Who is Spurs’ new head coach Igor Tudor?

Football writer Ben Bloom examines new Tottenham Hotspur head coach Igor Tudor, his track record of stabilizing clubs and how his tactics could shape Spurs’ race.

Following the departure of Thomas Frank, Tottenham Hotspur has entrusted Igor Tudor with management of the club until the end of the season.

But who is the Croatian, what do Spurs see in him and what impact could he have on the struggling north London club?

Playing career

A pragmatic central defender also capable of playing in defensive midfield, Tudor spent most of his playing career at Italian club Juventus, having left Hajduk Split in his home country.

Although he often suffered from injuries, he was an important part of an iconic Juventus team that included Alessandro Del Piero, Lilian Thuram, David Trezeguet, Gianluigi Buffon, Pavel Nedved and Edgar Davids, who won back-to-back Serie A titles in 2001/02 and 2002/03.

He also started in the 2002/03 UEFA Champions League final, which Juventus lost on penalties to AC Milan.

Last row (left to right): Gianluigi Buffon, Ciro Ferrara, Lilian Thuram, Igor Tudor, Alessio Tacchinardi, Paolo Montero
First row (left to right): Gianluca Zambrotta, Mauro Camoranesi, Pavel Nedved, Edgar Davids, Alessandro Del Piero

In the first of these victorious seasons, Tudor was named Croatian Player of the Year. He represented his country 55 times, including at the 1998 FIFA World Cup, where he finished third, as well as the 2006 World Cup and the 2004 UEFA European Championships.

Persistent ankle problems caused him to retire in 2008, at the age of 30.

Executive career

After retiring as a player, Tudor began his coaching career with Hajduk Split’s youth teams. He spent nine months as Croatia’s assistant coach in 2012/13, before taking his first managerial role at Hajduk Split.

The 20 months he spent at the head of the club remain the longest he has spent at a club. Since then, he has managed PAOK, Karabukspor, Galatasaray, Udinese, Hajduk Split (again), Hellas Verona, Marseille, Lazio, Juventus and now Spurs, during a nomadic managerial career across six countries.

He left Marseille after guiding them to third place in Ligue 1 in his only season in charge.

After this stay in France, he spent three months at Lazio, where he lost only two of his 11 games in charge, then spent seven months at Juventus during a stay spanning two seasons.

Notably, from Spurs’ perspective, in the latter two roles he managed to stabilize the clubs in crisis as they sought to remain in qualification for Europe at the end of the season. He also twice kept relegation-threatened Udinese in Serie A when he was parachuted in in consecutive seasons.

At clubs where he has played at least 10 matches (his first spell at Udinese in 2018 lasted just four matches), he has always won at least four of those first 10 matches, and in his last three jobs he has won six.

Tudor record in first 10 matches at each club

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Tactical style

Tudor comes to Spurs with a defined philosophy which is based on aggressive football, extremely high intensity and a running requirement for his players. When he was in charge of Marseille, he passed on the club’s most gifted player, Dimitri Payet, because the Frenchman was not known for his running work.

“In modern football, physicality overrides quality so much,” he said when in charge of Juventus last year. “Quality is always important, of course, but without the physical side it doesn’t exist.”

Tudor also strongly prefers a 3-4-2-1 formation. He has used three defenders in 120 of his 124 league matches across Europe’s top five leagues.

How Spurs could line up this weekend under Tudor

Randal Kolo Muani could be one of the biggest beneficiaries of Tudor’s arrival. The Frenchman was a regular starter under Tudor during his loan spell at Juventus last season, and the manager was disappointed when he was not signed permanently last summer.