporters want us to get into that top three
or four.
I think that the management were hoping to get towards the
top six, a top six position would have been good progress. We
haven’t been able to achieve that and I suppose there is some
sort of restlessness present - particularly when you’ve had
three defeats in such a short period time. Also, all of a sudden
we’ve started conceding goals. I’d written in my own
programme notes that we seem to be quite resilient away from
home, we’d had the second highest defensive record to Liverpool
away from home.
Hill:
But the venom is usually directed at the
manager, but on this occasion the venom appears to be against
Sir Alan Sugar, a man I know personally, is totally involved in
making something happen there?
Pleat:
Absolutely, he’s very determined to achieve.
There is a wonderful stadium, there is a superb academy, we are
buying more land to expand, our academy is now beginning to
really flourish, we’ve got good coaches in there - but all
these things, they take time.
Hill:
And he gets no credit for it does he?
Pleat:
Well, he’s been unlucky with a couple of
managerial appointments. A level of mediocrity has been amassed,
and we need better players than that, and as a consequence
we’ve had to kind of get rid of this mediocrity to make room
for better players. But since January '98 we’ve spent over £22m
and I don’t think a lot of supporters realise that. The
difficulty that we’ve had is that we haven’t been able to
sell an Anelka for £23m, we’ve been selling mediocre players.
That has accumulated to around £3m and there’s been a couple
of very poor mistakes in the transfer market where we’ve
literally had to give players away who have failed for whatever
reason - like Moussa Saib who the new manager didn’t fancy,
and the lad Tramezzani who was a major disappointment. But all
clubs have these kind of players.
Hill:
I’m not acting as a defence counsel for the
chairman, but surely it was the managers involved who selected
those players which for whatever reason didn’t come off?
Pleat:
Absolutely. I haven’t had or seen an
interfering chairman who has said, why don’t you go and buy
him or get rid of him. I haven’t had that, and I’ve been in
the game for a long time. I’ve had the occasional comment from
a chairman when you think is there a hidden agenda but certainly
at Tottenham since I’ve been back there, never at any stage
has the chairman said to the manager 'Why don’t you sign him
or why don’t you get rid of him?'. He’s said many times
we’ve been unlucky with certain players that we’ve signed in
terms of injuries, but the manager signs the players, the
manager recognises the ability of the players he sees, he puts
the team together, he arranges the tactics, he does the
training. The manager is the one that controls the players and
the team.
Hill:
So, is the chairman saying I’m not going to
give the manager any money to spend, or is he saying, if you can
persuade me that money needs to be spent in the interest of
Tottenham Hotspur, then it’s there?
Pleat:
I think we are very aware that we need to spend
money, we have identified a couple of areas for sure, we’ve
been very frustrated this year on a couple of occasions. I think
it’s been very well documented we brought the boy Bridges for
talks. However, I think that the deal was almost done and dusted
with Leeds, although I like the boy Bridges immensely.
Hill:
But you know that goes down bad with supporters
to think that Leeds United are getting a player we should have
had?
Pleat:
Well, they have to come to terms with that.
There’s a lot of competition in the Premiership and sometimes
it’s for geographical reasons, sometimes it’s because a team
is in Europe.
You’ve got to get in to Europe
to be able to say, come and join us. The bottom line usually
with players is salary, I have to say that, and what their
prospects are within that team. Where we have done well is I
think we’re bringing younger players into the club.
In the past, a lot of players in the 29–30 age group were
brought in for decent money, and if you look at the record over
the last five years there’s no future in those players. The
money is available at Spurs to buy players, that is a clear
message. The manager is very careful with his money, as he was
at Arsenal. If you look back at the record, he was a very slow
spender, and he didn’t spend big and he may wish to do it a
similar way here.
Hill:
But also I mean if you declare to the world now,
we’re going to spend money because we want to be successful,
and we want to give Spurs supporters all the joy in the world,
anybody you come to buy a player from says: ‘Oh, here they
come knocking at the door. How much’. So you have to be
temperate?
Pleat:
Exactly, we can’t tell the world that we’ve
got £50m to spend. What you do know is one or two clubs in this
country have had a very big go at it, and have sacrificed quite
a lot and mortgaged quite a lot in those attempts. They may have
invested money that they haven’t even received yet from new
proposed television deals. It's a slightly dangerous way to go.
We try and take a sensible line, but there is money available.
He knows we’ve got to get two or three players and we will do
that but we’ve been suffering recently. We’ve started the
season well and finished badly, perhaps we should have started
the season badly and finished well. But I thought the best that
we could hope for was about 6th this season, at the moment
we’re languishing in around 12th position, which isn’t good
and we should do better than that.
Hill:
There are no trips to Europe
next season that’s a certainty?
Pleat:
No, you look for defining moments Jim. They
lost in the last minute at Kaiserslautern,
they were winning 1-0 and it’s a horrible scenario to concede
two goals in the last minute. That, looking back may be a
defining moment, I don’t know, everyone tries to look for when
it happened, where it went amiss, and Kaiserslautern
was a massive disappointment.
Hill:
Can or does the number of factors that are
significantly against the chairman, manager, history of the
club, can that in itself have a detrimental effect on the teams
chances of doing well, does that make it any harder or does it
not make any difference?
Pleat:
I don’t think so, I think every 90 minutes is
a separate issue and if they win it’s a lifter, if they lose
it can be a demoraliser. We have young players, Campbell, Carr,
Walker, Iversen, still only 22, we have some good young players
coming through our club. The experienced Sherwood has been out
for a long time, Leonhardsen who was bought in has been out for
half the season, When we had Leonhardsen, Sherwood, in the same
midfield, and Freund, that’s when I think we were playing our
best football.
