It's just shocking we went into the season with just 3 senior CBs. Total madness. We saw the injuries Ange's system caused last season, knew we'd be in four competitions but just shrugged and went 'ah, we'll make do'. Just like the two seasons we went into it with Kane as our only recognised ST. We do everything possible to make the manager's job as tough as possible. Then the fans turn on the manager. Then the manager gets the sack. Then the next mug comes in and gets a window that hints to future promise of common sense. But that window is literally never repeated. Then the fans turn on the manager. Then the manager gets the sack. And so on and so forth, and nauseum. Making Do FC, brought to you by Daniel Levy.
Many of us knew that wasn’t enough especially with the extra games from Europe and it being near impossible to have a worse cup run than last year but for some reason the club and manager thought it would be. Even now we hear the manager say it’s unlucky to have so many injuries even though he publicly admitted at Celtic that his way of playing can result in more injuries than average. Yes he can and probably should have a bigger squad but he’s shown that squad rotation is one of his many many weaknesses.
It appears I might be preoccupied tomorrow so may not see much of the match Mainly because mentioning that my sister got my mother a QR code for AI generated perfume for Christmas (yes, that sentence is supposed to read that way) on my socials seems to have gone viral, and I now have people from the US, Canada and Australia asking for more information morning, noon and night No, seriously, not one word of that sentence is made up I am in hell Help me
I agree but there are certain positions where it is almost impossible for him to rotate. CB and CM. The former I've described, the latter I'm honestly not sure what our plan was to start with as Kulusevski's conversion into a deeper midfield player appears to have been by chance rather than by design. So we sold Skipp and Hojbjerg in the summer, replaced them with two teenagers, and then entered the season facing four competitions with five recognised CMs to cover three spots in the team. I shudder to think what would have been had the Kulusevski experiment turned into a disaster. The lack of common sense at the club does my head in.
Loaning out Alfie Devine has caused more of an issue than offloading players Hojbjerg's legs had clearly gone this time last year so moving him on clearly made sense (even before we get into the wages argument), while Skipp had clearly been knocked back a step or two by his second ankle injury, though TBH I was less on board with him being moved on given our abysmal CG quota that means we have to include Austin and Whiteman in our EL squad On the other hand Devine would have at the very least been cover for Maddison, which we were short on with Jamie Donley being loaned out to get some experience this season, and given our lack of midfielders who can pass this season he would have potentially offered something
I wasn't against Skipp and Hojbjerg moving on as they clearly weren't the future for Spurs. What baffled me was how little we then did to improve that area of the team when it was blindingly obvious all of last season that it was a massive weak point. Devine would have been useful but to what end? To provide cover for a player who himself can't hold a spot down in the starting line up? One of the biggest issues with Maddison is that he just doesn't seem to fit anywhere in the system. And I'd say the same about Bissouma, Bentancur and Son tbh.
Maddison fit into the system pre-injury...but we've had twelve months since then where he's had maybe half a dozen games where he's stood out in any way other than asking if he was even on the pitch post-match, so having an option to shove him aside while also getting some early Europa games to establish himself is one of those things that could pay off better than we initially realise
I’m not sure anyone does to be honest. I think the system is so chaotic and reckless it removes the ability of a player to play consistently well. Kulu’s been head and shoulders our best player this season and even he’s not always been great in games. It all feels so amateurish to me. For as much as I like the bloke, Ange is slowly convincing me he may be one of the poorest managers we’ve hired under Levy, which is quite damning when you think about it. I’d love him to change my view because I’m still desperate for him to succeed but I feel like he needs a major turnaround that you almost certainly never see in football management.
I'm not accepting injury as an excuse. Bottom line is we had a raft of players who looked incredible in those opening 10 games, and then one of two things happened. Either some of them picked up injuries that permanently ruined them as players, or opposition teams worked out our system and by the time those players returned, the game was up. The latter is exponentially more likely than the former.
Wolves have been a real bogey side for us in recent years, they are in the middle of a real new manager bounce and we are in on the crest of a slump with no fit centre backs, only 1 outcome today and Ange will be left hanging on by a thread. I have no idea who plays today, the biggest question seems to whether Bissouma or Dorrington plays alongside Gray at CB, me I would play the actual CB but I have feeling Ange will play Biss. My team . Forster, Porro, Udogie, Gray, Dorrington, Bentancur, Bissouma, Maddison, Johnson, Solanke and Werner.
I think we’ll win today. Even though we have defensive issues player wise, we generally don’t have an issue scoring goals at home so cut out the silly mistakes and can see us winning this.
In all honesty I believe it is one of those "must wins" today, purely from a confidence thing. The next upcoming game against Newcastle will be far from easy so lose both, and dare I say it but things starts to look a bit shaky...
