Spurs "Not Strong Enough" Against Sunderland | Relegation Awaits, Officiating Woes & The Brobbey Push

28:17Adam Michie:And for me, it's that bit that has just got on top of the players, the inability to dig themselves out of messes that they've created themselves. The amount of goals can, what is it? I'm trying to think what the name of the stat is. Errors leading to shots or errors leading to goals. We are top of the tree as a team for that. By quite some way, I think, as well, isn't it?

28:39Jack:Considerably. I often see tweets to this effect floating around.

28:43Adam Michie:we're top of the tree for goals conceded from outside the box 12 goals this season from outside the box the closest to us i think is forest in nine with nine well i remember a lot of that

28:54Jack:there was the conversation around frank and his lack of pressing outside the box and everything because there was a similar correlation at brentford in his first couple of seasons there as well that they were they were constantly conceding goals from outside the box and you know and to the point about like the knock-on effect of players confidence and stuff when you've got vicario playing through a hernia injury he's suddenly shipping goals from 30 yards every other game it's what's the accumulative effect of all of that exactly well what the accumulative effect of all of that is what we see right now um quite frankly that that's that's it's where we it's where we find ourselves i mean look yes i guess like it's not fair to say that like you know maybe to my point at the top that they're all like terrible players and stuff but i do think the conversation here like the lack of that cutting edge the lack of the ability to finish off a game to me it just kind of brings back that feeling that and i know this is a really basic way of slicing this but we just don't have a star player mate we don't we don't we don't you know when we're considering like you know son pain urbatov those sort of players great but we don't even have the knockdown from we don't even have the the defoe the keen who could always dig us out have a tight spot, let alone like the Klinsman.

30:11Jack:Our last relegation battle is noted by the fact that it was Jürgen Klinsman that carried us on his back, got us over the line. We don't have that. We don't, you know, I don't mean that to be horrible or to be harsh to any of these players, really. It's just the truth of the matter. I don't think there's a single player in this team that any club, I would say honestly, mate, I would say honestly, even if we're taking it down to a Teddy Sherinham or we're talking about a Ledley King or whoever, I think for the entirety of my life, Spurs have always had at least one player that you could make an argument for any club in the division and maybe even most clubs in Europe being able to accommodate in their team.

30:56Jack:I don't think we have a single player like that right now. I think we've got a very promising player in, say, like an Archie Gray or something like that and plenty of other players that no doubt Christian Romero no doubt Christian Romero you chuck him in at Atletico Madrid if he finally gets that move he'll be playing Champions League football weekend well year in year out and being in title races for Atletico and he'll look like a very fine part of that as he does for Argentina when he plays internationally but I think there's very specific circumstances that make that the case if you get what I mean you look at a lot of the players we've had down the years look at Harry Kane look at what he's doing right now he could have been he could have done that for anybody I guarantee you had City got that across the line he would have won the treble with City that yeah you know it's there's no there's nobody right now that's that's going to be able to put us on their back and make the difference in those moments and that's on Enoch again that's on Enoch again not prioritizing I mean it's tough like they I mean they spent a lot of money we can talk about Let's talk about Xavi Siemens now.

31:59Jack:They spent a lot of money on Xavi Siemens. That came with a lot of excitement from the fans, I think from football in general. I think a lot of people were saying this could be a really good move for Xavi Siemens. He's threatened to be a really, really top-tier player for most of his career. This might be the perfect match for him now. Spurs, I think we've maybe let him down, but I don't feel like he gets to be completely let off the hook. To me, there's a reason why three managers in a row now haven't made him their guy straight away and yep okay we might be able to talk about the fact that the position that the team is in means that they prioritize a more defensive approach they prioritize a certain profile of player over the diminutive attacking threat but i don't feel like he's really made a case has he to be that first name on the team sheet and that that's part of the problem as to as to where we find ourselves right now but i guess on that to put a finer point on it were you surprised that Deserby left him out because I think I think I'd seen a lot of people say he's maybe the type of player that Deserby would like in his setup not surprised

33:07Adam Michie:purely based on Sunderland's midfield and I think Deserby's thinking was around making sure we win those battles in midfield we need the ball the problem was that then disconnected us from the three we put three strikers up front you know we're at the top there's three out there uh richardison works hard solenki works hard don't get me started on kola moany um but there was a complete disconnect and i said it comes back to those profiles of player we had three players in there they were water carriers um all right i think bergval's got a bit about him um gray's obviously got a bit about him are they creative players no can they stitch things together are Are they the ones dictating the tempo of a game?

