Antonio Conte appointed Tottenham Head Coach — What happens next?
After the world’s longest ever managerial search, one underwhelming appointment and a wasted five months, Antonio Conte is finally the head coach of Tottenham Hotspur.
The ex-Inter, Juventus, Italy and Chelsea boss joins a Spurs side in an even worse state than when he first turned down the role in summer. After the seemingly rudderless stewardship of Nuno Espirito Santo that led to a boring style, one even more snooze-worthy than the very worst of Mourinho performances, the promise of Conte’s high-scoring, ball-playing philosophy is most welcome.
In Nuno’s last Premier League outings, Spurs failed to muster a single shot on target in two hours and 16 minutes of football, a far cry from the “Spurs DNA” that Daniel Levy promised was at the heart of the manager search last summer.
Plenty have been calling into question the leadership of ENIC and Levy in recent seasons, following a string of more than questionable decisions that have led to a rapid decline from the heights of the Champions League final in 2019. Not backing Pochettino was a mistake, appointing Mourinho was a disaster, and then choosing Nuno as his replacement was doomed from the beginning. This recent track record has meant that as soon as Nuno’s fate looked sealed with cascades of boos at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium against Manchester United, plenty were questioning where we would be able go next, ruling a boss of Conte’s quality and standing out.
The swift appointment of Conte mirrors the appointment of Mourinho. There appears to be a genuine intention to compete and to do what is necessary to get the club back to the top 4 and competing for the biggest titles in the game, and there is much to be done…
The gap between Spurs and the top teams, Chelsea, Man City and Liverpool looks as wide as it has been for a decade, and a rapid improvement is needed to challenge this season.
There is plenty of hope however. Spurs have a squad that is capable of playing the way that Conte is likely to demand. His favoured 3–5–2 formation requires two flying full backs, which Spurs have in Emerson Royal and Sergio Reguilon; a strong central midfield pairing, in Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Oliver Skipp; and world class attacking talent, which is obvious in Harry Kane and Heung-Min Son. Conte has also been a big admirer of Tanguy Ndombele, having tried to sign him for Inter Milan in 2020, so there is definitely scope for the creativity problem that has plagued Spurs for so long could be solved reasonably quickly with a change of tactics and a shift of personnel.
As well as a first XI full of ready made talent on paper, there have been early rumours of a £150m budget and full control of recruitment for the January transfer window, in partnership with new Director of Football Fabio Paratici, who Conte worked with during a successful spell at Juventus. If accurate, this will be a huge boost to the squad, with potential reinforcements like Milan Skriniar, Dusan Vlahovic and Houssem Auoar being available to come in and add quality to the first XI and squad as a whole.
However, many will still be skeptical about whether the promised funds will really be made available by Levy. If they do, then Conte’s CV suggests that very good things could be just around the corner for Spurs, with good football, competent defending and passion on the touchline. After such a tough few years where so many fans have almost totally lost interest… Doesn’t that feel great?
