With Juande Ramos being sacked by CSKA Moscow, it seemed to me from anecdotal evidence that former Spurs managers have gone on to a kind of managerial wilderness or TV punditry. After a little research, it was quite striking to see that, with the exception of Christian Gross and Martin Jol, our most recent full time managers dating from the Terry Venables era are either out of football altogether, managing lower division or minor league clubs, or in TV punditry. So I am led to ask the following questions: does the Tottenham manager position hold some kind of curse (regardless of the qualifications of the manager he is doomed to failure because of the nature of the club), or did the board simply make poor decisions in their appointments ?

Anyway, here is the evidence, not including caretaker managers:

Terry Venables
1987-91
(won FA Cup in 1991)

Manager of England 1994-96 (lost semi-final Euro 96)
Australia 1996-97 (failed to qualify for France 98)
Crystal Palace 1998-99 (sacked in less than a year)
Middlesbrough 2000-01 (finished 14th)
Leeds United 2002-03 (sacked before end of season)

Peter Shreeves
1991-92
(sacked after 15th place finish)

Barnet 2002 (sacked after less than one season)
Grays Athletic 2009 (currently caretaker manager)

Ossie Ardiles
1994
(sacked after 3 months in charge)

Yokohama F. Marinos 2000-01 (sacked after less than a year in charge)
Tokyo Verdy 1969 2003-2005 (won Emperor's Cup - whatever that is - then was sacked)
Beitar Jerusalem FC 2006 (fired after less than a year in charge)
Huracán 2007 (finished 7th in the Argentina Apertura then resigned)
Cerro Porteño (sacked after less than a year in charge)

Gerry Francis
1994-97
(best finish was 7th)

QPR 1998-2001 (won only 37% of games)
Bristol Rovers 2001 (resigned after less than a year in charge)
Now a TV pundit

Christian Gross
1997-98
(sacked after poor start to 1998-99 season)

FC Basel 1999-2009 (4 league titles, 4 Swiss Cups)

George Graham
1998-2001
(won League Cup in 1999 and last Tottenham manager to beat Arsenal in the league)

Now a football pundit for Sky Sports

Glenn Hoddle
2001-03
(sacked after poor start to 2003-04 season)

Wolves 2004-06 (resigned, Wolves gained promotion to Premier League in 2008-09 season)

Jacques Santini
2004
(resigned after just 13 games in charge)

Auxerre 2005-06 (sacked after less than a year in charge)
No longer in management

Martin Jol
2004-2007
(finished 5th in 2005-06, 2006-07 seasons, sacked after poor start to 2007-08 season)

Hamburg 2008-2009 (finished fifth)
Current manager of Ajax

Juande Ramos
2008-2009
(won League Cup in 2008, sacked after poor start to 2008-09 season)

Real Madrid 2008-09 (finished second in La Liga but lost 6-2 to Barcelona and 5-0 on aggregate to Liverpool in the Champions League, released at the end of the season)
CSKA Moscow 2009 (sacked after less than two months in charge).

anthony michael (a spurs supporter in the colonies)