Ironically this would be a good time to have Harvey White as a bench option At least give him a start, Derby...
It was always likely we'd never see Richarlison get a consistent run in the side though, as he's simply nowhere near as good as Kane, Son or Kulusevski. He was signed to essentially upgrade on Bergwijn and Lucas from the bench as well as cover the void left by Carlos Vinicius, the problem is he's been no better than Bergwijn or Lucas and it's now looking as what many initially feared in that we blew a ridiculous amount of money on an average player - again. I think it'd be quite distasteful if Conte (or anyone) were to put our poor football down to Gianpiero's passing, as we've been playing poorly since the second game of the season and Gianpiero passed in October. There's no doubt he'll have been sorely missed but the style of football never changed post-Gianpiero. If Conte being away from his family is also affecting his management then we should absolutely part ways now, because as far as I'm aware there's no plans for his family to move to London and seeing as he's clearly not willing to commit anyway, I don't see why we're basically flogging a dead horse with the managerial situation, it's only negatively affecting our players and results. This then has a further adverse knock-on effect as another poor season almost certainly guarantees Kane won't renew and the club then has a huge decision to make in the summer.
The thing with Richy is he does offer a different dimension to our play given how good he is in the air...if he was playing in a front two, rather than stopping Deki getting games by being played as a RW More than anything else this season, Conte being such a Starmer about playing 352 is causing issues because not only do we routinely lose control of games when we play 343 as our midfield two gets overrun, but actively stops Richy playing in a role where he makes sense - instead of playing in a role that gets us worried that we won't automatically trigger the buy option in Deki's deal
Richarlison is hardly a Peter Crouch or Tim Cahill when it comes to aerial superiority. He's not even better than Kane in the air. So it's hardly a USP in Richarlison's favour. Playing 352 would still see Richarlison benched most weeks too, as Son would still start up top ahead of him alongside Kane.
Weirdly, Crouchy wasn't as good in the air as people think he was. For example Adebayor was better in the air than he was Of course that could just be because players switch off and aim crosses approximately 8ft in the air once he's in the box, which routinely happened with me even though I'm 6'3" and not the ****ing Empire State Building
Distasteful? Don't get that comment at all. The loss of TWO close friends and not having your family with you to share the grief is not easy for anyone to deal with and that's not going to make your job easier. That was my point. Management of people is a complex and often difficult job. Our squad, like any PL squad comprises top quality footballers. The job is not simply down to who is playing well there are many many other factors. There are many reasons why any particular player should be playing in the team at any given moment the clue is the word 'team' . We are talking about human beings with all their swings of mood, confidence and form. The loss of Doherty for example will have a knock on effect. I think it's a fair bet that the win over City induced overconfidence in the side is another example. There is no way we can judge to what extent any of these factors are or are not making a difference, what I am doing is responding to the cries for Conte's head by suggesting that is far from a simple matter. Conte like Mourinho before him have proven track records in England and Europe, they don't suddenly become bad managers it suggests to me that the problem lies with the growing pains of Tottenham Hotspur. We are trying to move up a level, otherwise why appoint them, and that is going to be difficult whoever is in charge. Look around at other clubs and relative success has come from having stable management in place. The only exception to this is Chelsea and they just chuck millions at the problem. Other than them, time is needed to develop a team fully.
Because to use someone’s passing as a reason for poor football when poor football was happening before their death is just plain wrong - as it would be for Vialli as he passed in January and our poor football was occurring far earlier than that. There is absolutely no doubt Conte has had a tough few months and has sympathies from everyone for the losses he’s had to endure but when the football hasn’t changed pre and post the passings of Ventrone and Vialli I fail to see how you could determine they’ve been contributing factors. If his family being away from him is compromising his ability as a manager then we need rid now both for ours and his sake. When a manager isn’t fully focused or is distracted it has negative effects on the team, just look at when Redknapp was flirting with the England job, our form nosedived and then when the role was given to Hodgson we smashed Newcastle 5-0 within about 24 hours. Football management is of course complex but that’s why they get paid millions of pounds to do so and when they don’t perform they get questioned by the very people whose support goes a long way to paying their wages. Why did we hire Jose and Conte? Because in truth it was likely seen as a cheaper alternative than spending about £500m to improve the team after Pochettino told us we had a painful rebuild on our hands, the problem there as we’re seeing is that neither Jose or Conte are the types of managers who can go in and rebuild teams, they’re the types of managers who add the finishing touches to already established ones and go on to win titles.
