Pass map time please log in to view this image What's immediately obvious is our midfield did a much better job of feeding the forward line, with Winks pinging the ball around in the Modric/Rakitic role he;s better suited for rather than the Jorginho role he's been playing most of the season, while Dele was making himself available to receive passes in a way Eriksen really hasn't been all season I did notice during the match the Twitter/Reddit crowd were saying that Dele's revitalised under Steptonho, but to be honest that's a fair amount of bollocks as he was playing the exact same way in the Red Star game when he was in the same role (and, crucially, Eriksen wasn't on the pitch) where he was doing a fine job of linking midfield and attack. True, Red Star were no great shakes...but were West Scam for 72 minutes yesterday?
Something I really enjoyed yesterday which is something Jose has implemented in the last few days is the speed at which we counter. Whilst we kept a lot of the Poch-possession style, when the opportunity arose to knock a long ball forward or out to the wing it allowed Son and Lucas - accompanied by Kane and Alli - to really hit West Ham on the break and I massively enjoyed that, very similar to how Jose set up his Madrid side back in the day with Ronaldo (Son), Ozil (Alli), Benzema (Kane) and Higuain/ Di Maria (Lucas). If Jose can convert Sess into a LB, then he'll also have his very own Marcelo at the club. If you've got a spare 7 minutes, I'd recommend giving this a watch as albeit it's just one game, that game really looked like this is potentially going to be our future under Jose, something I can really get behind (FYI, video resolution isn't the best):
The Humble One wants to build a team. If you don't want to play for the team that he wants to build, you won't play. Dele looked better because Jose played him in a position where he was going to be most effective. Kane saw more of the ball because Jose set up our attack to be more effective. Non of this is rocket science, yet Poch didn't seem to be able to work it out. I think our slight second half capitulation was a gamble on Jose's part to save players from tiredness and potential injury. Whatever any of those who have bought into the Jose negativity may otherwise think of him, Jose is a far superior tactician than Poch will ever be.
Again, when Dele played as a number ten against Red Star and Sheffield United his game was exactly the same as it was against West Scam: he was linking midfield and attack far better than Eriksen has, which in turn means Harry Kane isn't having to drop so deep to receive the ball that was common during the diamond phase - but since the pundits had settled on the Narrative of Dele being crap, people ignored it (even when I was providing actual video evidence...) At the risk of turning into yet another episode of Let's Bash Christian Eriksen, there's no denying that Eriksen was doing a rotten job of linking midfield and attack when he played, to the point he was so ineffective against Saltypool that he was effectively a black hole where our forward play would vanish from existence if it went too close to him - a problem exacerbated by both Dele and Lo Celso being unavailable at the start of the season meaning Poch couldn't simply start one of them in Eriksen's place, which was made worse by the fact Poch did try and drop Eriksen from the team only for the fans to wail en masse (just like they did when Verts was dropped and Rose was left behind in pre-season) which essentially meant the fans were happy for Poch to do his job...as long as it was the way they wanted him to do his job
One question: how can it be the fastest counter attack in the world if the video lasts seven minutes? I'm pretty sure Andy Booth could've made it from one end of the pitch to the other in less time than that...
It's one of the reasons that I've always thought that we should leave Son and Moura up when we're defending set pieces. Neither of them is particularly useful in defence anyway and it forces the opposition to leave men back or risk getting picked apart on the break. Son had a very good game yesterday, but Moura needs to stop coming inside so much and so early. His goal was a perfect example of when to do it, but he often left us short defensively and put additional pressure on Aurier. What's surprising is that the Ivorian actually dealt with it well for most of the game, though he looked pissed off at our capitulation at the end.
Pulling our entire team back to defend corners is a long-standing thing I will never understand - especially considering it's so long-standing that the trait goes back to when Hoddle was in charge
And so he should be, it’s been a massive problem for us this season and needs to be ironed out if we’re to push forward. We've let 2-goal leads slip against Arsenal and Olympiacos, we’ve also lost or drawn having gone 1-0 up against Bayern, Leicester, Liverpool, Watford and Sheff Utd. We were so comfortable in yesterday’s match for the most part yet 3-2 makes it look a close game. In theory we should’ve made it 4-0 before they made it 3-1 as Lucas missed a glorious chance and Kane took too long when through on goal too but our defence really needs to remained switched on. Crazy how we’ve gone from one of the best defences to one that’s constantly letting us down.
The lack of a good DM is the main reason for that I'm hoping that's going to be sorted PDQ come January - although that would likely rule out Zakaria
It’s definitely a contributing factor but the defence as a unit has massively weakened. Walker and Trippier leaving have left us light at RB. Rose being poor for 18 months and Davies getting niggling injuries haven’t helped at LB. Toby’s form dropping well off the boil and Jan not being at his best this season has also been a nuisance. And then there’s Hugo’s ever increasing brain farts too. Sanchez has probably been the only defender who’s been consistent and even he hasn’t been perfect.
One pattern I've noticed going back to Old606 is how, when we don't have a DM (or we have a DM, but a crap one) is there's always one defender who cops the flak for it Michael Dawson was constantly getting it in the neck when he had Didier Zokora LARPing Patrick Vieira (badly...) in front of him, yet either side of that when he had the Davids/Carrick pairing or one of Palacios, Parker or Sandro in front of him he was an absolute rock Younes Kaboul got it even worse than Dawson when Zokora was in front of him, yet when he returned with Palacios in front of him he was getting praised once again Jan Vertonghen was hailed as a Rolls-Royce centre back when he had the Sandro/Dembele pivot covering him, but he was getting shredded Tactics Tim refused to play a DM - yet got praised once more when he had Dier/Dembele or Wanyama/Dembele in front of him Obviously a quality DM won't cure all ills, after all our inability to defend corners has been an issue since last season, although a good DM will also prevent a few situations where we concede a corner in the first place, so it evens out to a certain degree
My guess regarding the second goal and training would be that Kane should keep back and attract the defenders to him and let Moura move into the box.
Let's hope Jose can bring a style of play back to Tottenham which we can all sit/stand and enjoy,as in the past! COYS!
We had stopped pressing anyway for a few seasons now His downfall seems to have been his over emotional blinkerdness towards a select handful of players. Jose doesn't do sentiment
