Spurcastle United?

Harry Redknapp has been hailed as the man that can turn around Tottenham’s season, Harry Houdini, the escape artist.

Spurs third manager in just over a year claims he is the man who can “keep Tottenham up”—cue rejoicing Spurs fans.

But why is keeping Tottenham up such a bold claim?

It wasn’t long ago Martin Jol was being praised for his efforts in the league, or Juande Ramos for his Carling Cup victory.

Yet Spurs still insist on another change of manager, yes Ramos had not produced this season and he was unlikely to survive much longer on the poor run of results he’d had, as any manager outside the top four would have.

It harks back to Newcastle of a few seasons ago, after successive seasons in the Champions League and a reign spanning five seasons Bobby Robson was given the boot.

Self-destruct initialised.

After producing a fairly mediocre display all season, Graeme Souness managed to produce championship winning form at the end of the season and pull Newcastle up, from twelfth with eight games to go to seventh and a place in Europe.

But it wasn’t hard to see that despite it having the same players Souness was far from having the same effect that Robson had presided over.

Souness was sacked and Glenn Roeder earned a crack at the job after an impressive caretaker spell.

After just over a year, and without having the opportunity of fielding Michael Owen throughout his spell, Roeder was shown the exit.

Sam Allardyce came in and out within the space of six months and after Kevin Keegan made a cameo appearance the St. James' Park hot seat has become so uninviting that no current Premier League manager wants it.

Throughout this time Newcastle’s league positions have continually fallen despite the amount of money being spent.

Attacking players like Albert Luque, Belozoglu Emre, Obafemi Martins, and Michael Owen all being brought in despite the problems that Newcastle have consistently had at the back.

When Robson asked for a defender Freddy Shepherd, chairman at the time, decided to bid for Wayne Rooney instead.

Poor leadership in the boardroom—not the changing room—has destroyed a club that was looking like realising some of the potential it has in it and Spurs are in danger of going the same way.

Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy acted swiftly bringing in Harry Redknapp as a replacement for Ramos and has decided to axe the role of sporting director completely.

It’s a move that could save Tottenham from becoming the next Newcastle as Levy claims they are “returning to a more traditional style of football management.”

If they hold on to Harry and give him the time he needs then he may take them to success but they have to be sure exactly what success means.

Liverpool look like serious title contenders this year but it has taken a long time to get there despite being comfortably inside the “Big Four” for a long time.

It will take a team many seasons to break the “Big Four”, and in the same way Newcastle’s expectations got too high too soon it seems Spurs may have too.

Jol took them within millimetres of Champions League football but they just weren’t ready and he wasn’t given the opportunity to keep going with the squad he had built.

Spurs have the potential to be a big team, as they are one of many sleeping giants that are floating around the Premier League at the moment.

But if they’re not careful, they could become a sinking giant.