Less than a month into the new year, it feels like every new week is centered around a different manager in the hot seat. Enzo Maresca, Ruben Amorim and Xabi Alonso are all out of jobs just 20 days into 2026 and by all accounts, Tottenham Hotspur’s Thomas Frank feels like a natural next person of interest. His experiences, though, seem to be very different from his now unemployed colleagues.
“I’ve just been feeling the trust along the way. I’ve said that every press meeting, that there’s backing and support,” Frank said in a press conference on Monday ahead of Spurs’ clash with Borussia Dortmund in the UEFA Champions League. “I had lunch with Nick [Beucher, co-chief executive] and Vinai [Venkatesham, CEO] and Johan [Lange, sporting director] today, so all good. I know it’s part of the media circus and the only focus I have is to do everything I can for us to win against Dortmund. I’ve said many times and I’ll say it again, as long as we win football matches and make sure we win enough of them, then everyone will support us.”
Frank is not wrong about the last part — win, and just about every trouble in the world goes away for a sports team. The problem for him, though, is that Spurs have not been winning all that often lately, and not in the way Alonso was not winning games at Real Madrid. Frank’s side enter Tuesday’s match with just two wins in their last eight and none in their last five, their most recent result a 2-1 defeat to relegation contenders West Ham United that pushed the limits of boredom and ineffectiveness. Look a little further back and the picture is even bleaker — Spurs have won just four games in all competitions since the end of October. He clearly has enough support from the higher-ups to leave him in charge of the team for at least another 24 hours, but his tenure so far at Spurs forces an existential question: Is this situation even tenable anymore?
How to watch Tottenham Hotspur vs. Borussia Dortmund, odds
- Date: Tuesday, Jan. 20 | Time: 3 p.m. ET
- Location: Tottenham Hotspur Stadium — London
- Live stream: Paramount+
- Odds: Tottenham Hotspur +180; Draw +250; Borussia Dortmund +145
Tottenham’s humdrum run of form, which currently has them in 14th place in the Premier League, is more than just Frank’s fault. Years of poor squad building means, at best, they are likely only good enough to be on the outside looking in at a top four finish, something that will be magnified on Tuesday. Frank will have only 11 senior team players available against Dortmund, mostly through a round of injuries while Micky van de Ven — one of Spurs’ few high-caliber players — will miss the match through suspension. Just as it was for his predecessor Ange Postecoglou a year ago, Frank will have his work cut out for him.
The issue for Frank, though, is that he has not made matters better. The things that are in his control have not taken Spurs all that much higher than the 17th place finish they managed in the Premier League last season, none of Frank’s value propositions really taking the team up a level. He was likely valued for a defensive organization that Postecoglou’s Spurs lacked and though their numbers have improved in that category, Frank’s version of the team is midtable at best in that territory and prone to blunders. They have just four clean sheets since their slump began in late October, a run of 18 matches.
He has been overly conservative at times in defense, frequently pairing the redundant duo of Joao Palhinha and Rodrigo Bentancur as midfield anchors until the latter picked up a lengthy hamstring injury this month. What Frank has truly sacrificed along the way, though, is any coherent attacking idea — Spurs have only generated one or more expected goal eight times in their last 18 games, the lowlights including a loss against Chelsea in which they took three shots and mustered together 0.12 expected goals and a defeat to Arsenal weeks later that saw them take three shots worth a shockingly low 0.07 expected goals. Cohesive attacking ideas, outside of capitalizing on set pieces, feel few and far between for Frank’s version of Spurs, which is where their form has taken a real pounding. Their average expected goals tally per game slid from 1.5 last season to 1.2 this campaign and they currently rank 17th in the Premier League when sorting teams in that category.
CBS Sports
Somehow, the opportunity is still ripe for Spurs – and Frank – to drum up something meaningful this season, at least in the Champions League. They share the exact same record as Dortmund heading into Tuesday’s match, three wins, two draws and one loss, and sit just one point outside of the top eight, though elimination in the league phase feels unlikely at this stage of the competition. If there is one team who feel more poised to take advantage of the opportunity in front of them, though, it’s Dortmund. Bayern Munich may be running away with the Bundesliga title once again this season, but Niko Kovac’s side have cemented themselves as Germany‘s next best team, all while keeping busy in front of goal in the Champions League with 19 goals in six games.
In North London on Tuesday, Dortmund technically have a chance to notch a first statement win in Europe this season but one has to ask what type of statement it would actually be. Dortmund may have been on the wrong side of a lopsided defeat to Manchester City but they have otherwise held their own in various Champions League tests this season, most notable among them a 4-0 pummeling of Villarreal, who are currently third place in La Liga.
Tuesday’s game, then, presents a chance for Frank and Spurs to reverse the narrative that surrounds them. Half a season in, though, and Frank’s inability to establish a clear vision for the team makes it hard to anticipate any meaningful change in a competition where the team can still salvage their reputation. It is almost unfair to ask Frank to come up with a brand new coaching innovation to save his job but like he said, the chatter will go away with some wins and no matter a style of play a coach prefers, wins are the one thing required of them all. The predictability of Spurs’ banal look under Frank, though, really makes one wonder what exactly the higher-ups are still betting on.
