Tottenham hero Gary Lineker says his old club should never have dumped Martin Jol.

The former England striker told the Sunday Mirror: "Look how well Jol is doing with Hamburg now. They should have stuck by him.

"We'll see what happens with Ramos. Generally, if you look at the clubs who have been successful, they are the ones who have stuck by their manager.

"Obviously you need the right one. If they think Ramos is the right guy and knows his stuff then they should give him time."

The ex-England star feels Spurs' problems are the result of selling top-class forwards Jermain Defoe, Robbie Keane and Dimitar Berbatov.

"After having a load of strikers they are now struggling up front," said Lineker. "You hope Roman Pavlyuchenko adapts really quickly - but now he's out for a while. It's just been a really tough start for them. Everything that could go wrong has done.

"Defoe has been on fire at Portsmouth. We all know Berbatov was a different case - if he's desperate to go then he's going to go. And losing Keane was another huge blow."