Published: 02:00, 17 January 2026 | Updated: 02:00, 17 January 2026

Every night, Thomas Frank reads for half an hour before bed. Thankfully, he says, sleep is his friend.

What are you reading? I ask. All of the coverage around Tottenham?

‘No,’ he says, and his smile tells you he knows that would be unwise. Sleep would not come so easy if absorbing the negativity that surrounds him and his club right now. Rather, reveals Frank, it is Dan Brown’s The Secret of Secrets that is his bed-time read. He has followed the series since The Da Vinci Code.

‘This is good to calm my head down,’ he says. ‘There are a lot of thoughts in there in terms of trying to constantly improve and turning the corner.’

So far, corners turned have led to blind alleys for Frank as Tottenham head coach. He is the bookmakers’ second favourite in the ‘sack race’. The only manager with shorter odds is West Ham’s Nuno Espirito Santo, who he hosts in Saturday’s Desperation Derby. Or, as Tim Sherwood called it this week, ‘El Sackio’.