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Tottenham Hotspur supporters were looking for any sliver of optimism, and they thought they had found it after a 1-1 draw with Liverpool and a 3-2 win over Atletico Madrid. Suddenly, it looked like interim manager Igor Tudor had found a winning formula, and if in the span of a week Spurs showed they could play up to two Champions League quarterfinals, then maybe they would be back in business over the weekend with the resumption of the Premier League relegation battle.

But intead of showing up in a must win relegation six pointer against lowly Nottingham Forest, Spurs were absolutely decimated and eviscerated in front of their ardent supporters, losing 3-0 in a historically inept performance.

All of the praise for Tudor has flipped right back into grave concern, and on the BBC Sport broadcast after the game, former Tottenham Hotspur and England national team goalkeeper Paul Robinson uttered the universal truth about the plight of Spurs and of Tudor's place in the problems.

Igor Tudor can't fix Thomas Frank's mess

Robinson said, via The Spurs Web, "I don’t see a structure. A game plan, or a way of playing. I don’t see a tactical idea. I see a team that’s set up in the first instance, that changes two or three times during the game. They look devoid of ideas, and a manager who is looking for something that he is yet to find, and no time to find it."

Everything Robinson said above is spot on, and not even the five members of the Igor Tudor fan club could dispute what is plainly evident before everyone. Tottenham are not in this mess because of Tudor, and the manager before him, Thomas Frank, clearly had the team set up poorly and himself was devoid of ideas.

It is a long standing issue for Spurs, yes, but Tudor has not exactly helped matters. You could see in the 3-0 dismantling at the hands of an unimpressive Nottingham Forest that Spurs still have no ideas, no patterns of play, and no way to adjust during games when things are not going well. Spurs started poorly against Forest and somehow finished even worse.

The last bit of Robinson's quote is perhaps the most biting. Because even if Tudor had a prayer of coming up with the right formula for Spurs, there are merely a handful of games left in the Premier League season to get things right. There is no time for a turn around, and Tudor, thus far, has not shown he is the right man to do it.

The Tottenham Hotspur supporters were in full force before the match against Nottingham Forest, knowing the sheer magnitude of a relegation six pointer against a side that had robbed them of Morgan Gibbs-White this past summer transfer window. With a draw against Liverpool last weekend and a win over Atletico Madrid just a few days ago, Spurs came into this Sunday's encounter with a great deal of optimism, but they left it torn into tatters, losing 3-0 to Forest in a game that left fans wondering if any of the players understood the magnitude of the match themselves.

While the vast majority of the individual performances for Spurs were simply dreadful, there were three players who, once again, stepped up in this dire moment of need. Even though it doesn't feel like a time for silver linings, positivity deserves to be acknowledged where it exists. And it did for these three, even against Forest.

LW Mathys Tel

Even though the end product still isn't consistently there for Mathys Tel, he is the only forward on Spurs who truly threatens the defense. Whereas Richarlison struggles to create or beat defenders and Dominic Solanke has become an absolute ghost, Tel is out there creating chances for himself and others and is by far the best dribbler on the team in the final third.

The former Bayern Munich man had two key passes and led the team with four dribbles completed, drawing a foul for good measure. Tel is the one player worth praising in the attack, and he is the one forward who actually bothered to show up for Tottenham vs. Nottingham Forest.

CB Kevin Danso

Kevin Danso was brilliant against Nottingham Forest, and he put both captain Cristian Romero and Micky van de Ven to shame. Honestly, Danso should be in the team sheet ahead of both of them at this point, and he is probably the most underrated player on Spurs.

He saved a goal with a great header to start the game and led the way with five interceptions. Even compared to Romero, Danso reads the game so much better, and it's a good thing Barcelona and Real Madrid are too busy looking at Van de Ven to notice Danso.

CM Archie Gray

In truth, Archie Gray was better in the preceding matches for Tottenham Hotspur, but he was still the best midfielder on a team in which all the other mids struggled badly vs. Forest. Even while hobbled in this game physically, Gray was still the one player brave enough and intelligent enough to create chances and drive the ball forward with positive passes.

