Louis van Gaal has hinted he would be open to an approach from Tottenham Hotspur once his stewardship of Holland concludes after the summer's World Cup finals, with the London club's 1-0 defeat at Norwich on Sunday having left them six points from the Champions League qualification places.
The Dutchman, whose contract with his country expires after the tournament in Brazil, had spoken directly with the Spurs chairman, Daniel Levy, after the dismissal of André Villas-Boas in December but had made clear his intention to lead the national team to the finals in South America. Levy subsequently firmed up Tim Sherwood's position, the caretaker having made it clear he would not work on an interim basis before signing his own 18-month contract at White Hart Lane.
Yet Spurs' interest in Van Gaal has not waned even in light of Sherwood's impressive impact in his first senior management role. The 62-year-old's desire to coach in the Premier League before he retires makes him an attractive and as a former manager at Barcelona, Ajax and Bayern Munich heavyweight candidate at the end of the current season.
Asked about his future post-Brazil, when Guus Hiddink will again take up the reins with Holland, Van Gaal said: "I will definitely not be in charge for the Euro 2016 qualification campaign. I don't know where I will go next. Normally I go with my pension, and go to live in Portugal [where he owns a property], but maybe there will come a new challenge. I have said before that a challenge should be a club in the Premier League. That's a challenge. Maybe Tottenham are coming but, first, we have to go to Brazil."
Spurs had also sounded out Frank de Boer, currently in charge of Ajax, prior to elevating Sherwood formally from his position as youth co-ordinator at Tottenham, a role to which he has indicated he would not be prepared to return.
Sherwood was understandably downbeat after an unexpected defeat left them still fifth in the Premier League, but now six points behind Liverpool, and with a vastly inferior goal difference. "It's a big gap, a real blow to us," he acknowledged. "It's the first major setback I've had and we need to bounce back and show what we are made of."
Asked if his players were still feeling the effects of the midweek trip to the Ukraine to play Dnipro in the Europa League, the former Spurs midfielder demurred. "We were stronger in the second period, so we can't use Thursday as an excuse," he said.
"In the second half we looked by far the better side. But we've started slowly in quite a lot of games and it was sluggish, sluggish. It was a nothing game in the first half, we took a real blow early in the second, and I think we started playing from there and created a few chances. Unfortunately we couldn't take them.
"We have to bounce back, we have two games now, we have the second leg [against Dnipro] on Thursday and then Cardiff at home next week. We need characters in the dressing room to do that."
Sherwood saw the misfiring Roberto Soldado miss Spurs' best chance when he blazed over the bar from close range shortly after coming on as a second-half substitute. "We're waiting for him to take one [of his opportunities] and then hopefully the confidence will start flooding back," said Sherwood of the Spanish striker, for whom Spurs paid £26m and who has scored just once from open play in the Premier League.
"It's all about scoring on the big stage and we know he can do that. We've seen him do it over the years, and hopefully it'll be sooner rather than later when he starts putting it in the net."
Soldado also missed an excellent chance against Dnipro, prompting the former Spurs chairman Alan Sugar to describe him as a "donkey" in a tweet.
The result means the Norwich manager, Chris Hughton, survived to fight another day after being widely tipped for the sack if the Canaries were beaten. That was down to the chief executive, David McNally, openly admitting in an interview before the game that Norwich were actively examining the market for a potential successor.
Hughton, who came into the game having overseen just one win in 11 league matches, claimed McNally's words had not been in his thoughts. "There's enough goes into the week preparing the players, and this was a performance up there with our best this season," he said. "It feels like a big win.
"My biggest concern is we've had a real good level of performance in the last few games without getting the results we deserve, so I'm pleased for this group of lads, they've been as frustrated as anyone."
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