Arsene Wenger has announced he is to leave Arsenal at the end of the season. So which Tottenham manager did Wenger love and hate playing against the most?
LOVE: Martin Jol
Wenger went more than a decade without losing a league game to Spurs between November 1999 and April 2010, seeing off four Tottenham managers who never defeated Arsenal in any competition during that span. But his dominance was perhaps most notable against Glenn Hoddle and Martin Jol.
Hoddle was one of the first of Wenger’s former players to go up against him as a manager — but certainly not the last — and the Frenchman’s record of two wins and two draws probably only deepened his affections for his pupil.
There was no love lost between Wenger and Jol on a personal level, though, as evident in the fracas after the 1-1 draw at Highbury in 2006. Wenger called Jol a liar, accused him of poor sportsmanship and refused to shake his hand after the game following a controversial goal, and their personal rivalry only added to the heated derbies in those days.
But Wenger repeatedly came out on top on the pitch, with four wins and three draws against the Dutchman, keeping his upstart Spurs side firmly in their place. — Mattias Karen.
HATE: Mauricio Pochettino
Harry Redknapp’s Tottenham team were the first to believe they could better Wenger’s Arsenal but Mauricio Pochettino’s current crop are the first to prove it. It is telling that after finishing below their neighbours for 22 years before last term, Spurs will do it again in Wenger’s final season with absolutely no fanfare.
Wenger finally beat Pochettino in the league at the seventh attempt back in November, ending a run of three 1-1 draws at Emirates, but the long-prophesied power shift in North London has undoubtedly arrived in the last three years, even if Arsenal snuck above Spurs on the final day of the 2015-16 campaign.
Pochettino’s high-octane team is a combination of young, homegrown superstars and canny overseas signings — all superbly-coached — and Spurs are now many of the things Wenger’s Arsenal used to be. The Argentine has united the club from boardroom to terraces, while Wenger’s longevity has fractured Arsenal.
But Wenger’s habit of winning silverware in the death-throes of his reign has made that missing aspect of Pochettino’s tenure at Spurs all the more pronounced. Even at their lowest point under the Frenchman, Arsenal are still a team capable of winning trophies, while even at their highest point in 20 years, Spurs have been unable to take that final step under Pochettino.
Spurs fans would not swap the last three years — among the most progressive and joyous many of them have ever known — for the same period at Arsenal but it is Wenger’s side who have something tangible to show for it. — Dan Kilpatrick.
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