After huge losses in important matches against Arsenal, Fulham, Crystal Palace, and Atletico Madrid, the common referendum on new Tottenham Hotspur interim manager Igor Tudor was that, somehow, he was even worse than Thomas Frank - or, at best, just as bad.

But after Spurs drew Liverpool 1-1 with a second half comeback and defeated Atletico Madrid 3-2 at mid week, Tudor appeared to have won Spurs fans back. He was giving minutes to the team's young stars like Archie Gray and Mathys Tel, who were blossoming into the team's best players. Meanwhile, Lucas Bergvall was coming back, and it seemed like Spurs had more heart and desire under Tudor. Plus, unlike Frank, Tudor was unified behind the fans instead of pitting them and the player against each other, which was one of Frank's many cardinal sins.

That honeymoon period lasted one week. Because after watching Tottenham flounder to a miserable 3-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest in a loss that may be looked back on as historic, Spurs fans can only come to the same conclusion they had before the second Atletico Madrid game - that Tudor is not the right man for the job.

Igor Tudor took a massive step back from Atletico Madrid

Tudor never really had a track record of success before Tottenham Hotspur. Sure, he managed Marseille to third in Ligue 1, but they were second the season before he arrived. And he wasn't bad for Juventus last season in comparison to Thiago Motta, but, well, he wasn't exactly good either.

So far at Tottenham, Tudor has been poor, and even if he has been better than Frank, the difference is only marginal. And it's not like a comparison to Frank is exactly a high bar to set here, given Frank just might be the worst manager in Spurs history.

Tudor made so many mistakes against Nottingham Forest. It was as if he learned nothing from what worked against Atletico Madrid. Xavi Simons? On the bench. Richarlison? He was poor, but between the two strikers, it was wild to see him hooked off the pitch instead of Dominic Solanke, who delivered the worst single game performance of any Tottenham attacker this season just when his team needed it the most.

The scenes from Tottenham Hotspur supporters before the home game against Nottingham Forest on Sunday were a sight to behold. Unison, chants, plumes of smoke, and a raucous showing that would have rivaled celebratory Champions League victories at other clubs awaited a Tottenham squad that, in truth, was not deserving of such a beautiful response from their fans.

But no matter how often these supporters, who pay more money than most fan bases to watch their team, have been let down by the self inflated "stars" of Tottenham this season, nothing about the past mattered to these souls behind the barricades. All they wanted was to give their players that extra bit of strength to go out there and win a crucial, relegation six pointer against Nottingham Forest that, no exaggeration, carried strong implications for the club's future.

Instead of taking this unbridled support that they had been criticizing the fan base for not giving them all season long, the Spurs players took this unconditional love and spat it back onto the street without any semblance of decency.

Tottenham's players are not good enough

This 3-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest was as poor of a performance, especially considering the context of the match, as Spurs fans will ever see in their lifetime's of supporting this self sabotaging club. And it was the same culprits who did not show up. Cristian Romero is barely fit to wear the arm band despite the impassioned defenses in his favor from several fans. Micky van de Ven looks like his head is in the clouds in Barcelona. Dominic Solanke just feels like a ginormous waste of money. And Pape Matar Sarr, Richarlison, and so many other don't look like they are good enough.

We have seen players like Pedro Porro and Van de Ven screaming at fans after terrible performances. We watched as Thomas Frank threw the supporters under the bus for booing him and the team's poor displays, hoping that the jeers would get them to step up. But now with only love and unity behind them, all Tottenham could do was somehow lower their level even further.

For Tottenham fans who have followed this club their whole lives through thick and thin - mostly thin, if we are being blunt - Sunday's blowout loss to Nottingham Forest had to have been the most soul crushing of them all. Spurs fans gave it their all, only to receive less than nothing in return. At this point, if Spurs go down, it is nothing more than they deserve.