People have short memories. We beat Man Utd at home, we beat Liverpool,
we beat Arsenal, but they haven’t been able to maintain the
pressing game because George hasn’t been able to keep the same
team.
Hill:
It’s strange really that you explain matters
beautifully and intelligently so people can understand – why
then is there such bitterness about the chairman? If you don’t
mind me saying, you are a very experienced and talented person
to have on board. Is there something the chairman can do to help
you and the manager in your tasks?
Pleat:
He has an image that comes over to many as
rather brusque and severe. Unlike all men who’ve been quite
clever in their field, he possibly has a two-way personality at
times.
I shouldn’t really say this because you can’t generalise
about the media but, I think he gets a very unfair and rough
ride in the media. Whether that’s deserved or not, no-one
deserves personal abuse and some of the things that are said are
most unfair, they’re not correct and they’re misleading and
unfortunate. The public’s opinion is definitely clouded by
what they read and sometimes the man who's the victim of this
business feels because he’s had so much of it that you cannot
go out to the world and explain it because it’s not worth
explaining any more because they don’t listen.
Hill:
Because the journalists will say there he goes,
members of the public will say, of course he supports the
chairman because he employs him so an argument for him is once
again discredited?
Pleat:
Well, I try and see things fairly, it’s not
easy for the chairman, the manager or me but we know how to run
a football club and if you’re looking at young players and the
academy, we’ve got a good set-up. What we need is a good run
of results to show our confidence is justified. At the moment we
haven’t got that, so it calls for patience, sense and calm.
Hill:
But you are confident that the little triangle
at he top of Spurs, given time, will make Spurs regular
contenders for some sort of honour. Is that the target for
future seasons, and are you going to achieve it?
Pleat:
On pride alone, George has been a very
successful manager and it will hurt his pride severely of he
doesn’t achieve that. The chairman is bursting to get some
success after making several moves in the past few years that
haven’t proved as successful, and from a personal view I
desperately want to show that the general manager role, can be
seen as a very important mediator and give all sorts of reasons
to mould a club together.
Hill:
And you have no fear that Sir Alan Sugar,
obviously successful in some aspects of life, if not at the
football club for the moment, will stick with it?
Pleat:
I think so, he hasn’t been a lucky chairman
so far, that’s for sure, some people would have thrown in the
towel. But I have to say this, I’ve seen chairman get it in
the neck and it’s not just Tottenham. I’ve seen it in
different clubs where you have a bad spell, people are ignorant
and abusive and I wouldn’t tolerate that, that’s bad and if
it affects your home life. Manager’s children that have been
bullied at school because the team wasn’t doing well can be
very tough. Alan Sugar is a strong man, but we’ve all had it
in football, you’ve had it both as a player, manager and
chairman haven't you?
Hill:
Yes, every team I’ve played for finished
higher up the ladder than when I joined them. Anyway, back to
Spurs. I’m asking you for optimism?
Pleat:
We’ve got some good young players. The next
step is we’re going to buy some big players. We’ve got no
contractual problems at the end of this season. Sol Campbell
stays whatever until the end of next season. Hopefully he
won’t leave because if he did he’d be very unhappy, he’s
Tottenham through and through because he’s been at Spurs since
he was 12. He wants the club to do well.
Hill:
I was going to ask you later, not that the
chairman wants to become Mr Popular but if the chairman could
persuade Sol to commit himself to Spurs, wouldn’t that be the
most enormous thing that could be done?
Pleat:
Yes, I think Sol and his agent knows that. He
has to have a feeling. There has to be a confident mood.
Obviously then we can talk about salary. We will do everything
in our power to get Campbell to extend his contract past next
year. But whatever happens, it’s part of this hype. He has
another year to go. Really, Sol has always discussed and signed
extensions in the summer months. All the talk about him been
seen in Manchester,
so much devious stuff has been printed.
Hill:
I take it that Alex hasn’t put a bid in?
Pleat:
No, Man Utd have expressed an interest for a
year now, but you know how it is, at the time we were talking
about Solskjaer, but we haven’t made too big a fuss about
that. We spoke about it and hoped we got a deal. Alex persuaded
us Solskjaer is better on the bench at the moment, two years on
and he’s still scoring goals and more or less on the bench.
Usually, when you have a discussion with another club about a
player who they respect, they usually come around to talking
about one of your players that they respect, so you can’t deny
that you’ve had a discussion.
Hill:
But in terms of Spurs here and now, how will
things happen?
Pleat:
We hope Sol will commit himself beyond the next
year of his contract this summer before he goes away with England
in the Euro championships.
Hill:
For the sake of everyone, is that going to be a
niggling problem that might cause further trouble for George’s
health?
Pleat:
George had some tests on his joints and he has
gone home and he’ll have a rest. He won’t be at the club for
a few days and we respect that. We’ve only got a few games to
go, we all wish George well and we hope he’s going to be back
amongst us very quickly.
Hill:
I have a feeling that Spurs’ future is going
to depend on the team spirit of those off the field, staff,
chairman, more than those efforts on the field?
Pleat:
On the field, we can put together a competent
side that needs improving with a couple of quality players.
There is no doubt in my mind about that. In terms of supporters,
of course they want to see us do well and they have to behave
themselves, providing that the players can prove that they are
giving the effort. That's the most important thing. In the end,
it’s a very competitive business and you think we enjoy
finishing 6th, 7th, 8th, we want to be in the top there.
Hill:
Thank you very much indeed. You’ve been
honest. I’ve thrown everything I can at you about the club and
I think the message has come over that if I was a Spurs
supporter, rather than a the grandfather of a Spurs supporter, I
would say 'keep it up'.
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