When Jose Mourinho was appointed as Tottenham Hotspur manager in November 2019, there was some understandable scepticism at his suitability for the role.
His final days at Manchester United made some wonder if his time at the top was over, such was the lifelessness of his team and apparent lack of ideas in the dugout.
However, just 12 months on from his appointment, he has his current side top of the Premier League table with 20 points from nine games.
So, what has changed for Mourinho? And what does he have now that he didn’t at Old Trafford?
Mourinho notably didn’t get the backing of the United board to make the signings he wanted in the summer of 2018, with the most significant issue concerning the failure to land one of the manager’s central defensive targets after expensive moves for Eric Bailly and Victor Lindelof in previous seasons.
At Spurs , however, the manager has identified key targets and been given the green light to bring them in. Whether the same would apply in the manager’s third season is a matter of debate, of course, but for now he is being backed.
We have seen this targeted approach reap benefits over the summer, with Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg - a key target more or less from the moment it became clear the former Southampton man would be available - making an immediate impact on the pitch.
Part of the reason why things have gone so swimmingly, of course, is the presence of an established partnership in attack.
While Harry Kane’s role has developed under Mourinho, his understanding with Son Heung-min long pre-dates the arrival of the Portuguese manager.
Such a relationship was never even allowed to develop at Old Trafford, however, thanks in part to Mourinho’s own decision-making.
By introducing Zlatan Ibrahimovic to the fold in 2016, he made space for what he considered a sure thing in attack, but at the expense of developing relationships between the likes of Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford.
Even when the Swede became less critical and moved towards the exit door, the introduction of Alexis Sanchez further hindered such development.
Had Martial and Rashford been more established in their partnership by the time Mourinho arrived - as is the case with Kane and Son - he might have felt confident enough to work with what he had. Instead, though, he forced himself to continually reset in attack to the detriment of his team.
As was the case with Ibrahimovic in that first season, there is an argument that Mourinho’s efforts to develop anything sustainable at Old Trafford was hindered by the short-term displays of David De Gea in the manager’s second year.
The form of the goalkeeper helped patch over deficiencies elsewhere in the squad, and indeed might have been seen as justification from the higher-ups that defensive recruitment was unnecessary, and yet as soon as the unsustainable 2017/18 form returned to merely above-average goalkeeping, the wheels started to come off.
While Hugo Lloris is not a limited goalkeeper by any stretch, Mourinho now knows he won’t be repeatedly bailed out by a superhuman presence between the sticks. This has forced his hand somewhat, requiring a more solid all-round approach.
Tottenham haven’t been afraid to absorb pressure in Mourinho’s system, picking up three wins in league games where they had less than 50% possession (per StatsBomb/FBRef ), but it has been an approach of containment as a team rather than reliance on one man, meaning there are plenty of individuals in place to sweep up danger when needed.
While we’re only a handful of games into the new season, it would be wrong to get too carried away by Spurs’ development under Mourinho. There are still areas of fragility, and injuries to one or two key men could still do the team untold harm.
However, the differences between his team this season and the one he left in Manchester are anything but superficial, and we can certainly point to significant ways in which he appears to have grown in application as well as opportunity.
The trick now is keeping it going.