33:54Adam Michie:No. They work hard. They've got qualities. They can't get the ball into the right places at the right time consistently. Archie Gray's done pretty well this season with that. That goal that he popped over to Richarlison in the back post in the Champions League. Lovely goal. You know, he's done that a couple of times. He's got it in him. I don't think... And that lovely movie, him and Simmonds hooked up together against Atletico Madrid. He's shown glimmers that I think he's got the capability maybe to do that. Is it part of his skill set at the moment? Consistently, no. But I do understand why De Zerbe went for those three.

34:32Adam Michie:I think the problem Xavi Simmonds has had has come with the players around him. I think he needs players around him to really shine. When it's him doing it by himself, he really struggles because teams know that it's only him. And if they shut him down, then all supply lines are cut off for Spurs. And it makes us incredibly easy to defend against. The time when he did the best work was when Kudus was playing. When there was Kudus and Simmons, there was, I looked it up, 14 games in the middle of the season where they were both available. And we won 16 points. And when they started together, we won 13 points.

35:13Adam Michie:Eight games. 13 points, eight games. There's the difference maker. Yeah. Right there. Kudus has been gone from the squad since, what was it, the 4th of January. And since then, you know, the burden of creativity has fallen back onto Jabby Simmons alone. And he's a young kid in a new league, very physical league. Fair play to him. He started very slowly. I think he got the pace of the game eventually, but he has been isolated to do that job. So while I'm certainly not giving him a pass, I think maybe for the amount of money we're paying for him and all that, maybe we should have expected a little bit more.

35:53Adam Michie:But I think the way that the squad has crumbled around him has not helped him and particularly Kudus' absence.

36:00Jack:It's just difficult, isn't it? Because there's context to all of this because, you know, you look at the way the squad crumbled around, say, a Harry Kane and yet he was still there week in, week out doing it. but then you're like but we're talking about one of the greatest footballers of all time here you know you can't hold everyone to that and i don't think i don't think i'm doing it purposefully maybe subconsciously but you do this this this kid did come with some fanfare and we've seen what what he is capable of the brilliance that he's capable of and it's just a shame to have not seen that be able to come to the fore more often for spurs regardless of all of the situations around because sometimes I guess and I don't think it's too harsh to say sometimes you're in a situation where you just need your so-called best players to step up and make the difference and I think for me that that's the one thing with Xavi Siemens where I think I've been disappointed and I do think that there is there's so much valid and relevant context as you point out there to not get him off the hook but just to explain as to why it's been a difficult season for him It's been a difficult season for the entire team.

37:13Jack:But, you know, just in that way, in that sense that your backs are to the wall and you need somebody to step up and be counted, as we have seen down the years at Spurs, you know, with players from players who maybe aren't even as talented as somebody like Xavi Siemens. He just hasn't been able to do that. But, you know, again, he's not really had a consistent run of games, has he? You know, he gets pushed in and out of the squad by various different managers who all expect him to do different things. can you play as a sort of number six? Can you play as a kind of number eight? Can you play as a number 10?

37:45Jack:Can you play as a winger? You know, it's difficult for the lad in an already particularly difficult situation. I just wonder if De Zerbe's going to realise that we need him. Because the main thing that we saw, I feel, against Sunderland was just devoid of any spark again in that final third. Correct. As we've seen so often.

38:07Adam Michie:All season. And this for me is why what Langer and Vinay Venkateshian did in January, which is nothing, is so outrageous. It's egregious neglect, right? So let's start the season. We knew we weren't going to have Maddison all season. Chances are all season. We knew at the time Kuliseski was out for some time. All right, we bought Caduce. Great. Started the season really well. We then bring Sam Simmons in. Great. Then you get to January Kudus-Sescu is still not back We still know that Maddison isn't going to be back Kudus gets injured on the 4th of January You've got four weeks You look at the squad and you go We have Simmonds, that is it We don't have anybody else who can create Now, they knew that Kudus was going to be out for a wee while They should have brought someone in They should have taken the burden off of Simmonds at that point The idea that, you know, not stress buying Well, no, no, you're not stress buying, you're squad building.

