Thomas Frank's last stand delivers a Tottenham in his image: Will this be the manager's Spurs turning point?

LONDON -- Maybe that was nothing more than a vision of what Thomas Frank's Tottenham might have been. It says everything about the perilous situation the Spurs head coach has manufactured for himself that a comprehensive 2-0 win over the 2024 Champions League finals can be framed as delaying the inevitable. When even Frank himself is at a loss to explain what changed in the space of three days, it makes sense not to bank on it consistently repeating.

If it does, then perhaps the chorus of boos meted out in Frank after Saturday's home defeat to West Ham will not prove to be what it still looks like, the moment when a parting between club and manager became inevitable. In the more likely event that the status quo is resumed when Burnley line up in the best low block they can muster, then what will this game prove to be?

Perhaps it will be viewed as a stay of execution, but in its best moments it felt like something more than that. Seven months after his appointment and with an awful lot of underwhelming displays in the rear view mirror, blitzing Borussia Dortmund in the first half felt like the nearest Tottenham have yet come to fulfilling the vision of what they might look under Frank's tutelage. Organised, aggressive and explosive. This was the sort of display that would have answered every skeptical question about Spurs if only it had come in August or September.

Coming to Spurs, Frank had to prove that he could deliver something comparable to the high-grade, reactive, solidy midtable football from a Brentford side always punching above their weight financially with Tottenham, a club intent on retaining their Big Six status with a wage bill closer to Newcastle's or Aston Villa's. For the most part it hasn't worked. Playing with possession has been a tough gig for Tottenham, in no small part because their most creative midfielders have been injured. Frank didn't coach a way around that though and for too much of this season the ball might have progressed through a quagmire quicker than the middle third of the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

Nobody should have expected the players at Frank's disposal to be knocking it around like Barcelona in their pomp, but by now it would have been fair to expect Spurs to do what Brentford did, to attack with intensity down the flank, getting the ball into dangerous areas quickly and into the box before the defense could settle. There was organization to match the cavalier countering, a team that gave up very little and backed its forwards to win close games at the other end. Spurs were not a carbon copy of that on Tuesday, but in their best moments, most of which came when it was 11 vs. 11, before a 26th minute red card to Dortmund's Daniel Svensson they felt like a Frank team. No wonder he was so enamored with what he saw.

"I really enjoyed the performance and the win, of course," he said. "I think especially the first half, I felt we were very good. I think we started exceptionally well. On top of them, pressed them, calm on the ball, produced chances, created opportunities, scored a good goal, and kept going. And then scored the second goal, which of course is also super important. So, everything about the first half, I was extremely happy with. I think it's definitely some of the best we've done."

That they were so good might ultimately tell us more about the state of European football than Frank's Tottenham, who ended Tuesday between Bayern Munich and Paris Saint-Germain, comfortably settled in the top eight. Spurs are not one of the inner circle of contenders that that placing would suggest, but they have had one of the competition's most favorable draws. What is also true is that teams of Borussia Dortmund's quality, who spend so many games on the front foot, look far less at ease setting up to stifle than most teams who run into Frank in the Premier League.

Even at even strength, Tottenham looked a cut above Borussia Dortmund in terms of strength and organization. The nine ball recoveries in the attacking third is by some distance the most of Frank's tenure, with Dominic Solanke delivering eight months worth of pressing to make up for his lengthy absence. The goal was not too shabby either. 

Like he had been out in west London, Frank was prepared to adapt to the opposition. In attack Djed Spence was an out and out left winger, fearless with the ball at his feet, ready to commit multiple defenders with every dribble. Without it, at least for the first third of the game, he tracked back gamely to ensure Spurs matched Borussia Dortmund's system. The vibe was a little bit Keane Lewis-Potter-plus as Spence put the wing in wing back and was unlucky that his darts into the penalty area didn't result in more. Destiny Udogie, too, was empowered to drive forward whether he was a left-center back or a more orthodox fullback. Given the issues the Italian has had with injury of late, it was a welcome sight for Frank that he showed no sign of slowing down.

Xavi Simons was also outstanding, finding pockets of space from which to attack from the very start of the game, in one passage pushing up close to Solanke, the next dropping back to give Spurs a midfield three that easily bypassed Dortmund. With a prodigiously talented youngster running midfield, explosive running power down the flanks and thundering power in defense, you could convince yourself in moments that this was the sort of football Frank had always aspired to play with a talent upgrade that Brentford couldn't afford.

Best of all for the Spurs manager, his football did enough to at least hint that the rupture between him and the fans was not absolute. Tempers were still frayed before kickoff in North London, a smattering of jeers audible when Frank's named was announced on the PA pre-match. That opprobrium, though, was at least limited to the dugout and there was a palpable sense from early on that the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was prepared to let bygones be bygones if their players were daring and doing.

This was not the ground at its most full throated and there were patches of empty seats in the upper tier, but there were plenty of explanations for that, not least the deluge that pounded into the stands in the second half. That at least seemed a welcome metaphor for Tottenham's night, a cleansing of sorts, a washing away of the ill-feeling from the weekend. "That energy between the fans and the players was magic," said Frank.

The fear had been that Saturday's defeat was the latest point in Tottenham's chain reaction of mental anguish. The fans would lose faith which would make the players even more hesitant which would send the stadium into further paroxysms. Tuesday night, at least, Tottenham changed their direction of travel.

"When we're all together - players, staff, fans - that's key," said Solanke. "We're all one club, we all want the same thing. We need to put the performances in on the pitch like we did tonight and hopefully we can carry on the momentum."

They will have to do that. Fail to beat Burnley on Saturday and all the familiar questions will be asked of Frank again. Burnley aren't better than Borussia Dortmund, but they might be more comfortable setting up in a low block and demanding Tottenham break them down. Spurs are not the only English club to relish the space and time afforded to them in European matches, but the difference is stark: this is a team that averages 0.81 xG from open play per game in the Champions League and 0.58 in the Premier League.

"It's a big skill to be able to produce Premier League, Champions League, Premier League, Champions League every week from the team and players," said Frank. "[It's one] that we're working very hard on and I actually think and I keep saying it because I mean it, this is the eighth game in a row where I think we consistently performed quite well."

This though was magnitudes greater than what Spurs have served up before. In their aggression and organisation, it was Tottenham as a Thomas Frank team. Unlikely as it seems right now, if the Dortmund win happens to be something this team can replicate then someone is going to have to start scrubbing the writing off a few walls.