They both played in more than half the matches when we finished 2nd and 3rd. We recently beat Man City, Arsenal and Leicester with them both starting. It's our defence that's the issue, not them.
Players do struggle in their first seasons but they need to be given the support to make it right. Son was terrible in year one now look at hum. Jose also needs to find a way to make it work. He's paid a small fortune to get the best out of the players and Ndombele has the ability to be one of the very best. He also didn't really have a pre-season, he only returned in the Watford game, he missed the Ipswich, Birmingham and Reading ones. Sessegnon on the other played in them all, done well, and still can't make the squad, Jose needs to start trying different things because persisting with the same underperformers won't get him or us anywhere.
The defensive mistake is on Dier and Toby but the lineup was dreadful mate. Winks and Hojbjerg in the midfield offers us nothing. Anyone could have seen that and yet somehow Jose can't? I don't rate Dele and I wouldn't have started him but to have subbed him off for Sissoko was just as baffling as starting Dele in the first place. Dele's more likely to grab a goal or assist that Sissoko, Winks and Hojbjerg combined. What's Lucas doing to give Jose the impression he's better than Bergwijn? He hasn't scored in something like 21 league games, Bergwijn has about 4 since joining in January. Ndombele coming on for just 15 minutes is pointless as well, we were crying out for creativity at minute one and it took for minute seventy five to bring the one player on our bench who has the capability to make through ball passes. Loss was on Jose mate, simple as. I'm not Jose out as some are but there's no way I'm gonna refuse to criticise him either. The players were dogshit but it begs the question, why? Like I said to Hudd, where's the logic in a Winks and Hojbjerg partnership? Who are you relying on there to get the ball forward to the attackers? Lucas over Bergwijn also baffles me, one is so inconsistent, one is full of promise and has more goals since joining despite playing a lot less, I just don't understand it. Subbing Dele off for Sissoko meant that we had three central midfielders on the pitch, all of whom who can't pass a ball forward, that team selection and tactics yesterday just made no sense and Ancelotti took full advantage of it.
They only started about 10 games in the league between them when we finished 2nd. Huge difference to now where they're starting around 85% of games.
FWIW I think Sess will start midweek and he’s not going to be short of game time given our fixture pileup. More generally I think yesterday highlights the fine margins that football games can switch on. Issues with their free kick have been discussed that would obviously changed the dynamic but that apart, if Doherty finishes his chance, or Kane gets played in during that breakaway in the first half, suddenly we’re optimistically celebrating a scrappy 1-0 with a lot of players who had incomplete preseasons. We were far from perfect yesterday and just as Jose is getting it in the neck today I expect him to be doing the same to the players. But it’s not doom yet.
I can see why he picked the starting XI. Jose likes Lucas for his work rate and the doc confirms he sees something in Winks that the player just isn’t displaying on the pitch. Personally I think Sissoko for Winks might have given us more go-forward in midfield and I would have wanted Dele kept on. I agree that Moura is in danger of becoming a Lamela without the injuries, as he works hard but doesn’t have a high output. Bergwijn looks a far more dangerous player. I hope Jose isn’t developing blind spots for Lucas and Winks because it’ll be hugely damaging for us if he does.
Yeah the likelihood is he'll start against Plovdiv, as I presume Bergwijn and possibly Ndombele too but two of those should be starting league games for me and the third deserves a few chances as well. Seeing too many of the same players that are just constantly letting this team down frustrates me more than anything and the manager is the one that picks them. It's losses like yesterday that end up haunting us at the end of a season too. A few different tweaks to that XI and a better tactical gameplan and I think we take three points.
That final sentence is my worry. In the doc I've seen what he says about Winks and also in episode one or two he and Sacramento say something like "You can't get better players than Kane, Son, Lucas and Dele", the latter two are certainly players we can improve on, we arguably have them in the squad too.
I agree. GLC for Winks and Bergwijn for Lucas and you’re looking at a very different team. I still think yesterday was a game of very fine margins but Jose and the players need to do a whole lot better. The best teams are good enough that they still win when the little things don’t go their way. We used to be like that when we peaked under Poch. Jose needs to get us back to that level. I fear it’s a long road.
Ndombele for Dele too. I know the guy has his problems but if he's staying he needs to play - and more than just cameos. We've given Dele three seasons to recapture that form he showed as the new kid on the block. He was looking like he'd go on to be England's next superstar but nowadays you'd probably prefer players like Grealish, Maddison and possibly Foden and Mount over him too. He's had his time and chances, time to try something new and whilst Ndombele has pissed just about everyone off it's still very early in his Spurs career and we've given plenty of others a lot more time to come good.
