Tottenham Hotspur‘s sporting director Johan Lange has said interim head coach Igor Tudor could get the job on a permanent basis as he revealed style of play will be “high up on the list” when they begin to identify candidates.
Tudor takes charge of his first match in Sunday’s north London derby against Arsenal having replaced Thomas Frank, who was sacked last week after just eight months in charge.
Spurs are 16th in the Premier League and sit just five points above the relegation zone. Tudor, 47, has never worked in England but won Serie A twice as a player with Juventus, where he also managed most recently prior to being sacked in October.
The Croatian has had spells at a number of clubs including Hajduk Split, Galatasaray, Udinese, Marseille and Lazio and in a statement confirming his appointment, Spurs highlighted his track record of delivering an instant improvement at clubs as an important factor in his selection.
Speaking to reporters at Tottenham’s training base on Friday, Lange said: “He has shown the capabilities of coming into clubs around this time, February, March, and also big clubs, and made an immediate performance impact.
“That was of course a very big reason [for hiring him]. There is a big difference, if you are a coach for example, who has only started a new job on July 1. You have six or seven weeks to prepare to get to know the club.
“I’m not saying that necessarily is easy, but that’s a different challenge. If you come in here on the Monday and you are playing at the weekend, you need to build relationships with the players immediately.
“You need to come into build relationships but of course assess the style of the club immediately. He has shown that with great success, not only once but a few times, to come into that.
“That is one of the reasons why we believe he is the best candidate here now but of course also with his reputation and what he’s done in his career, of course, if things go well, he could be here for a long time.”
Sources have told ESPN that United States coach and former Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino is a leading contender for the job and his name was sung by supporters in their final home game under Frank last week, a 2-1 home defeat to Newcastle.
But Lange refused to be drawn on their future plans or specific candidates. “Igor has been here for five days,” Lange said.
“Our focus right now is to get high up in the table in the league, focusing on the Champions League as well. That is our focus right now, and I am sure you can understand that. I am not going to comment on any names that have been linked to the job.”
Pushed on how much style of play would be considered in a potential manager after fans grew frustrated with Frank’s football, Lange said: “it is definitely something high up on the list.
“We are very ambitious to create a team that can play dominant football and that can control the matches with the ball for a few reasons. If you look across almost every league in the world, that is how you can say the top teams normally are successful — that is being able to dominate possession, create chances, be aggressive without the ball and so that is of course the football.
“Then we are also a club with a rich history of having some of the best offensive players in the world and having a very particular style of play that resonates with the history, resonates with the fans and I think that combined with having a possession-dominant, aggressive style of play, those two things go hand in hand.”
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Lange, who confirmed he is employed on a “rolling contract” by Spurs, defended the club’s transfer record after former boss Ange Postecoglou — and to a lesser extent, Frank — both cast doubt over the club’s ability to compete in the market.
Postecoglou claimed Spurs “are not a big club” when it comes to committing wages on players while Spurs missed out on signing Antoine Semenyo in January as the winger chose to join Manchester City from Bournemouth.
Lange said: “I’m not going to sit here and start commenting on an ex-employee of the club’s comments. [Chief executive] Vinai [Venkatesham] in his notes earlier this year, or the latter part of last year, made it known in the match day programme that we, as a club, need to grow our wage bill to be competitive.
“I think Thomas commented a little bit on players in January, and it was definitely not because of a lack of emotion from our side or efforts from our side that those players are not here today.
“When you are in any transaction it does take three parties. It takes a player to agree and we are not in control if a player makes a career choice to join another club, then that is unfortunately outside our control.”