39:07Adam Michie:How have you not got a list of players that you believe could come in and enhance the squad, regardless of time of year, regardless of, apparently we were going to spend some money, you know, you must have had a list and the list should be, you know, you've got your squad and you've got another name next to each member of the squad. You bulk it out. I mean, look at the other lot down the road. You could go through, I know they're having a quite fantastic wobble, but you look at all of their squad. You could go a quality player for each position all the way through the team. Why aren't we doing that?

39:39Adam Michie:Yeah, all right, Kudus is injured, he's coming back. Great, so we're going to have competition for him. We've just sold Johnson. It was Johnson and Kudus. Now Johnson's gone, you get someone else. And then you support Simmons and his creative flair. You give him a bit of space to work with. You know, I think Odobea started to help, then he goes out, right? Then he gets injured. Tell is the only player who's been available for every game this season. He's the only player who's been available. He hasn't missed a single game. You know, he's been fully fit. He keeps picking up knocks and then being back the next week.

40:13Adam Michie:Great mentality. Loved that. He's the only one who's been readily available week in, week out. Right? And then we've got all these, like I said earlier, about the same profile of player who they just churned through. You know, it's just you could swap them in, swap them out. They're the same kind of player. it doesn't change the team, it doesn't change the dynamic, it's the players like Simmons, Kudus when he was playing, Kuliseski, Madison, those guys who can pick the ball up and pick a ball. And we just neglected that. And that is on Langer and Vinay. It's why we are where we are. Look at West Ham.

40:47Adam Michie:Look at the players that they brought in when they knew they needed them. They didn't even have an injury crisis. They didn't even have an injury crisis. Their crisis was that they were going to go get relegated. But we had an injury crisis at the time. we weren't near getting relegated, then all of a sudden, oh, look, look at us. Look where we are. It's utterly unforgivable. And I remember so many people saying it at the time. And that is our epitaph now. We'll be, we don't want to stress by. That will be on our 25, 26 season tombstone. We didn't want to stress by. It reminds me of what's on Spike Milligan's tombstone.

41:22Adam Michie:It says, I told you I was ill. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right, it's the same thing. We didn't want to stress by. rip toplum 2026 do you know what I mean but it's it's it's truly astonishing is it it's truly

41:34Jack:astonishing just in in the respect that these are people who are paid just astonishing eye-watering sums of money to know about football to be able to not only understand football on a say a business level but just to have an instinct for it to have an instinct for the way that say the wind is shifting if you like and it's been abundantly clear to i would say to spurs fans for quite some time that we're in peril um and it's now it's only been sort of more recently so that i think the wider footballing community has opened up their eyes and they're suddenly like oh spurs this might not just be sort of one of these fanciful things where we all get to say we'll all have a laugh and a party when spurs get relegated they're all getting a they're all getting hot dogs on the grill now aren't we really like that's it it's everyone's the bunting's being put out yeah that's it they've they've really really woken up i mean the only thing i would say is there's a lot of west ham fans getting quite loud already you know it's it's not it's not over yet lads i mean i kind of feel like it is but i've gone i think they've gone a bit early

42:36Adam Michie:but they might be all right the other team for us i think the team for us that we really need to be shooting for is leads yeah they're the ones that i think it for me it's either us or them i think West Ham have dragged themselves and I think their momentum is getting them there all right they've got some tough games maybe they've had their you know their their their surge maybe it tapers off Forrest seem to be a little bit up and down up and down they're still not very good

