Tottenham name Nuno Espirito Santo as new boss

47-year-old has signed a two-year deal at Spurs after Pochettino, Conte, Fonseca and Gattuso dropped out of interest

LONDON:

Tottenham on Wednesday announced they had appointed former Wolves boss Nuno Espirito Santo as their new manager, ending their long search for a replacement for Jose Mourinho.

Spurs have been without a permanent boss since Mourinho was sacked in April, with former player Ryan Mason taking charge for the rest of last season.

Nuno, 47, has signed a two-year deal at the north London club after former boss Mauricio Pochettino, Antonio Conte, Paulo Fonseca and Gennaro Gattuso were all inked with the job.

The Portuguese coach will take the start of pre-season training on Monday, when players not involved in international football this summer will return to Hotspur Way.

"When you have a squad with quality and talent, we want to make the fans proud and enjoy," he said in a statement on the club's website.

"It's an enormous pleasure and honour (to be here), there's joy and I'm happy and looking forward to starting work.

"We don't have any days to lose and we must start working immediately as pre-season starts in a few days."

Nuno guided Wolves from the Championship into the Premier League in 2018 and secured consecutive seventh-place finishes in their first two seasons back in the top-flight before a 13th-place finish last season.

"First of all, I'd like to welcome Nuno to the club," said Spurs chairman Daniel Levy. "We should like to thank our supporters for all their patience throughout this process.

"I've spoken already about the need to revert back to our core DNA of playing attacking, entertaining football and (managing director of football) Fabio Paratici and I believe Nuno is the man who can take our talented group of players, embrace our young players coming through and build something special."

Paratici, who officially starts his job at Spurs on Thursday after leaving Juventus, has been heavily involved in the recruitment process.

"The brief for this appointment has always been clear -- we wanted a head coach that can instil all the values that are important to this football club," said Paratici.

"You only have to look at Nuno's time at Wolves to see his ability to take a group of players and implement an adaptive style that brings success and allows players to develop and thrive."

Nuno, who has previously managed Valencia and Porto, has been available since May after his four-year stint at Wolves ended.

Spurs fans will be desperate to challenge again for the Champions League places after missing out on European football's premier competition for two consecutive seasons.

They were regular top-four finishers under Pochettino, reaching the Champions League final in 2019, but have not won silverware of any description since 2008.

The club also risk losing England captain and talisman Harry Kane, who told Tottenham he wanted to leave after growing frustrated at his team's 13-year trophy drought.