Daniel Levy will be the latest chairman to feel the wrath of his club’s supporters as Tottenham Hotspur fans prepare to protest outside the stadium on Saturday.
Demonstrators will vent their frustrations at Levy and Joe Lewis, the billionaire owner of ENIC, who hold an 85.55 per cent stake in Spurs.
The Spurs board were the last of the so-called Big Six to apologise over the European Super League fallout, claiming in a statement that they should have “challenged and reconsidered” the uncompetitive nature of the breakaway league.
However, anger towards Levy has been building over a number of years, particularly over his perceived lack of investment in the first team.
Between 2018 and 2019, Spurs went two transfer windows without signing a single player, becoming the first team in Premier League history not to make any additions over an entire summer.
The Lilywhites could not keep up the momentum of their 2016 and 2017 title challenges and with many of the stalwarts of the Mauricio Pochettino era – such as Kyle Walker, Christian Eriksen, Jan Vertonghen and Mousa Dembele – now departed, the club look set to miss out on the top four for the second successive season.
Pochettino warned that the rebuild would be “painful” and despite widespread praise for the delivery of the £1bn Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, the Argentine’s famous prophecy has come back to haunt his former club: “If you want to have a lovely house, maybe you need better furniture.”
The 49-year-old was sacked in November 2019 with Spurs 14th in the Premier League. The decision to replace him with Jose Mourinho was divisive and the Portuguese was fired 17 months later.
Since ENIC’s takeover from Alan Sugar in 2001, Spurs have won just one trophy – the 2008 Carling Cup – but their off-field strategy has also come under fire since the start of the pandemic.
In 2020, 550 non-playing staff were initially played on the government’s furlough scheme, only for that move to be reversed amidst a backlash.
Tensions finally reached a head in April, when the Tottenham Hotspur Supporters’ Trust called for the executive board – which includes Levy – to resign. In the same week, a smaller protest outside the ground witnessed fans singing “Daniel Levy, get out of our club” and “we want ENIC out”.
Saturday’s protest is expected to be much bigger in scale and will take place the day before Spurs host Wolves. Three days after that, fans will be able to return against Aston Villa as lockdown restrictions ease – but all adult tickets have been priced at £60, regardless of the area of the ground.
Why are Spurs fans protesting?
The demonstration is being organised by a group called “To dare is too dear” who told i:
“For me it started when [Martin] Jol was sacked at half time, but I went fully ‘ENIC out’ in the Champions League season of 2010-11 where Harry [Redknapp] wasn’t backed. And we ended up with [Louis] Saha and [Ryan] Nelsen.
“We’ve been waiting for years for a chance to do something like Saturday. Many of us have been doing our own thing for years. Taking abuse and hatred from fellow fans. But in the last year that we have been gradually finding each other and trying to work together.
“Failing to back Pochettino was very poor. What we are seeing is the after effects of the last couple of seasons, having England’s highest season-ticket prices for what seems a lack of investment in the team is another way of insulting us. As for the protest, it’s the only way to get ourselves heard. We obviously can’t attend matches. So it’s come to this.”
Billy Cairns, one of the fans behind the protest, echoed that view. “There’s been a lack of interest in the playing side of the project,” he said. “How can you employ Spurs’ most successful manager of recent times [Pochettino], sack him, and not be held accountable.”
Billie, another of the Spurs fans attending, added: “The Super League was the lowest point in a series of increasingly low lows. We pay the highest season-ticket prices in Europe but have witnessed one trophy in 20 years. The fans have had enough. Change is needed.”
Cenk, who runs fansite The Spurs Web, will also be in attendance. “As a fanbase, we are tired of overpriced tickets, poor recruitment, and a lack of consistent adequate investment into the first team,” he said. “The ESL has also fired this up. Our aim is to put pressure on the board to act quickly, and for them to understand that anything on the lines of the ESL should never happen again.”
Meanwhile, interim coach Ryan Mason called for unity with three games left of his side’s Premier League campaign to go.
“I respect the fans, they’re the heart and soul of the football club and their opinion matters, it really does,” he said.
“We want our fans, our team, our football club to be aligned, all pulling in the same direction. But what I will say, our chairman and our board have done incredibly for this football club in the last 10, 15 or 20 years since they’ve been here.
“I know how fans see that, I know how fans respect that as well. The most important thing for me is the connection between fans, players and everyone involved in the football club.
“They’re entitled to their opinion, there’s also Wednesday next week when they can come and help and support the team. I’m sure that’s in the back of their minds as well, to get back in our beautiful stadium and hopefully help the team… that will be a massive bonus for them.”
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