43:02Jack:all right yeah I'm still I'm still not convinced by Forrest either I will say but would you know this leads leads are what I'm hanging my hat on leads are falling apart let's hope so um do we we've got to do it the refereeing against sunderland is i think was was one of the worst refereeing performances i've ever seen the inconsistent let's not even talk about week to week game to game let's just talk about instance to instance in this the the lack of consistency and a startling lack of consistency we're talking van de ven getting an instant yellow card for an innocuous coming together outside the box whereas you've got destiny a doggy being literally kind of pulled down by the throat and being tripped simultaneously and it just been waved on not even being a foul um we're talking about a penalty that's gone to var which okay if we're talking about var and we're slowing everything down you're gonna say well it looked like his momentum was shifting this way slightly before the foul was made so again in my opinion anyway that's still an assumption on the part of var that moani was definitely go he wasn't definitely going down at the point he was fouled it looked like he was headed that way but the actual fact the hard fact is he was fouled onine onine oh nine however you pronounce it took him out and regardless i don't think he was being tackled particularly cleanly from behind by the by the other person that was behind him i'm not sure which which sunderland defender it was but still okay so that penalty gets taken away from spurs another penalty that spurs don't get we haven't had a penalty all season um but i think again if we're talking about like egregious we're talking about brian brobby who again up top let's just say absolutely disgusting to hear that he's been racially abused by spurs fans online this is a football-wide problem and it's appalling have a absolute fucking word with yourself if you're doing that to players online i can't imagine anybody that listens to this is doing that i'd like to hope not but who knows um but still you know if on in the footballing sense the guy was an absolute thug yesterday and that's what you want from your players it's what you want from your players don't get me wrong but i think he pushed that quite literally um pushed that beyond its beyond its limits which culminated in the in the shove on romero it's a kinski this potentially seen romero miss a world cup now maybe didn't look like a nice didn't look like a nice kind of way knee jolted he was in tears there's that part of me there's that maybe that little kind of bitter pathetic part of me that's like spurs need to chase retrospective action on that one it was a it was nasty it was deliberate um it was dangerous um but other people i will obviously just say just get over it it was a little shove um but it was yesterday was particularly it was particularly maddening to see the decisions go the way that they did and also to just hear sky sports the commentary um and it was don goodman who's obviously a former sunderland player but whatever um but still sky sports continue to do that i'll get up spurs get on with it type narrative which creates for that potent mix where in your weaker moments you sit there and think are we being done here like are we being are we actually being diddled here and look the as you say the chances are everything is just conspiring to see Spurs have had injuries we're playing poorly and then every single poor decision that goes against us feels a thousand times worse because all of these games are hinged on these tiny tiny moments if Spurs got that penalty at the top maybe we hold on and win 1-0 who knows and then we're sat we're sat here now and spurs 15th in the league but we didn't that went against us sunderland go on to win um and then what creeps in is that feeling that maybe this is maybe this has happened one too many times this year maybe this is a conscious thing maybe this is a betting syndicate or maybe this is sky trying to increase the drama in the premier league and all these various different reasons i guess to to to not start this off on a conspiratorial note it was just again another example of poor officiating in the premier league um a poor use of something like var when we're talking about var being something that was supposedly going to make the game better it hasn't done it's made it ostensibly worse um and we're sat here again nurturing these feelings that there is a conspiracy against us but it just all feels a bit unfair to be a baby about it Adam it all feels a bit unfair and I want to take my ball and go back home you

47:49Adam Michie:know you're quite right to feel that way I'll be honest because I feel that way and I'm sure most Spurs fans feel that way because it when it happens so often like this isn't just occasional you know you get a bad decision here it's every game it's every it's been every single game and we talk about the aggregation of these things that come together to to just exacerbate matters Let's talk about things like you allow a certain player to get away with three, four fouls before you book them, right? That seems to happen more often than not against us this season. Players are allowed so much license to do whatever the fuck they want to our players.

48:31Adam Michie:Whereas we get booked with our first tackle. Every single game. And Broby yesterday was the perfect example of that. That guy could have been sent off at least twice. Do you know? And... When it comes down to those kind of things, I was reading something the other day, he was saying, oh, there's a referee and he was talking about how people talk about referees and how we just want consistency. And he goes, no, you don't want consistency. You just want your team to benefit. No, we don't. We just nearly want consistency. If you book a player for a certain type of tackle, whether it happens in the first minute or the 90th minute, just do that.

49:09Adam Michie:that you shouldn't give a game time to breathe. If you can score a goal in the first minute, you can send someone off in the first minute and you can certainly book them for a bookable offence in the first minute. So why do you give people leeway? Because then it just becomes more difficult for the referee because then he has to keep thinking, oh, I've already set a precedent now within this. Each game feels like a little kind of judicial bubble where, and particularly for Spurs, like the tariffs are so much higher for us. And then you go from game to game. Look at the tackle that Xabi Simmonds got sent off for.