Serenaded by droves of fans who wanted nothing more than to will their team to victory in a must win, relegation six pointer against Nottingham Forest, all the Tottenham Hotspur players could muster was one of the worst performances in the history of the club, losing 3-0 to a squad that cost far less to build. Spurs are staring down a very scary reality right now, but they have nobody but themselves to blame.

These three players, in particular, were so poor against Nottingham Forest that they look like they would not even belong in the EFL Championship at this point.

CB Micky van de Ven

It is laughable that Micky van de Ven thinks he can play for two Champions League contenders in Barcleona and Real Madrid. These are two of the most successful and historic clubs in history with players like Carles Puyol and Sergio Ramos that have played at the heart of their defenses.

Meanwhile, Van de Ven has no heart. He does not show up when Tottenham Hotspur need him most, and he is so woeful in these critical games that you would be forgiven for thinking he is playing againt Spurs. Van de Ven was so bad that Spurs hooked him at half time in a relegation battle, which tells you all you need to know about how pathetic his performances have been. Even playing at left back could not save him.

ST Richarlison

Djed Spence, Pape Matar Sarr, and pretty much almot the entire Tottenham team merited consideration here, but Richarlison absolutely belongs as one of the worst three players on the pitch despite both being a well known star and apparently being a relegation hero.

Well, Spurs fans have yet to see this supposedly amazing Richarlison in relegation fights. Even against Liverpool, he got all the credit for the goal, but everyone forgot about the chances he missed before that. The real problem with Richy isn't the finishing, which has actually been good this seaon considering the lack of chances. No, the problem is how sloppy he is on the ball and how little he creates for the other forwards. Spurs will be better off without this one trick pony.

ST Dominic Solanke

And yet, Richy was hooked off when an even worse striker remained on the pitch. As poor as the Brazilian international was, Dominic Solanke was somehow 10 times worse. He was by far the most problematic player on the pitch, and it is unfathomable that this player cost Spurs a record 65 million pounds when he shows up for a few games in a year then calls it quits when Spurs need him most.

Solanke was a ghost. It's like he didn't even care. He never tried to get on the ball, press, or make things happen, and Spurs supporters are livid with how he performed against Forest in a must win. Solanke looked like he was strolling about in a Sunday League match.

Tottenham Hotspur center midfielder Lucas Bergvall finally made his return to the pitch after several weeks out with another injury, and Spurs supporters can only hope that the Swedish international stays healthy with Spurs in the thick of a tough relegation fight.

Bergvall is one of the biggest gems in the Premier League, even if the mainstream has neglected how high his potential is. Even though he got injured at the end of the campaign, the young midfielder was crucial to Spurs capturing the Europa League crown last season, and he is such a fiery box to box midfielder that clubs as big as Real Madrid are watching him closely.

With Thomas Frank, who seemed to always play Bergvall in a suboptimal role, out of the way, Bergvall has a massive opportunity on his hands now that he is back from injury. And Tottenham Hotspur supporters hope that their latest Swedish star will follow in the footsteps of another young gem midfielder on the Real Madrid transfer radar.

Lucas Bergvall's time to shine now

Archie Gray has been the bigget winner of the several winners of the Igor Tudor appointment. Even when Tottenham were playing very poorly, Gray was distinguishing himself positively, and he put himself on a more mainstream radar with a dazzling display in the win over Atletico Madrid.

If that is what Gray can do away from the shackles of whatever supposed system Thomas Frank was implementing at the N17, then imagine what his No. 8 counterpart Lucas Bergvall can do in the coming games once he lands into health and form.

Gray has set down the gauntlet to Bergvall of what is capable without Frank at the helm, and so Bergvall can look to what the former Leeds Unitd man is doing as an example to follow. Tottenham fans have both the utmost confidence and the utmost faith in Bergvall, who, in the next few years, should be establishing himself as one of the top midfielders in European football.

That journey can begin now. It should have already begun this season, but, again, Frank had no real clue what to do with him. Nor did he Gray, who is beginning to show his own signs of future superstardom in the iconic Lilywhite kit. Bergvall is such a tremendous athlete with the verve to get forward and add to goals, and there is no way Tudor holds him back in favor of Conor Gallagher.

