When Antonio Conte was hired by Tottenham last season, the expectations were that an elite coach such as himself, who is renowned as a serial winner would finally end the club’s trophy drought.
Amidst question marks about the former Inter Milan boss’ ability to coach an attack and blood in a free-flowing style of play, exiting the Carabao Cup in the Third Round at the hands of Nottingham Forest certainly did not help matters.
The Italian tactician’s side were typically all over the place, as Renan Lodi and Jesse Lingard fired Forest to an unlikely 2-0 win on Wednesday night.
With Tottenham’s chances of lifting either a Premier League or a Champions League trophy being virtually impossible, the Carabao Cup was one of the club’s two chances at winning silverware at the end of the season.
Keeping that in mind, former Spurs midfielder and active pundit, Jamie O’Hara was livid about the side’s exit from the competition.
“It’s not good enough! If we [Tottenham] scrape in the top four, great. Champions League football, well done. But we want a trophy!”
“That tonight [loss to Forest] Dean [Saunders] is a massive chance to get into a last-16 of a competition where Arsenal have gone out, Chelsea have gone out, big teams have gone out of the competition, we’ve got a chance!”, he told talkSPORT.
O’Hara continued, “But you get beat by Nottingham Forest? No disrespect, they’re a Premier League team, they’re a decent side but come on. When you’ve got players like Harry Kane in your side, you’ve got to win them games! You’ve got to set a standard.”
“And the standards at Tottenham all of a sudden are just falling off a cliff and I don’t know what the answer is.”
Tottenham fans seem to be in agreement with Jamie O’Hara, as a defeat to an unfancied Nottingham Forest side of all teams is a frustrating one, considering all eyes are constantly on the club to finally lift their first piece of silverware since 2008.
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