49:46Adam Michie:Not 24 hours went by before the same thing happened. It happened against Arsenal. So my bias is not shown here. I think somebody did it to Havertz and got booked for it. It's the same thing. And it's happened time and time again. The same type or tariff of challenge we're being more judgely treated on. and then you aggregate that up. Players, I mean, look, they're the most competitive creatures on earth. If you feel that you can take an inch, you will take a mile. Broby did that yesterday. Countless players have done it against us this season. If you feel like you can get away with it, you push it and you push it and you push it.

50:22Adam Michie:It's no wonder we've got so many bloody injuries. We get a total lack of protection. I'm not calling it conspiracy. I'm not saying any of that. I'm just saying they're shit. and it seems to be that their shitness rubs off on us more than anybody else i mean

50:38Jack:if it's less of a conspiracy something i've touched on before we fill on here is that there can just be narratives that are imprinted even in the officials heads like romero is rash romero is yes and romero is rash and romero is a tough tackling player but there were plenty of tough tackling players in the Premier League. Why is there this razor focus on pretty much everything that he does all the time? And that narrative is set by Sky Sports.

51:07Adam Michie:Jack, have you seen what was put out today? You know the review with Gallagher and Boothroyd? The two of them are looking at that. Says something along the lines of, well, you know, if the goalkeeper wasn't there, then it wouldn't have been an issue. So fucking what, mate? He was there and he pushed him into him. He caused a serious collision. What has that got to do with anything? And he's taken a look at it.

51:35Jack:He's taken a look at it before he shoved him as well.

51:38Adam Michie:And this will boil your piss even more because honestly, my head was spinning when I saw this. And I tried to disengage from Sky Sports because I know they're awful. And I know it's just rage baiting, you know, with an£80 subscription. Fucking works though, doesn't it? Yeah, well, not for me. I don't touch him with a barge bolt But yeah, they clip it up, they put it on Twitter And that's how they get me But yeah, Boothroyd, he goes Well, do you know, it's always Drives me nuts about, you know, for forwards If you're a forward and a player's Shielding the ball, they basically made it Out as if it was Romero brought it on Himself by, sorry, defending Defending the ball that was approaching His goalkeeper, right Broby had no chance of getting to it There was maybe, what, a five-yard period of which Romero was shepherding it towards his goalkeeper who was coming out towards him, right?

52:29Adam Michie:Broby knew that. Everyone knew that. He shoves him in the back, they collide. Gallagher says, oh, well, if the keeper wasn't there, then it would have been all right. Yep, he wasn't. And Boothroyd saying, oh, well, he shouldn't be shielding the ball. What should he be doing there? What's he supposed to be doing? It's literally his job.

52:45Jack:Nuts. But we're just in this, you know, two plus two equals five type reality when it comes to Spurs and the way they're spoken about. And it, fine, great. It makes for more headlines for Sky. That is their narrative. That's the drama they want to focus on because, you know, they don't want to go too hard on the title race yet because it's, you know, it still kind of looks like it's in, I mean, I think it is, is it in Man City's hands now? It is, yeah. If they win all their games, they win, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, power's back in their hands or whatever, but I'm sure they'll ramp that one up towards the end of the season.

53:24Jack:But still, Spurs getting relegated arguably is a bigger story than Arsenal winning the Premier League. So there's more focus on that. But they don't half let you know about it. And this stuff is just disingenuous though. It's totally disingenuous and it is infuriating. And whether or not it is a big grand conspiracy that's conscious, I do think these type of narratives look what can you do you can't you know is there an offcom is there some sort of regulatory media power that can say actually you shouldn't be saying this all the time of course not you know we have a sense of freedom of speech at least in this country freedom of press so look it's drama and it's silly and we're on the receiving end of it but it feels like more often than not we are that team that is on the receiving end of it and if we do go down i don't think that's going to stop you know sky still cover the the championship i tell

54:21Adam Michie:you i tell you what the bellwether is for this though and it is that opposition fans are picking up on it they're going oh that's yeah spurs have been all done by there i saw i did see a few of

54:31Jack:that i saw even a few arsenal fans saying chelsea fans and i'm just like look if they're saying it we're not imagining it let's i mean i don't want to keep for too much longer than but there is there is i guess one thing that might be a bit of a premature conversation to be having but just something that's been bothering me quite a bit today is the feeling about the threat of relegation because you know i i get it i get that a lot of people are blue skying this saying does this sense that it could be i looked at so say for example i looked at you know a team like riverplay and riverplay you can't really compare them to top them because riverplay are a liverpool of argentina right they're one of the biggest clubs in the history of the sport out there but they had two or three seasons of mismanagement at the top they had some financial issues as well on top of that but still there was mismanagement they wobbled for two three years and then in 2011 they went down they tore everything up again saw what they had to do came back up the next season and from that point on they've gone on to win the lot again they've won the south american champions league once, maybe a couple of times actually in that time.

