Fantastic article, and the only way is up for Spurs regardless of what happens on Sunday. For Spurs to be within touching distance of either Chelsea or Arsenal is pretty remarkable given the disaparity in money available to those two clubs, plus the fact Spurs have had serious injuries all season to key players. This season has been excellent in my opinion.

AVB has done his best, The squad have done their best...however as much as people think Levy is amazing. I believe with a little more backing (£10-15m) in January we would be comfortably in the Champions league spots.

AVB has already matched last season under Harry as it stands now - 69pts - regardless of position. The only difference being Arsenal didn't suffer a last-6-game slump and Chelsea have improved, hence we are 5th.

He has done better if we beat Sunderland, again even if we finish 5th. You can't dictate other teams results, and if Arsenal get 73pts that would have been enough to finish above every one of Harry's (70pts best). It would be our best ever PL points tally, and a draw would match it.

As is stands right now, it's our joint-2nd ever PL total, and above average for Harry's three.

Overall a slight improvement, at the price of being worse to watch.

1st season out of the way, lets hope it isn't as good as it gets (as it was for Harry's 1st full season)

He has given us a resilience I've never seen before - we have a fantastic away record, and we've comeback from losing positions more than any other team.
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Are you sure about that, man utd going 1 goal down was like a given or first half of the season we played for a lot of the season before coming back.

In fact this season is the most craziest season after like 25 league games.

Like i said in HRH artcile earlier, if we ahd taken 4 points off either chelsea or Arsenal instead of man Utd we would be 3rd.. close margins

ADE getting sent off at Arsenal was a big turn around as we really looked like taking all 3 points, that is a 6 point swing

5th is where i expected us to finish once transfer window closed in august with two strikers for the season

http://www.premierleague.com/en-gb/news/features/comeback-kings-man-utd-road-to-premier-league-summit.html

We gained 27 points from losing positions after 29 games. I knew it was a crazy season its a new record of points gained from losing positions.

To judge on league placing only is misleading. If we win we have a record high of points (72)...The same last year would have done for 3rd and the year before that it would have been good enough for 2nd, 8 pts off the title.

The competition has been more fierce than ever and back in Feb/March it looked likely that 70pts would do it.

So 5th on 72 points is not failure IMO.

We have improved in many areas:
- away form
- tactical awareness/options
- late goals / tougher mentality
- good use of squad.

And when you consider that for large parts the likes of Adebayor and Walker underperformed significantly, we have only had 2 strikers (1 at times), and we have suffered serious injuries to Parker, Sandro, Kaboul, Ekotto, then really I think we have done exceedingly well to get the points total we have.

We certainly have not hit the highs we did under Harry but we have avoided the long lows. We are more consistent. And when you consider the inconsistent form of the first dozen or so games when players, manager etc were all settling in to a new regime, again you have to think that with a good pre-season, some good purchases and a settled squad then we can start the season better and build from there.

Only 2 negatives from this season overall....

1) we might end 5th
2) leaky defence, not enough clean sheets. Needs sorting.

Tottenham problem is inferiority complex with arsenal and chelsea. You would think the tottenham players would have unleashed last seasons hurt on chelsea in a must win game. Instead they drew and went out with a wimper. Spurs should have treated chelsea away as a cup final, if they won who knows chelsea would be in squeaky bum time now.

"Spurs have regressed, we should have kept Harry, as our league placing is 1 position below last season"

or (and assuming we beat Sunderland);

"Spurs have progressed, AVB has improved our side as our points tally is greater than last season" (and in fact, a club record).

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i think i know which camp chicken will be in


in my opinion its hard to argue that we have no progressed if we get our record points total, and we have achieved our best ever prem away performance too.

Its been a decent season, nothing really memorable about it though apart from Bale. A lot of the football has been awful to watch, certainly not exciting. I'm happy with how its gone but hoping for a bit more excitement and attacking football next season.

comment by hafijur MUFC +PUFC (U6578)
posted 1 minute ago
Tottenham problem is inferiority complex with arsenal and chelsea. You would think the tottenham players would have unleashed last seasons hurt on chelsea in a must win game. Instead they drew and went out with a wimper. Spurs should have treated chelsea away as a cup final, if they won who knows chelsea would be in squeaky bum time now.

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what are you talking about you clown.

chelsea are not a side you just show up and beat.. infact a few days earlier they beat you on your own patch. we played well v chelsea and showed great spirit to come back twice after our defending once again let us down.

HRH, pretty much sumarised my whole feelings there with that comment

I feel we have more 'potential' under AVB though, whatever that means, whether it be he will only get better or just some deluded hope from me.

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comment by hafijur MUFC +PUFC (U6578)


Tottenham problem is inferiority complex with arsenal and chelsea. You would think the tottenham players would have unleashed last seasons hurt on chelsea in a must win game. Instead they drew and went out with a wimper. Spurs should have treated chelsea away as a cup final, if they won who knows chelsea would be in squeaky bum time now.

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What a load of guff!

If you think it is as simple as 'Spurs want revenge therefore Spurs beat Chelsea at Chelsea' then you really are the village idiot.

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on the whole very positive....

BUGBEAR....!?

still fackin' TERRIBLE at the back...especially from set pieces......

Wherever we finish we have done well this season as the likes of Modric,king and vdv leaving they are or were world class players. We replaced them with non world class players. In that sense we have done well.

My big grip is avbs stubbornness. He must see his faults and deal with them accordingly. Set pieces and marking as the biggest issue

I think AVB has done a very good job, considering he has been given a slightly inferior squad to last season and has had several long term injuries to key players.

The only gripe I have is that AVB prioritising the Europa League has been a mistake in my opinion.

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it shld be such a basic thing too overcome for pro's surely....!?

My major bug was the way the team was set up in Lennon's absence in the last couple of months....from Liverpool onwards....and his refusal to play Bale LM even when Naughton was at LB.

Dreadful, and has probably cost us 4th, maybe even 3rd.

On the plus side, all managers make mistakes, and last season was exactly the same to be honest so it hasn't got worse. As long as lessons are learned we should improve next season

yeah with AVB its easy to forget just how young he is !

young managers make mistakes.

^That was the difference between a slight improvement and a significant improvement in manager

My worry is that he repeatedly made the same one(s) Chronic, and it hasn't really been rectified at all.

A Summer of reflecting, dissecting and digesting will hopefully iron it out of him