Yeah it’s gotten to the stage where I’d like to see a midfield 3 of PEH, GLC and Tanguy just given a few games in the league to get into their stride. I’ve been as critical as anyone of Tanguy but he’s a serious talent and a run of games might get him up to speed and fitness. Worth mentioning that I also thought PEH was well below par too yesterday and I’m expecting a big improvement.
That's what I want to see, it needs to start around 8-10 games too, give it time to gel. As you know I wasn't overly keen on him but I'm happy to give the guy time. I also think - cue the Anti-Winks train again - that putting him alongside Winks does him no favours. When you're alongside another player who can't create you probably feel you have to try doing more than you should. Alongside Lo Celso/ Ndombele you know they're capable of making those through balls and therefore Hojbjerg can focus on winning the ball and protecting the back four. I even said pre-game I wanted a Sissoko-Hojbjerg-Ndombele midfield, Sissoko would help cover Doherty's runs as he's done for Aurier, Hojbjerg would do the leg work and Ndombele would have the freedom to create.
The problem isn't the individual midfielders, it's that we don't have a single combination that makes sense. Everton signed Allan so that Gomes and Doucoure have a solid platform to work from and can get up and down the pitch. We don't have anyone that can do that job effectively, so we're putting square pegs in round holes all the time. Wanyama's legs fell off and Dier lost the mobility to play that role. Who did we bring in? Nobody. We've got the same issue that I've criticised Everton for in the past, ironically. A deep-lying creative midfielder would work with a lot of our midfielders too, but we don't have one of those, either.
I agree with you about Lucas, but we couldn't sell him and get a better player for the money raised. And that is even more true for Dele. He still got a goal or an assist every two matches last season which isn't bad at all. Our problem stems from the brilliant recruitment to get Dele, Alderwiereld, Dier, Rose, Eriksen and Walker for less than £50m. At their peak they were worth eight times that and the only way to replace them adequately would have been to sell them all two or three years ago.
Or to put it another way Lloris Walker, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Rose Dembele, Dier Son, Eriksen, Dele Kane cost us about £100m Gazzaniga Aurier, Sanchez, Foyth, Sessegnon Hojbjerg, Ndombele, Sissoko, Lo Celso, Bergwijn Lucas cost us more than £300m and are nowhere near as good. Although I have hopes for six of them
How do you know? I don't really understand that viewpoint. James Rodriguez at £12m shows there's huge value in the market if you look in the right places and he's a better player than Dele and Lucas. A loan for Coutinho would also provide a short term upgrade on Dele. Dele's stats were hugely padded too. 7 of his 12 contributions in the league last season came during the period he picked up form in Jose's first number of weeks, roughly spread over 7 or so games. Before and after that period he was practically anonymous - that's been the case for three years now too. His overall game is no longer impressive, often a passenger who tries one or two fancy flicks that more often than not don't come off. He just isn't good enough any more, a player that peaked early and never kicked on. Our problem is that we also rested on our laurels on that recruitment, we done very little in the following years to future proof the team for when those players declined/ left. Sanchez was probably the only player signed with the genuine intent to replace a player before they'd actually declined/ left.
Alli's constantly being used wrong. He needs to play up near the striker and he needs some supply from the midfield. Our team selection yesterday was another example of it. There was virtually no creativity and he was too deep. We got significantly worse when he went off, too.
I don't know, it is just my opinion. But I think people underestimate how good our players are. Someone tweeted today that back in 2007 we had Berbatov, Keane, Defoe and Bent as our strikers and now only Kane. But where did we finish with those four....? Only Berbatov was actually a top four striker.
He hasn't been played wrong for three years though and he generally does play near the striker, his starting position is often as the central attacking midfielder which is where he's always been. He's just too predictable for opposition defenders nowadays, he hasn't adapted well enough to be a marked man. He worked well in a certain system but he's unable to adapt to anything else. It's just not good enough.
I don't think they can they be underestimated when they consistently underperform. The team has declined year on year for the past three seasons. If anything people overrate some of our players due to their past form and I think it clouds judgement as to how they view them today. Go back to 2017 and look at our team now: 2017 - 2020 Hugo > Hugo now Walker > Doherty/ Aurier Toby > Toby now Jan > Dier Rose > Davies Dembele > Lo Celso/ Ndombele/ Winks/ Sissoko Wanyama > Hojbjerg/ Winks Dele > Lucas/ Dele now Eriksen > Dele/ Lo Celso Son < Son probably the one player who's better than their former self back then Kane = Kane It's a rough decline of a once very good XI.