55:40Jack:They've won the league two or three times in that point. They've won the League Cup and the equivalent of the FA Cup several times over that period. So, you know, I get it. There's this sense that Spurs are in a mess and maybe we're going to need something like this to be able to really tear the squad apart, make the wholesale changes that we need to, blood some of the youngsters, make players like Kevin Danso who seem like solid, decent players, more a part of the starting 11, for example. And I get that. I get that sort of the copium behind that. But for me, there's this lingering feeling that this club isn't built for that anymore.

56:21Jack:This club isn't built for this football manager-like approach to everything. The stadium, the training ground, all of it is built for a club that wants to be playing Champions League football every other year. let's let's take it on less of a say an emotional thematic sense we have a mountain of debt behind us like this is a and flav as i keep saying flav on the lab has has done a an interesting pod going into some of the finances um you know a lot of it is is very interesting food for thought and helps to shave off a lot of the anxiety but some of it i still feel i'm not even a pop at it i'm just saying a lot of it still for me doesn't address the fundamental issue that spurs have tons of debt we owe like 300 million pounds for play if i'm if the figures i sort of picked up on reddit are to be are to be taken so this is i did a little look into it reddit says that so our debt or gross debt stands at 1.2 million pound most of this is tied to infrastructure and stadium financing about 240 million pounds but it could waver to about 300 million pounds in net outstanding transfer fees to other clubs for past signings.

57:32Jack:We've recently recorded our largest ever pre-tax loss of roughly 120 million pounds, parading costs ballooning to about 668 million pounds. So the drop to the championship is going to trigger an estimated minimum direct financial loss of about 150 million pounds in TV and commercial revenue, which is going to put a massive amount of strain on our ability to service like the debt that we already have. if we're talking about a fire sale we're talking about getting rid of van de van romero xavi siemens whoever else that we we can get anything for we're also talking about the fact that we're going to need to buy serviceable championship players to supplement the squad we're not going to get we bought xavi siemens what close to 60 million we owe a lot of that still probably still to to leipzig or pierce i can't remember did pierce still own them at that point or they might some kind of something some hook in him somewhere or other something or ever we're not going to get what we paid for him thus we're still going to have overheads on a lot of these players that we still owe money for i just look the the thing for me is that i get it i get it in a blue sky sense we clear the squad out we buy players that are going to say take us back up to the premier league but it ignores the fact that the championship is an incredibly difficult league um is an incredibly difficult league to perform in ignores the emotional fact that Spurs coming down to the championship is going to be a massive and that's not an arrogant Spurs fan take it's a massive anomaly we're a huge huge huge day out for a lot of teams there coming to our ground being able to get one over us to bloody our noses is going to be a massive carrot for loads of club for loads of teams down there I think there's a lot of this sense that like we're just going to be able to sort of float our way back up to the Premier League by playing Mikey Moore and Archie Gray and just ignoring the fact that there's a lot of really battle-hardened championship clogging players down there that are going to be agricultural on us and on these young players like so say we say we do sign more players at a championship ready right then we're in that cycle of what happens when we come up back up to the premier league and suddenly we've got a team that's built for championship football we've then got a fight to stay in the premier league again and the cycle continues.

59:50Jack:And my point is, the reason why I bring up the debt is because there's only so long, right? There's only so long that the glittering lights of the Champions League and the partnership of Kane and Son and whatever's come to the point of us building this ground is actually relevant at all for Spurs. At some point, and yeah, there's parachute payments, I get there, but at some point, we're going to have to address this debt. A lot of this debt is accounted for the fact that we're a Premier League team and a Premier League team that's probably in Europe most seasons, more seasons than it's not. There comes a point when you're not that club anymore and that debt catches up on you.

