Spurs are one of the few clubs that seem to be in an infinite loop of false hope followed by despair - and the man who has kept this nightmarish sequence in motion over the past 11 years is Daniel Levy.
Recently, the chairman has acquired the status of a shrewd businessman with incredible foresight and remarkable knowledge of the game. What people forget is that Spurs fans had viewed him as a bumbling fool before the Redknapp acquisition and in over a decade he has wasted too much money and gone through too many managers - nine.
Each of them was a mistake apart from Harry Redknapp who he then inexplicably fired. The only other success was Martin Jol, the best accidental signing Levy could have hoped for, who he tried for years to find an excuse to get rid of.
The similarities between the way he handled club affairs since sacking Redknapp and his preparation for that 2008/09 season, when Spurs were bottom after eight games and had to sack the manager, are startling. It is as though he fears success.
Here are the connections:
The pennies saved by leaving transfers until the final day are nothing compared to what the club loses by failing to get off to a good start. Once again, if Spurs fail to reach a Champions League position, fans will look back to the first few games where the team failed to acquire enough points.
Now there is extraordinary pressure on AVB to do an impossible job. But he has not helped matters by mirroring Levy's passion for the deja-vu phenomenon. Against WBA, with the game tight at 1-0, he took off striker Defoe for midfielder Jenas. This sent out a message to the Spurs players to sit back, inviting pressure from West Brom who found a late equaliser. The following week at home to Norwich, in exactly the same circumstances, the manager replaced Defoe with Huddlestone. The same thing happened.
Don't expect change...