Woodgate urges Spurs to back Ramos

Tottenham must keep faith with underfire manager Juande Ramos despite the club's woeful start to the season which reached rock bottom on Sunday against Stoke.

That was the message to the Spurs board delivered on Monday by defender Jonathan Woodgate who insists the Tottenham players are right behind Ramos.

The England defender said: “He is still the manager and hopefully he will continue to be.

“We will stick by the manager no matter what. We've played well at times, but this season we haven't cut it. The buck stops with the players.

“We're bottom of the Premiership and it's not nice at all. We're hurting inside but we have to stand up and get ourselves out of this mess that we've got ourselves into.”

Spurs have just two points from eight games and are bottom of the league table – and a newly-formed fans group is planning a mass protest at Tottenham's next home game against Bolton on Sunday, calling on chairman Daniel Levy to resign.

Ramos himself admitted Tottenham's situation was “terrible” after Stoke's 2-1 win on Sunday condemned his side to their sixth defeat of the season and the Spaniard said he had no idea whether he still enjoyed Levy's confidence.

Spurs face Bolton, Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City as their next four league opponents and unless they achieve some positive results then relegation could be a real possibility.

Woodgate admitted as much but said he was confident they would stay in the top flight.

He added: “We're in a hard battle. We have to stick to our beliefs and play like we did in the first half (against Stoke) with 10 men.

“We should stay up and I think we will. Would it be a successful season to do that? No idea. I think we will stay up. It just depends how far up the table we can get.”

Former Spurs midfielder Jamie Redknapp believes the club's policy of having a director of football is causing a problem.

He told Sky Sports: “Directors of football don't work in this country. They need to rethink it.

“They had David Pleat when I was at Tottenham and all you get is people undermining the manager.

“Unless the manager and the director of football are close then it won't work.

“If he is asking for players and getting ones in different positions that is never going to work in this country.”