Mauricio Pochettino has called for Chelsea to be stripped of their 2017 Premier League title and for it to be awarded instead to Tottenham Hotspur, the team he managed to second place that season.
Chelsea won the league in 2016-17 under Antonio Conte, with Tottenham finishing as runners-up on 86 points after scoring 86 goals. Chelsea have since admitted breaking Premier League rules by making secret payments exceeding £47million to unregistered agents and third parties to secure transfers, in a scheme that ran from 2011 to 2018 and included the deal that brought Eden Hazard to the club. Hazard excelled during Chelsea's title-winning campaign.
"We should win one title, one Premier League," said Pochettino, now head coach of the United States national team. "We should have been awarded it. They were punished. They admitted it. The title should be for the team that was second.
"We deserve to be champions that year. We didn't compete with the same rules. It's impossible if some clubs play with offside and others don't or one plays with VAR and another plays without VAR. For everyone the same rules and then the same capacity to create the best team."
Chelsea's punishment
The Premier League fined Chelsea this year over the illegal payments. Chelsea escaped sporting sanctions such as a points deduction because the offences were self-reported and the club cooperated with the investigation.
"Maybe with the same rules we could've signed some players that would have made the team better or scored more goals," Pochettino said. "It's not me complaining, it's the truth.
"I have no doubt and I'm not scared to say the truth. The Chelsea fans will be upset with me but if Tottenham broke the rules, I'd say we don't deserve the title.
"I don't say they didn't play well or that Conte wasn't great. I don't want this message twisted. But if you broke the rules, then 'ciao', you need to give it to another team."
Five years without a trophy
Pochettino has managed both London clubs, though his single season at Chelsea is remembered far less fondly than his five years at Tottenham, widely regarded as the club's finest modern era despite never winning a trophy. His Spurs side reached the Champions League final and were Premier League runners-up while playing on a transfer budget squeezed by the construction of a new stadium and training ground, with Harry Kane leading the goalscoring.
Between January 2018 and July 2019, Tottenham made no signings at all, and the club's combined spending across the first five of his six summer transfer windows stayed below £300million. Asked whether he envies Roberto De Zerbi's outlay of close to £400million on ten new signings this summer, Pochettino said he did not.
"I am happy," he said. "Tottenham is still my club, and I want the best for them. If they have the possibility to spend on proven players in the Premier League it's good for the club. After the relegation battle it's important to improve and not to suffer."
Tottenham's spending is now driven by a new generation of the Lewis family, who own the club: patriarch Joe Lewis's daughter, Vivienne Lewis, and her son-in-law, Nick Beucher, working alongside chief executive Vinai Venkatesham and sporting director Johan Lange.
Bond with Daniel Levy
Daniel Levy was ousted as Tottenham chairman just over a year ago after 25 years in charge. Pochettino said their relationship had at times been tense but that the two remain close and in regular contact.
"He feels like I did when I was sacked," Pochettino said. "Now he knows the feeling. Yes, I keep in touch with him. I never made the situation personal.
"It's like you receive the letter and you are sacked, pick up your things and you can never come back. Maybe 200, 300 people that were your family, you cannot say goodbye, cannot send a text, cannot do nothing. That was really, really tough for me. I was talking with him about that. Of course, I'm not happy that now he feels the same because I am not a person with bad feelings.
"It's difficult because for him. For 25 years he was building his house, his club, and what happened after, for sure, was tough for him, for his family and of course I am so sorry for him and for everyone."
Contact from Spurs during the crisis
Pochettino confirmed Tottenham contacted him earlier this year as the club lurched from Thomas Frank to Igor Tudor and came close to relegation. "Yes, but in this moment they called everyone, all the coaches, those free and not free," he said, before adding more seriously: "If I was free, of course, I come. But I wasn't free. I was preparing the World Cup."
He was committed to leading the United States into the World Cup as hosts, with his initial two-year contract due to expire after the tournament and no decision yet made on his future. He said he has always remained open to returning to Tottenham, even had they been relegated to the Championship. "It's the only club that always I am open to help, whatever division," he said. "Another club, no. But Tottenham, yes."
Tudor's interim spell soured quickly and Tottenham instead secured De Zerbi on a long-term contract, ending talk of a reunion. "The timings were never the best," Pochettino said. "When I was free, I never received a contact and then when I was working, I received a contact, but I cannot make the decision to come back. A little bit unlucky. Maybe one day the stars will align and it can happen."
World Cup and a new contract
Pochettino's USA side made a fast start at the World Cup before losing to Belgium in the last 16, in a tournament clouded by controversy over Folarin Balogun's escape from suspension and claims of interference by President Donald Trump. Pochettino dismissed the Balogun affair as an excuse, saying his team simply did not perform to its best when it mattered.
He said meetings with the US federation before the tournament, and the public response to the team's early success, convinced him to sign a new four-year deal that runs to 2030, another World Cup cycle. "Before the World Cup we met the board in New York and they offered us four more years," said the 54-year-old Argentine. "I said, 'Yeah but if we lose all the games...' and they said, 'No, no, no we trust in you and your vision and the way you behave'."
The federation knew other clubs would try to tempt him away but he promised not to negotiate with anyone until after the tournament. The USA have upcoming friendlies against Peru, Chile, Mexico and Canada.
Life in international football
Pochettino joins a group of former Premier League managers, including Thomas Tuchel, Jurgen Klopp and Carlo Ancelotti, now working in international football. "It's more pure," he said. "It's intense with limited time, but you enjoy a lot one week with the players. The players are not toxic, they come because they want to enjoy, they want to play, they don't have time to become upset or disappointed because they don't play. It's all very motivated and the moment they start to become upset they go home to their clubs."
His son, Maurizio, 25, plays for Inter Escaldes, the first club from Andorra to reach the league phase of a UEFA competition, in the Conference League.
Pochettino did not rule out one day managing England once his spell with the USA ends, despite the rivalry with his native Argentina renewed by their World Cup semi-final meeting. "With our experience maybe yes," he said. "I believe in diplomatic things." He also gave his backing for England captain Harry Kane to win the Ballon d'Or: "It's Harry Kane's time. It's not clear today who is number one in the world and should win. In the past, it was more clear. He deserves it in his career and if I am to pick one then it's Harry Kane."
