Alan Shearer has warned Thomas Frank that Tottenham will be a “hugely different environment” to the one he worked in at Brentford.
The Dane was announced as Spurs’ new head coach on Thursday after Ange Postecoglou was sacked six days earlier. Postecoglou was relieved of his duties despite guiding the club to Europa League success over Manchester United.
Frank signed a three-year contract with the Lilywhites after impressing at Brentford, where he turned the Bees into a stable Premier League side after getting them promoted from the Championship in 2021. The challenge for Frank now is to improve Tottenham’s league form while also building a side capable of challenging for trophies.
Former Newcastle United striker Shearer believes the journey will be “fascinating”. Speaking to Betfair, Shearer said: “Thomas Frank has done an unbelievable job at Brentford. You look at the turnover of players, the money made in terms of how their system worked at Brentford. He’s such a nice guy too.
“I was lucky enough to work with him at the Euros with the BBC. He’s a great guy, and he deserves a chance to go to a club that should be winning trophies, Spurs have won a trophy now and hopefully can kick on. But he’s going to a very differently run team and it’ll be fascinating to see how it works out.
“In terms of him being given the opportunity, I’m delighted for him. I don’t want to be disrespectful to Brentford but I’m not surprised at all that ‘bigger’ clubs have come in for him. When you look at the way he’s managed Brentford, coached players that were pretty unknown before they came into the Premier League and how high he’s pushed them. I’m not surprised he’s been chased by bigger football clubs than Brentford.
“I hope he does really well, but what I will say is that he’s walking into a hugely different environment in terms of how the club is run at Spurs compared to Brentford.”
Postecoglou is now out of work but should not have trouble finding another club, according to Shearer. “Imagine you haven’t won a trophy for 17 years, and a lot longer than that in European football, and you had a manager who had a tonne of injuries but still delivered the trophy and Champions League football, then you sack him,” Shearer said.
“They’ll have their reasons for the decision, I get that. Perhaps because they finished fourth from bottom then you may have to look at the bigger picture but I was surprised. When a manager delivers what he says he will, with an incredible injury list then yeah, sometimes I look at it and think about what a crazy game football is.
“I’m not surprised fans got behind him because he said he’d deliver a trophy and he did it. He promised he’d do that and I guess the reward for it is, he got the sack. If you look at it from Ange’s point-of-view, Spurs are obviously a very difficult club to manage so I hope he gets a really good payoff, the fans will remember him forever and there’s no doubt he’ll get another big job.
“I really do think that Premier League teams will be looking at him. I hope he gets a job in the Premier League. The argument is that Tottenham finished fourth bottom and they were really, really poor. You can’t argue against that, but the bigger picture is that he delivered them a trophy that they so badly and desperately wanted, like Newcastle did. It’d been so long and he’s given them Champions League football next season. I guess he’ll go off with a big payoff, smile and watch them in the Champions League next season.”
Thomas Frank is Spurs’ new head coach! But what job does he have on his hands? Click here to listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham discussing Frank’s task ahead! Or click here to watch on YouTube!
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