Young Mathys Tel's stock is finally on the rise. The Tottenham Hotspur left winger has been putting in some strong performances this season despite little reward, and after Thomas Frank continually snubbed him week after week, Spurs supporters were fearing the same as Igor Tudor was not regularly starting him either.

But now that Tudor seems to have settled in as the new Spurs manager, he is starting to trust Tel fully as a starter. After shining in the 1-1 draw with Liverpool with a bevy of key passes and dribbles completed as an electrifying outlet on that previously dead left hand side, Tel finally grabbed his assist with a perfect cross to Randal Kolo Muani to open the scoring in a 3-2 win over Atletico Madrid.

Tel was great all night long yet again, putting defenders on skates and creating chances for his team. But Tel should have had a second assist, squandering a great chance to square the ball for his teammates by shooting instead.

Mathy Tel can't pass up golden assist opportunities

While Tel deserves praise for being a brave young forward and always having the willingness to try something to get a goal, including shoot and even shoot from range, he will have to remember to reign it in when there are better options.

In that game, Tel took the wrong option, but it ultimately was not costly. With the margins as tight as they are in a heated Premier League relegation battle like this year's, the next selfish mistake from Mathys Tel may not be forgiven so easily by the opposition.

Tottenham Hotspur need to keep trusting in Tel, because he has the potential to be a top left winger for them in the aftermath of Son Heung-min's departure to MLS. But what Tel needs to do is remember what made Son so great on the left wing and what makes a great winger is that virtue of playing for the team and not letting even a well intentioned zeal for goals get in the way of what will ultimately help the team.

Now that Tel is starting regularly, it is time for him to tackle the next developmental milestone in his career. He needs to be more present and aware. The tools and the potential to have the understanding of a true, top class winger are there, but Tel has to put it into practice and do so consistently. That starts with not botching these obvious assist opportunities.

Thomas Frank made a myriad of unforgivable errors when he was Tottenham Hotspur manager, and part of the reason why Igor Tudor looked so terrible at the beginning of his tenure as interim manager was the fact that he inherited such a mess and a squad ingrained with bad habits from Frank.

The former Brentford coach regularly held back the team's brightest young stars, would not start the best players on the team, and set the team up in such a way that they were so negative and almost incapable of creating chances.

But for all of his actual tactical flaws, the worst thing Frank ever did as Tottenham manager was divide the locker room against the players. Instead of contructively criticizing the players, pushing for better, and using the fans to rally behind the players, he would openly criticize fans for booing and coddle the egos of some of Spurs underperforming players instead of lighting a fire under these young men to perform to the Tottenham Hotspur standard.

Igor Tudor actually respects Tottenham fans

Well already, Igor Tudor is undoing Thomas Frank's disunity. Ahead of the most crucial game of the season thus far against Nottingham Forest, Tudor decided to praise the fans and act as a unifying voice for this organization - something Frank never even attempted to do.

Here is what Tudor told reporters, as captured by Spurs Army, "Beautiful sense of the togetherness with the fans. I enjoyed the sensation of us doing well on the pitch and sharing it with the fans. We need to continue all together."

Now that is what a manager needs to say out loud in public for his fans and the players to hear. Instead of pitting people against each other, Tudor knows that the players need the fans and that everyone involved with Tottenham needs to be in it together in order for Spurs to survive this - arguably the worst crisis in their storied history.'

Maybe it's because Tudor just came from coaching Marseille and Juventus while Frank never had a big job, but Tudor clearly knows that the boos from Tottenham fans in the past were all about trying to get this team to play better; it was never personal at the players. And he knows that Tottenham fans are so good about being behind their players, using his platform as a manager at the press conference to rally the troops, with the fans being very much a part of the fight along with the players.

Johan Lange told Tottenham Hotspur fans that the reason for transfer inactivity in the winter when Spurs obviously needed reinforcements was to avoid panic buys, but, well, not only are Spurs panicking now that they are in a relegation fight, but they also DID make a major panic buy in center midfielder Conor Gallagher.