So on the plus side, our next manager will have half a season's worth of data of what Skipp and Sarr can do to work with...
I don't think I have a much different opinion from what people have said. But my main problem is with the manager. I know there are other issues about recruitment and the players, but I'm going to put that to one side for the moment because of the rather practical reason that these are the players we have until the end of the season. The manager has to work with them, regardless of the (valid) considerations of how we got them, who we should have and who we shouldn't have. And with a few exceptions they have performed poorly. So yes, Conte may want better more expensive players but surely a top level manager should be able to get more out of this bunch? But no many argue, it's all ENIC's fault because we don't have the sort of players Conte can work with. Really? Only a week ago we beat a team which has regularly been described as the best in the world (yes really). Whether they are that good may not be true, but our victory over them was not a fluke. Yet a week later we are absolutely stuffed by what is clearly a lesser team. This should not happen if the manager is doing the right thing. But this idea of sticking to the same thing (surely flexibility is a feature of great mangers?), and all those games of starting badly and having to catch up - surely a great manager can fix that? So we go into the game after Citeh without Romero, but at least Emerson had his best game yet for Spurs. What does he do? He drops Emerson, making the right side of the defence look potentially a problem, and so it proved. And I'm not being clever in hindsight, I really couldn't understand why Emerson was dropped before the match. Basically I am not seeing much evidence of this elite level manger we are supposed to have. In fact the team played better last week when he wasn't there! He is the wrong fit for Spurs. Certainly he deserves some plaudits for the CL qualification, but don't forget that was not just based on a pick up in our form, but an implosion by Arsenal. And talking of CL, regardless of how well we actually do on Tuesday, we should not be going into that game with midfielders with so little game time this season. Yes there are contributory factors which are most certainly not Conte's fault, but the absence of rotation is. But of course I hope I'm wrong! Edit: just remembered another thing I wanted to mention about this match was the number of misplaced passes. I can't recall a time when so many went astray. Probably was, but for some reason I was really noticing how bad it was. Kane was also at it, which is unusual for him.
Awful news. other than Kane getting injured, that’s about as bad as it can get for us at the moment. Looking forward, I’d like to get excited about what Skipp and Sarr can produce in midfield. We know Skipp has talent, and Sarr has really impressed during his limited game time this season. However, I still think conte will muster up some way of not using the young players! Midfield duo of Sanchez and Emerson incoming.
I do genuinely half expect Dier to be moved up into midfield, which if it does happen, would be a monumental kick in the bollocks to both Skipp and/ or Sarr.
I agree. - if that happens, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Emerson be used as RCB, which wouldn’t be the end of the world in my opinion. praying for Dier’s legs if he’s used as a DM for 90mins.
Dier used to be a DM didn’t he? Then a RB and now a CB. Not excelled in any position but somehow still stealing a wage at Spurs after all these years
The saving grace is Spurs are 5th, still in the FA Cup and Champions League. I think Conte and Spurs definitely part ways at the end of the season and then it’s time to go for a manager who is progressive rather than pragmatic.
On paper that's very respectable but one or two were saying similar about being 3rd a couple months back when it was pretty clear our luck of late winners from poor performances wouldn't keep holding out. With no Lloris, Bentancur and Bissouma for a while/ rest of the season, I can only see that number changing for the worse in the coming weeks and months, especially with how the manager's tactics keep playing towards our weaknesses and not our strengths. It's gonna be pretty grim viewing I think.
So we've just bought our most expensive wing back ever. Everyone agrees that Porro is better than Emerson. Our defence is already weakened by the absence of our most expensive centre back ever. Surely that is even more of a reason to start the better player at RWB, irrespective of how well Emerson played in the previous match. I think there was a case for playing Emerson in Romero's position though.
Even if Conte was minded to stay beyond the summer, Paratici's likely departure would kill that stone dead. Hopefully, someone is already doing constructive work (tapping up) a replacement for both DoF and coach. I dread a repeat of the post-Mourinho debacle this summer...but if it's Levy running the show again, it's not out of the question.
It was suggested last week that Benfica sporting director Pedro Braz is being lined up So, less Italian players, more Portuguese and South American ones
Spurs are the wrong fit for anyone who is a winner I wouldn't lose much sleep over our form if I was Conte Seen it all before
