They played virtually the same game that Ipswich did, but Watkins fluffed a chance to make it 2-0. We came out in similar fashion after the break in both games, but our quick goal against Ipswich was chalked off for a handball. Postecoglou then made a fairly odd sub, in my opinion, replacing Sarr with a semi-fit Werner, though he did draw a marker for our goal.
The new stadium has allowed us to catch Arsenal and Chelsea on revenue but it is no guarantee of success. £1b is as Chelsea and Man City. Eze is 26 years old, never won anything and never even scored a full international goal. Obviously exactly the right signing to help our mentality.
Man City paid £100m for Grealish who’d also never scored for England and had never won anything. Bayern Munich paid £100m for Harry Kane who’s also won nothing.
I agree there’s definitely a mental edge that the top players have and I agree that we don’t shop at the top table. But to compensate for that you need to set the environment up within the club to support the pursuit of excellence. The mental edge that a Ronaldo has isn’t just on the pitch in matches and moments, it’s the entire mentality, how you apply yourself to self improvement, how you try and motivate your teammates, the tone of every relationship you have at a club. And my feeling is that there have been enough comments from enough different people over the years to support the suggestion that this isn’t what’s happening. I think it’s fair to be suggesting that the attitude towards what happens on the pitch seems more about doing just enough, rather than doing the maximum. Which is a stark contrast to how the club handles off pitch investment and work. If the stadium was delivered half cooked then it would be more understandable if there wasn’t the right tone on the pitch, but that isn’t what happened. Without any of us definitely knowing what happens behind the scenes, it doesn’t look like the standards are set where they need to be to drive overperformance on the pitch, which is what we need to do if we want to win anything given our financial standing.
Which takes us right back to the part where he tends to score goals because somebody got the ball to him, which the midfield were shambolic at doing for the majority of the game It's one thing to say that he's not someone like prime Gareth Bale who can pick up the ball in his own half and have the ball in the net less than ten seconds later, because that assessment is more than fair (and, you know, accurate) - but if the ball isn't getting to him in the first place the fault lies elsewhere, and Bentancur is the prime suspect for a lot of it
Mentality is certainly an issue both at the club and who we sign. But I’d also say so is quality. We’ve spent lots since moving to the new stadium but how many players have joined that immediately gave off “oh that’s a quality signing” aura? Don’t think I can think of one. Maybe Bale and Perisic but both joined at the tail end of their careers, neither actually cost us anything outside of wages either, so it’s very possible both would’ve joined if we were still at WHL.
He missed a sitter from Son's cross near the start of the game. Realistically he needs to score or assist (which sounds simplistic but I think you know what I mean by it) to make it worthwhile him being on the pitch, otherwise it's pointless him being there. You'd barely know he was on the pitch.
The issue there is several other players also fall into that remit, not least Son and Maddison, but both of them certainly get free passes more often than not while Johnson immediately gets torches & pitchforks
Maddison hasn't gotten free passes at all, no idea how you've come to that conclusion... just look at the comments on this board in recent months. The manager has seemingly even had enough too based on recent selections. Son's also come in for criticism, though when you consider what he's done for this club, a little leniency is also understandable.
When have Son or Maddison ever had people jump on them whenever they drop a bad performance, even though both have put in their fair share of those in the past nine months or so? They absolutely get free passes compared to other players It's hardly new behaviour from our fanbase either, because they're always looking for a lightning rod because it's easier to blame one player for the performances of the eleven on the pitch than look at any potential structural issues. It's the same as when Sissoko was apparently at fault for every loss, rather than the fact that Poch's system was failing due to multiple factors such as failure to replace key components of his system when injuries caught up to them coupled with a loss of authority for letting Danny Rose talk **** about the club to Murdoch's Hate Comic when any other player who effed around soon found out
Son's knackered and was rushed back from injury because our 3 backup left-wingers are also injured. He'll now fly halfway around the world to play every minute for South Korea, even if they're about 4-0 up with ten minutes to go. I did think it was interesting that Maddison replaced Johnson on the right, though it should've happened much earlier. Might be a useful option in that role, considering the state of our squad.
Countless times. Just look at CK and Lefty on here for examples on Son, they've both been highly critical of him, CK even said he's finished as a top player on this very thread, something I personally disagree with. The only difference is a big thing was made out of Johnson because he chose to temporary delete his socials because of the criticism and abuse. Multiple other spurs players get criticism and abuse across social media, as do thousands of others.
I think the system is killing Son just as much as any fatigue or aging issues to be honest and it's been something I've felt for a while. Udogie ends up taking a lot of the space Son would often occupy and the system is so reliant on scoring tap-ins inside the box that it's essentially trying to force Son to play as an orthodox winger to supply crosses to the striker, we rarely see him score 25+ yarders now and we rarely play through balls to him (or anyone really) to run onto, one of the few times we did this season, he scored against West Ham. He used to pretty much have his own goal of the season catalogue every year, that's disappeared over the last 18 months, I really don't think it's a coincidence.
Yet when have people pored over FBRef for either of their data after a poor result? In terms of Johnson, the fact he's had to disable his Insta twice in the past year due to the abuse he gets underlines the issue: a section of our fanbase wants him to be the problem, which is a completely ****ed up way to view things, so when they have an excuse to single him out they grab it with both hands Compare that to someone like Serge Aurier, who was utter dogshit for a large chunk of his time with us and watching games in real time you could see his presence being a negative for the team given how often certain players had to cover for the huge gaps he habitually left on the right (and bloody hell did our opponents know about them...), yet he never had had people waiting to hurl abuse at him Also worth mentioning a post on r/coys about how one bloke in the stands on Sunday yelling abuse at Vicario all game long, because it's easier to blame Vicario than the refs who let opposition players go UFC in our area for set pieces
The halftime tweak against Villa was to have our fullbacks overlap. We scored almost immediately and just battered them for 45+ minutes. I don't really see why we didn't continue with it from the start against Ipswich.
He gets no more abuse or criticism than others here at the club, him disabling his socials just draws attention to the matter. If other players also disabled their accounts or removed comments it'd garner more attention too. That's literally the only difference. Aurier got dogs abuse for years. He was the butt of multiple jokes.
I was pondering this earlier. I do think we'd get much more out of Son if he was a lot closer to Solanke, so that the latter can use his strength and hold up ability to bring the more technically gifted Korean into the game in much more dangerous areas.