Not only did Spurs sign a player who is clearly not good enough to start for them and has already fallen off the pecking order under Igor Tudor, but they overpaid by 10 million euros in order to sign him ahead of Aston Villa after the injury to Rodrigo Bentancur - a player whose style is not even replaced by Gallagher's. And by the way, Benta is about to come back from injury, in addition to the fact that Lucas Bergvall has already returned as a much better version of what Gallagher allegedly offers.

The 40 million euro transfer fee is a problem, but the wages to Gallagher, breaking the club's wage structure for a backup level player, is the much bigger problem. And after Daniel Levy so delicately, to the point of holding back the team in the transfer market from competing with the other Big Six clubs, set a strict wage structure, Vinai Venkatesham and Johan Lange have corrupted it in the worst possible way.

Conor Gallagher's wages will have huge consequences

A recent article from The Athletic's Daniel Taylor, Oliver Kay, Gregg Evans, and Steve Madeley absolutely went IN on Tottenham Hotspur and is well, well worth the read for a deconstruction of the unbridled competence within. But the most concerning nugget in the piece may have been regarding the consequences of the Conor Gallagher contrat.

The Athletic reveals a quote from an agent who stated that if Gallagher is now the biggest earner at Tottenham, all the other stars who are better than Gallagher and want new contracts, like Micky van de Ven and Cristian Romero, are going to be looking at that and feeling a bit disrespected that he is now the one making all that money.

They, in turn, are going to want more, and it is going to be even more difficult, if not impossible, for Tottenham to keep ahold of those players. Now, the wage structure needed to be broken in order for Spurs to compete, yes, but to break it by giving Conor freaking Gallagher 200,000 pounds per week is malpractice of the highest order. And the true ripple effects of this bizarre decision will be felt very soon once the storm is unleashed this summer.

Tottenham Hotspur only have an interim manager in place, and although Igor Tudor has given Spurs real signs of improvement, the bar was also beneath the earth with how poorly Thomas Frank was doing as Spurs manager. So Tottenham are almost certainly going to be in the market for a new coach, and although fans may have dreams of Mauricio Pochettino, the club cannot restrict themselves to pining for one option, especially someone who has a high profile national team job in a World Cup year.

When Tottenham ultimately hired Frank, they were also linked to a few mid table standouts in the Premier League. The most impressive of them both in the past and currently this season is Andoni Iraola, whose Bournemouth side blasted Tottenham early in the season - when Spurs were actually looking like a good team - and is currently in European contention even after selling superstar Antoine Semenyo to Manchester City.

Iraola may not be the biggest name on the Tottenham Hotspur manager wish list, as fans will be pining for not only Poch but also Xabi Alonso or even his old rival Xavi. But Iraola has overachieved for Bournemouth and was arguably even more impressive before that as the manager of Rayo Vallecano in La Liga.

Athletic Club want Andoni Iraola

But La Liga could be calling Iraola's name again with an even more desirable spot, especially for him personally. According to a new report from talkSPORT's Ben Jacobs and Alex Crook, Andoni Iraola is one of the "leading candidates" to take over for Spanish managerial icon Ernesto Valverde, who recently stepped down from Athletic Club - the place where Iraola became a star in Spanish football as one of the best right backs in all of Europe during the 2000s and early 2010s.

Per Jacobs and Crook, Iraola will soon tell Bournemouth whether or not he is going to sign a new deal to stay at the club or if he is going to pursue other job openings from clubs like Athletic and Tottenham. The Cherries manager is out of contract at the end of the 2025/26 season, but Bournemouth reportedly like their chances of keeping him after signing top young players, replacing Semenyo with another exciting forward in Rayan.

If given the choice between Athletic Club and Tottenham, it is hard to see Iraola picking against the Basque club. They have so much history with their homegrown players, and Iraola was such an icon for them in defense. Athletic Club have been disappointing this season, too, but they are an easier situation to walk into than Spurs.