Another good finish 2-0. He looked just offside to me but we don't deserve any better, it's been a flat second half from us.
Tino Costa seems to be sent off for swearing at the ref, I assume. I don't blame him, the refs been crap.
Exactly what we will get in the Prem. Don't take our chances we will pay. JD was poor tonight, he won't always play as bad. I hope I'm wrong, I think Harry Kane will earn a living but not in the Prem, probably in the Championship or Div 1. Their Second goal exposed the high line. May have been off side but those sort of decisions will go against us in the prem from time to time. Overall though it was the best result possible. It highlighted the lack of strikers. Levy has no choice but to act.
2-0 FT. That was rubbish. I don't see what we gained out of that performance, bar some fitness and sharpness for the coming season. The defence is still adjusting to the new style, but there seemed to be little progress on that front and neither Kaboul nor Dawson got on the pitch. Both full-backs looked to be struggling with it at times and there seemed to be an overall lack of cover and communication. The midfield pairing of Livermore and Jenas was dire, fairly unsurprisingly, yet Villas-Boas felt it was better to experiment with playing Sigurdsson and van der Vaart in the creative role, once Jenas had departed. Huddlestone remained unused and Carroll was brought on for a couple of minutes. Defoe proved yet again that he can't play the lone role and the lack of service starved our wingers of possession, with Bale going out of the game completely in the second half. Sigurdsson wasn't involved for most of the time that he was on the pitch and Kane looked brighter in his place, but I doubt either will start. Deeply unimpressed by that, to be honest. It's a friendly and the result is irrelevant, but we all know where we're lacking and what not to do, yet we're repeating the same mistakes that Redknapp made in the last campaign. Our system needs creativity in the middle of the park and we're simply not going to get that from Jenas and Livermore, so why attempt it? If Modric is either going to leave or begin the campaign with no match fitness, then why aren't we using Huddlestone and building him up from his injury? Barring that, I'd prefer to see Carroll given a run out in that position, as the experience might do him good, if nothing else. Not happy.
Poor performance, and if ENIC don't wake their ideas up, poor old AVB is going to get another kicking from the media again this season. But for me it's not' AVB out', it's 'get your money out ENIC'.
We don't even need to spend big, in my opinion. The dead wood needs to go, as we've been saying for absolutely ages now and we need to sign players that suit the way that we play, not necessarily better ones. I like Defoe. He's a decent striker and he'll get you a decent number of goals in a season. He has no place in the current system, though and he'll be 30 before the turn of the year. What's the point in keeping him? We don't need to bring in someone better than him though, just someone that can play up top on their own at a good standard. He can't.
Echo what everyone else said. Vertonghen was a better playmaker for us at centre back. Another problem in my view was poor closing down for a lot of the game. We didn't have a particularly highline but not putting enough pressure on the ball didn't give us any control on the game once they started playing better.
Fat chance ENIC will spend any real money as they rarely put their money where their mouth is. Defoe is a top half of the table striker , never been top 4. I feel sorry for AVB as the board will expect miracles with their annual ***in austerity transfer fund. Big boy tax dodge Lewis you cant take it with you.
It doesn't bode well, yet we are two big signings away from having a team as strong as last year BUT clocks ticking and if nothing happens in the next few days then i worry that we're going to have a dreadful season by our recent standards.
Be very careful what you wish for PnP. Andy Carroll was not cup tied by the mickeys tonight. That means one of two things, Newcastle or ....... I can't bring myself to say it but expect all the press to be saying it tomorrow.
Under this regime we are always two players away from being a team that will win things. ENIC just give us empty waffle every year, and never deliver a team that can really compete for honours.
I can't disagree much with that as I've made my feelings on Levy known but as a fan we hope the club will make the right decision from a football aspect and not leave us having to go backwards. We have been in this situation before when berba left, last year was unfortunate but still not handled well and again it looks like we're going to start the season behind our rivals so clearly its not just "bad luck" if we're constantly unprepared for a season.
i think it has been about trying out different things in order to see what does NOT work best for us. maybe that is why the performances have been stop start with many obvious downfalls in the team and possibly a few new things learned about a few partnerships all over the field. in which case hopefully it means job done in identifying where the team needs new faces possibly....from now till the window shuts...its over to you Levy. i dont ask any questions of AVB due to what we have all observed.
Some excellent points made. Personally, it's a no-brainer for between Carrol and Defoe as the 'sole striker', Carroll all the time. I'm not saying we should get him, but if Levy thinks he's a 'bargain' then it won't be any surprise if we buy him, or loan him. Would make for a fun day at Toon, that's for sure Carroll and Defoe would be be classic big and little man, also Carroll VDV could work very well, a la Crouch and VDV when they clicked for quite a while. It would mean AVB 'changing his system' of course - but hey with JD as sole striker the system is bust, kaput, dead deceased and nailed on its perch.
Oh dear, seems to be a few posters back-pedalling now, so much so if it became an Olympic event I doubt Chris Hoy would get on the podium! So much for our defence suiting the system, so much for 3 strikers one of which is JD being enough....I'm sure someone said this a while ago and it was rubbished! Oh yes, I do love a told you so moment!
+1. If he can be had at a decent price then he would score goals for us. He can hold up the ball and he will bring the wingers into play and then get on the end of their crosses. I'd prefer Adebayor but beggars can't be choosers. Anyone that thinks we are better off with a lone Defoe or Kane are insane
It wasn't anything to do with playing a highline because we didn't play a highline. As I said in the thread we had about it, it's just going to become an easy thing to blame for any goals we concede. Infact it doesn't even make sense for the first goal as that was caused by the defence backing off to track the striker whilst the midfielder, who was left by our inept central midfield partnership, struck a unsaveable shot. A highline defence would've pushed up to play the striker offside and closed down the guy who scored, although more importantly had Parker or Sandro been there the player would never have been given so much time to pick his spot. The biggest problem with our defence last night was getting caught out down the flanks. Benny had a bit of a 'mare in general but really it came down to the central midfield again, neither Jenas or Livermore took the opportunity to drop back in defence to cover the fullbacks when they'd gone up. Avb seemed to want to play on the counter in the first half last night with Bale and Lennon pushing up more and our defence sitting deeper and passing it to try and draw them out. That's how we should play against Newcastle, they were a sucker for counterattacks against us last season which should allow our fast forwards to play to their strenghths. As long as Jenas and Livermore don't start we should be a lot better and if we have a new striker in that'll be even better.
the amount we've seen of jenas and bentley in preseason is possibly more worrying the lack of striker