1:00:27Jack:There's only so much water you can push out of a sinking ship. And for me, relegation is the start of a very, very dangerous and slippery slope for Spurs. And I don't think a lot of people really want to take that face on. And I don't know entirely what I'm talking about when it comes to this stuff. But just on a really basic fundamental level, I feel like this is not good for Spurs. And I hate being a doomer about this type of thing, but I'm honestly, mate, I'm really worried about the future of the club if we get relegated.

1:01:03Adam Michie:Tomorrow morning is knocking.

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1:01:18Adam Michie:I think you're right to be, but I think with a lot of these things, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Like, one, it is not going to be a picnic. It's not going to be a happy procession from, you know, minute one in August all the way through to May, and we just get promoted with 100 and whatever it is points. That isn't going to happen. I also, I'm not 100 % on this idea that it would spell financial disaster. I think the one thing that Daniel Levy had going for him is that he did set us, at least on a financial sense, with a serious amount of stability. The fact that our wages, though high in terms of revenue, you know, they're about 44 % or whatever I think it is.

1:02:05Adam Michie:As soon as you get relegated, you halve that wage bill. according to the contracts that they've got. I think, you know, there's, I reckon, 10 to 15 players who will leave. I mean, I've got a list. Very quickly, I think it'll be Vicario, Poro, Dodoghi, Romero, Van der Ven, Dragosheen, Helene Yoron, he's not ours anyway, Benz and Kerr, Bissouma, Kuliseski, Simmonds, Kudus, Richarlison, and Chuck Solomon in there, because he still belongs to us. I think of that, you're probably going to get close to 200 odd million pounds, maybe more. You know, it's going to be a big sale, but it's going to be in the contract that they've got will be an amount of money that they can leave on if we get relegated.

1:02:44Adam Michie:And I'm sure they're not going to sell themselves short. I don't think that'd be that dumb. So I think, you know, you think 10 to 15 players, let's say 40 million a pop, it's quite a lot of money, right? Then, like you say, you've got to backfill. You've got to get the right battle-hardened type of players who's ready for the Saturday, Tuesday type of football against, you know, some proper shithouse teams, like teams that are, you know, just ugly, rough and tumble championship teams, but with some quality to them, to be fair. If you've ever watched the championship, I know it's not everyone's cup of tea.

1:03:18Adam Michie:I actually really enjoy it because it's so tight most games and there's usually a lot of stuff going on. Quality is not top draw all the time, but then look at the Premier League this season. Not exactly the best either. So I think we've probably got a core of players who I think will say, I suspect that someone like Spence might stay because I'm not sure anyone will want him. I'm basing that on not much. I suspect Gallagher might stay purely because he's fresh in and I don't think anyone's going to want to pick him up.

1:03:50Jack:There's been some talk about maybe loaning somebody like a Gallagher for a season and then we pick him back up when we come up or whatever.

1:03:58Adam Michie:And then people like, I think, you know, Odderbear and Tell, I think they'd stay and I think they'd be bloody good.

1:04:05Jack:I don't think they'll have much option in that either.

1:04:07Adam Michie:Correct. Bergvau, I'm 50-50 on. I don't know. Gray, I think he'd stay. Sarr, maybe. I don't know. And then you've got people like Danso, who you've already mentioned, who I think would be ideal. You've got Phillips, who plays at Stoke and has basically had an incredibly good season and has been in the Championship for the last three seasons. He could come in straight into our back line and know the league inside out. exactly perfect position for him to come in and slot in. You've got people like Moore, who you mentioned, is literally getting the shit kicked out of him by Kilmarnock and Motherwell week in, week out.

1:04:45Adam Michie:I mean, he's not going to worry too much about coming into the Championship either. I think there's green shoots. I don't think it's doom and gloom. I think there is a core of players. Look at Lancashire. Look at the young Scottish lad, Wilson, who we brought in January, but everyone's forgotten about. Mason Melia, I know they're young kids, but those two are starting to play together. They're starting to score at the youth level. All right, it's a huge leap. But look what Lancashire's done. You know, I think he's got, what is it, nearly 10 goals for Oxford this year? In a poor team. I think something like that, yeah.

1:05:16Adam Michie:We've got Devine and Donnelly

1:05:18Jack:talking about.

