Why Tottenham Hotspur Fans Should Be Setting Their Sights A Little Higher

On this site yesterday there was a lot of discussion over a piece linking us to two Blackburn Rovers players. Those players, Christopher Samba and Junior Hoilett, are experience Premier League players that would allegedly cost the Tottenham Hotspur a combined £15 million pounds. It's not an outrageous price, certainly not for 2 players who are, at the very least, capable of starting for some teams in the English Premier League.

However, it seems like Spurs fans have forgotten that Tottenham Hotspur are not "some teams". For too long Tottenham fans have been in the mindset of simply qualifying for the getting close to the Big Four. Now, however, we're in a new era of English Football. There are, essentially, six big clubs competing for four Champions League places.

Tottenham Hotspur NEED to secure one of those four Champions League spots. We, unlike Arsenal or Liverpool, would certainly be hurt by another season without Champions League Football. Why? Because our best players (Luka Modric and Gareth Bale) should be playing in the Champions League and if they won't be playing there for Spurs, they'll be playing there for someone else before too long.

So, how do we as fans adjust from the mindset of simply getting up there with the big boys to going out and smashing them? It's really quite simple. We have to set out sights a little higher.

When we wrote yesterday about potentially signing Hoilett and Samba there was a lot of disagreement between not only the folks in the commentariat, but also between the staff of Cartilage Free Captain. All of us think Junior Hoilett and Christopher Samba are good players. They are certainly Premier League quality. Most of us that both could do a job for Spurs. Only one of the writers here, though, thinks that either of these two (or maybe just Hoilett) might actually be good moves.

The truth of the matter is that these players are not the kind of "special player" that is going to lift a club from Champions League contender to title contender. Let's face it, at this point, year in and year our Tottenham are contending for the Champions League. This isn't ten years ago when the club finished 12th, 9th, 10th, 14th, and 9th in successive years. Spurs are in the midst of a run the has seen them finish fifth or better in four of the last six years. We're no longer playing catch-up.

Now that we're Champions League contenders, what is the next step? Title contenders! To make that step Spurs need special players. You're absolutely outside of your mind if you think a player like Junior Hoilett would start for Manchester United and Manchester City, Chelsea, and Arsenal when everyone is fit. So why should we even be thinking about him?

Whatever players, if any, that Tottenham Hotspur buy in January and in the coming seasons should be bought with one thing in mind: how will this player help us win the league. I know, that sounds overly ambitious. Maybe I have been drinking a bit too much of the Kool-Aid, but is it wrong as a club to set our sights on the league title? I don't think it is.

For a closing thought, I will refer you to the great Bill Nicholson, the man who is Tottenham Hotspur:

It is better to fail aiming high than to succeed aiming low. And we of Spurs have set our sights very high... so high, in fact, that even failure will have in it an echo of glory! ― Bill Nicholson OBE