Spurs still full of potential - Pleat

David Pleat believes the vacant Tottenham manager’s job is made more attractive because of their recent lack of success.

It is 42 years since Bill Nicholson’s Spurs became the first English side to complete the domestic Double and 13 since they managed a top-three finish.

Even then, the Londoners ended 16 points adrift of champions Liverpool and Glenn Hoddle became the latest big name to pay the price for failing to effect a change in fortune when he was sacked as manager last week.

Celtic boss Martin O’Neill has emerged as the early favourite to replace Hoddle, although some pundits have questioned why the Irishman would want to give up life in the Champions League at Parkhead for mid-table mediocrity at White Hart Lane.

But current stand-in Pleat, who steered Spurs out of the bottom three with a 0-0 draw at Manchester City yesterday, believes the depth of the challenge is the most appealing factor.

“It is harder for potential managers to take over a club that is doing well,” he said.

“The attraction of Tottenham is in its potential – and I am not talking about past glories.

“It is a big club. It makes the news whether it is succeeding or not. It is also a club that attracts 35,000 people every week and has some good young players.

“I believe we only go forward and at the moment we are looking at the profile of someone who is suitable to run a club like ours.”

Whether that is O’Neill or not, Hoddle’s eventual replacement will have a wealth of talent at his disposal – if he can get them all onto the pitch at the same time.

Ledley King, Simon Davies and Jamie Redknapp were missing at Eastlands yesterday for the Premiership’s most injury-plagued club, although sicknote himself, Darren Anderton, did complete 90 minutes and helped Spurs earn a point they didn’t deserve.

As Blues boss Kevin Keegan observed, if it had been a boxing match the contest would have been stopped at the halfway point, such was the pummelling the visitors took.

Paulo Wanchope was guilty of three glaring misses on his own, the last of which would surely have brought a red card for man of the match Dean Richards had the Costa Rican gone down after clearly being tugged.

That expression of sportsmanship brought no reward and Nicolas Anelka, Trevor Sinclair and Steve McManaman didn’t get any either as Kasey Keller blocked anything that was going on target.

Only once was Keller beaten by a goalbound effort, when Anelka stabbed Wanchope’s first-half knock-back towards the visitors’ goal, only for skipper Stephen Carr to boot it off the line.

“We had a lot of clear-cut chances but chose the wrong option on too many occasions and their keeper guessed what we were trying to do,” said Keegan, whose side remain fifth even though they have won only one league game at their plush new home in four attempts.

“Maybe we had too much possession because it just didn’t happen for us in front of goal. Nicolas Anelka and Paulo Wanchope played very well together and if they had been able to finish we would have been talking about an excellent performance and fourth place in the table.

“Given the amount of pressure and possession we had, it was the most unlikely 0-0 draw I have ever seen.”