1:05:18Adam Michie:Devine, Donnelly, Dorrington. Hey, let's bring Valise back. Is Valise still our player? I can't even remember if he's our player. I think we actually sold him. Did we get rid of him? Maybe we got rid of him. I think so, yeah. We've got Yang. Yang was ripping it up for QPR. He didn't have such a good time at Portsmouth. And he's at Coventry now, I think. And he hasn't played. But I mean, Coventry and Motoring, so they don't need anybody. But he did well at QPR. So I don't think it's doom and gloom. We do have these kind of really good kids. Look at Ajayi, Olasusi, Scarlett. Dane Scarlett. This might be the making of it.

1:05:57Adam Michie:It's not all doom and gloom. Obviously, yeah, it's a massive hit. It's a hit to the pride more than anything else. It will be costly, but I don't rule out us bouncing straight back up. I think we would have the envy in terms of revenues outside of football of the whole league. That's something that's in our favour. I think the debt against the ground is what it is. That's managed, self-contained. Transfer debt, I think, could probably be largely taken care of by the fact we're going to ship a load of people out. The squad wage bill will be slashed. And I think players, the best players, are going to want to come and play for Tottenham because they will look at it as going, one, play for a massive club.

1:06:39Adam Michie:Two, this might be our turbo-boosted route into the Premier League. So I'm certainly not going to look on the bright side completely of it. It's awful. And there will be some very dark moments in December and January where we're slugging it out. But I don't think it's Dooban Gloom. I think we may have the right type of players potentially available. Ben Davis, Ben Davis, maybe he could be our leader. You know, if he comes back in, he's a rough and tumble kind of guy, you know, and he's Tottenham to the core. Adam, I hope you're right, mate.

1:07:20Jack:You know, I have been spiraling a bit these past few days. It's funny, it comes in waves, doesn't it? because with the acceptance that I feel like we're going down is now suddenly becoming, there's a whole new sort of raft of different anxieties and things that I'd perhaps push down a bit. Things like this, the finances, things like the actual squad building itself. Did you have Madison on your list, by the way? Madison's on there. Madison's on there. You know, my only concern... He's coming to the end of his career. I don't think he'll want to be playing in the championship.

1:07:51Adam Michie:Although, the Coventry link, that bothers me.

1:07:54Jack:Oh, yeah. yeah um do you think they want the homecoming i can see the homecoming hero you can see that i can

1:08:01Adam Michie:see it but then i can also see that madison goes look they stuck with me all the way through this

1:08:05Jack:you know and he i think he's got a year left in his contract next year though oh christ well there

1:08:11Adam Michie:you go i think so it's tricky my only i say only caveat there's loads of caveats but the one thing is that we're relying on the people who left us with like five players on the bench in the champions league to squad build right same people are still squad building so um that that's for me that's that's the um the fly in the ointment is the same people are in charge two seasons left with uh

1:08:35Jack:madison 27 28 season so 27 28 season is his contracts up um but yeah i agree enic get rid i mean there's there's going to be hours and hours and hours of conversation about vinay Venkatesh and Johan Langer, Viv Lewis and the whole gang to come this summer, whether we stay up or whether we go down. So, you know, there we go. But Adam, mate, it's always a pleasure chatting to you, mate. And thank you for, I guess, putting me on an even keel at times when I'm perhaps starting to like, you know, lose it a bit. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I appreciate it, mate. I appreciate it. Where can people follow you if they want to?

1:09:16Adam Michie:I am purely a Twitter merchant, flicks and tricks and you can find me there uh drop me a line i had a few few followers from the last time i spoke to you which is great had some good chats with those guys yeah it's always good to to meet fellow spurs fans albeit um online all good and of course i will say that if you

1:09:33Jack:didn't listen to the last pod i had with uh with adam we spoke a lot about his book orienteering on that orientation orientation sorry orientation god that's what a good plug for me i didn't even get the name of the book right orientation which is about his journey into non-league not non-league that's harsh not non-league it was quiet wasn't it didn't they go I thought they went

1:09:56Adam Michie:no not that season it was league one okay well we might be there soon

1:09:59Jack:never know I'm making a horror show of selling this book aren't I but still you know brilliant love that work read his book it was good there you go there you go well recovered thank you mate thank you thanks a lot Jack

1:10:14Thank you.