ANTONIO CONTE has been warned by Andre Villas-Boas: “Don’t suffer my Spurs nightmare.”
AVB was sacked in December 2013 with Tottenham seventh in the table.
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Italian Conte is the fifth permanent boss brought in by chairman Daniel Levy since Villas-Boas left.
And the Portuguese chief said: “For Antonio it will be a challenge, a great challenge.
“We have a Premier League-winning coach in Antonio, going to a club with the best stadium in England and the best training facilities in Europe or the world. But you always see that something is missing at Spurs.
“Daniel has had a coach that took the club to a Champions League final (Mauricio Pochettino) and one of the most successful coaches in the world coaching his team in Jose Mourinho.
“It’s up to him and (owner) Joe Lewis to decide what they want for the organisation.
“But it’s a difficult organisation because of that lack of clarity.”
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Opposition fans would say the most obvious thing missing at Spurs is trophies.
The Tottenham Hotspur Stadium may have cost £1billion but there has been nothing in the trophy cabinet since 2008.
Chairman Levy has a notoriously itchy trigger finger — with Nuno Espirito Santo getting the bullet this week after four months as boss.
Villas-Boas added: “I don’t want to turn this into a criticism of Daniel.
“Everybody has their ups and downs, strengths and weaknesses, but Daniel is not an easy person to deal with.
“There are a lot of things that have to be said face to face, each side with truthfulness.
“But sometimes they look like they don’t happen that way.”
The end came for AVB after Spurs shipped 11 goals in back-to-back humpings by Manchester City and Liverpool.
For me and my history at Tottenham, it is like I don’t exist any more
Andre-Villas Boas
He admitted: “Coaches have to be judged on their performance — I agree.
“We lost, miserably, two games that led to us agreeing terms for me to leave but he’s not the easiest person to deal with. Yet what is easy right now in football?”
AVB, 44, reckons he got a rough deal from the man who was Levy’s sporting director at the time, Franco Baldini.
The one-time Chelsea chief recalled: “It looked like a moment where we could create a great dynamic with the arrival of Franco and it turned out to be a nightmare. To this day, I was proven right.
“Franco was not fair. A long time has passed, I don’t even know where Franco is and he doesn’t know where I am and that is it. Football has moved on.
“I have the greatest memory of the Tottenham fans, the ambience of White Hart Lane and the supporters.
“But for me and my history at Tottenham, it is like I don’t exist any more. This is how people treat you when you are kicked out of the door.
“That is the nature of football and it is very sad. The Tottenham story was a pity.
I thought we were building something special
Andre Villas-Boas
“At the end of my first season, I didn’t go to Paris Saint-Germain because I thought we were building something special at Tottenham. I thought the love was reciprocal.
“When I found out that people were actually kicking me out of the door, that is when things turned nasty.
“I’m a highly emotional and highly principled person and for me not to have renewed my contract at the end of my first season at Tottenham is something I will never forgive those people for.
“But Antonio was very successful at Chelsea and Inter Milan, he can do a good job.
“He is one of those people who puts people into the peaks of performance by motivation, by determining objectives.
“In football, you always reach stages where that link-up to the top has to be there.
“If that link-up is fine-tuned it can maybe be a good fit.”
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Antonio Conte will not be able to make January transfer signings at Tottenham, hints Fabio Paratici
