Thomas Frank remains convinced he has the support of the Tottenham board and will continue in his job as manager, arguing that the club’s problems run deeper than him. The Dane watched his team lose 2-1 at home to Newcastle on Monday night; they have won just twice in 17 Premier League games and lag 16th in the table, five points above the relegation zone.
It was another night when the Spurs fans booed and jeered him. At one point, they sang for Mauricio Pochettino, their former manager, who is now in charge of the USA national side, while they also told Frank towards the end of the game that he should be “sacked in the morning”.
Frank was defiant, citing an extensive injury list and the club’s difficulties in combining the demands of domestic and European football. He was without 10 injured players against Newcastle and lost another one, Wilson Odobert, in the 34th minute. The captain, Cristian Romero, is suspended.
Spurs’ next game is the derby at home against Arsenal on Sunday week and Frank was asked whether he would still be in charge for it. “Yeah, I’m convinced I will be,” he said. “I understand the question and I understand it’s easy to point on me but I also think it’s never only the head coach or the ownership or the directors or the players or the staff. It’s everyone.
“How convinced am I that I am the right man for the job? 1,000% sure. I am also 1,000% sure that I never expected us to be in a situation like this with 10 or 11 injuries. But I know when you need to build something and need to get through things, you need to show unbelievable strong resilience. You need to have a calm head and carry on.
“I understand the mechanism in football [to sack the manager] – no doubt about that – but there are a lot of studies that [show] it is not the right thing to do. I know it’s the only movement they [the board] have, but there’s also plenty of situations where it’s not the right thing to do.”
Frank was also asked in a TNT Sport interview whether his job was under threat. “I spoke to them [the owners] yesterday so no,” he replied. Could the fan fury during and after this latest defeat change their view. “No,” he said.
