Southampton V Tottenham Match Thread

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Boss

Boss

Son of Pulis
Dec 3, 2011
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Preview

The 29th of September was the last time we saw this Tottenham team complete a full 45 minutes playing near to its full potential, with that game being against Man Utd. Since that game its largely been unimpressive & lacklustre with a real struggle to create clear cut chances.

Overall this season, I would suggest its fair to say the Reading game has been the only game in which we have been impressive for a full 90 minutes, looking like the same team in each half, which is why at times its hard to know which Tottenham will turn up.

This Sunday, we face a Southampton side that have conceded 24 goals in their first 8 games, so regardless of the players we have possibly missing (dembele) its fair to say this is an ideal game for us to take the game to the opposition and show real attacking intent.

Southampton are a team which don't lack confidence or team spirit, regardless of the fact they have the worst defence in the league, and it says a lot about their spirit, that they still enter games with the belief their attacking play will provide a positive result.

Naive? yes, yet having a manager which allows his players to play with freedom, is what attacking players love, and if you look at their performances against Man city & Man Utd, they have the confidence to play with freedom and cause real problems for this leagues top teams.

Southamptons key man, is Lallana, a home grown talent, whos performances this season lead to an England call up. Lallana is a superb passer of the ball, efficient and intelligent with his distribution and their most creative player, with four assists this season yet he reads the game well and has the 3rd highest interception rate in the league.

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With Dembele possibly missing for the game, it means we're going to face a real struggle to compete in midfield, as we simply don't have anyone in the squad that can fill that void, and that for me shows up the weakness of our squad and also flaws in AVB's tactics.

AVB will play 4-2-3-1, regardless of which players are fit, if this means playing a right footed central midfielder on the left wing, he will do that and also allowing our midfield to lack creativity to control the game if Dembele is injured.

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Looking at this spurs squad/team, when we have our best players fit, then AVB's tactics are starting to show promise, yet the concern is when a key player in midfield is injured, we don't have the quality in reserve and the midfield is vital to the high pressing games AVB wants to employ.

This game is hard to predict, if I was watching this as a neutral, I would most likely predict a high scoring draw with possibly a Tottenham win if our attackers are on form, yet if Southampton play with freedom as they did against Man utd at home then they can win.

Team news

Southampton will be without summer signing Gaston Ramirez & Frazer Richardson, while Danny Fox is in a race against time to recover from a slight knock. Jack Cork (knee) remains sidelined until the first week of November.

Gareth Bale back into the fold after the Welshman was given time off following the birth of his daughter. Mousa Dembele (hip) is a doubt, while Emmanuel Adebayor (back) missed the 1-1 draw with Maribor on Thursday night and is unlikely to feature.

Benoit Assou-Ekotto (knee) is a week or two from a first-team return, with Younes Kaboul (knee) & Scott Parker (Achilles) both set to remain on the treatment table until December.

Previous Meeting

I lie with the title, not our previous meeting but a classic game.

FA Cup result
01 Mar 1995

Stadium: The Dell
Attendance: 15172
Manager: Gerry Francis


Southampton 2 - 6 (2 - 0) Tottenham Hotspur

Southamptron Scorers: Matthew Le Tissier, Neil Shipperley.


Tottenham Scorers: Ronny Rosenthal (3) Darren Anderton , Teddy Sheringham, Nick Barmby


[video=youtube;29GpwMo0yII]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29GpwMo0yII[/video]
 
giving Boss a break this week, Notso? :) great thread mate and thanks. <ok>

Edit^^: thought it was notso who'd started this, misread it. (great work again Boss.)

i'll never forget that game you've posted the video to. one of my favourite memories of spurs as a kid. almost in tears over the scoreline, then the magic began. great game of football and a great evening. - (for my dad, who was fed up of me moaning and shouting at the telly like a spoilt brat. haha)

it's a game that we really ought to win, despite being away from home. we've got the quality to give the saints back 4 a lot of problems. however, they've got goals in them too. I really hope we don't see Gallas this weekend. I know Caulker and Verts played yesterday, but i'd like to see them line up with one another again. i can see a good partnership performing between the two of them.

1-3 is my prediction.
 
That 6-2 was typical Spurs, at times brilliant and other times awful.

I think 2-2 this weekend. Saints are battling for their life and we haven't looked good for a while now.
 
I've looked at the history and that wasn't the first time we scored six at The Dell but they've had some good wins against us there as well. This will be Bale's first match against his old club which with Spurs is something which always features. I'm cautious ahead of this match because of that. AVB was the connection last week and we were beaten which is often the case. I was disappointed with last night's team before the match so I'm waiting to see the team before saying too much.
You're right about their play against City and Utd which concerns me a bit about them. Great thread.
 
Great thread again mate.

I'm quietly confident on this one (though that tends to be a bad thing!).

Hope to see a line up of:

Lloris,
Naughton, Caulker, Dawson, Vertonghen
Lennon, Sandro, Dembele, Bale
Defoe, Adebayor

Though I know for a fact that won't be the team, especially as we don't know the fitness of Mousa and Ade. We'll most likely start Friedel, Walker, Gallas and Dempsey over Lloris, Naughton, Dawson and Ade which is a shame, Friedel, Walker and Gallas have unimpressed me this season, Walker especially and both Dempsey and Siggy haven't had the desired impacts. I have to say I've been a bit frustrated with our recent performances, we're not getting into things until the second half (bar Utd and Reading away) and we don't look as pacy as we did under Redknapp and it's not as if we've lost our speedy players. I hope AVB gets us playing better football sooner rather than later and be more consistent in both halves too. Still confident though we'll get the win, just hope it's with the team I'd like to see more so than what I expect to see.

With the team I'd like (providing Mousa and Ade are fit enough) I think we can get a 2 or 3-0 win. With the team I expect, a 3-2 or 2-1 scoreline.

Thanks again though Boss, always a good read <ok>
 
Apologies if i sounded negative towards AVB & his tactics, yet my head is nearly hitting the keyboard from late hours working so am not in the best of moods ha! hopefully his tactics on sunday will shut me up and we can repeat the 2-6.

Roo, like you I remember that game like it was yesterday and couldn't believe we went 2-0 down, yet for rocket ronnie to score that hat trick, was one of the best games cup games i've watched.
 
Good stuff again Boss.
This is a danger game, which Spus will turn up?
The exciting can't live with version? Or the pull your hair out version.
Bale should be bursting by now- a return to his first club.
He will be the catalyst for a comfortable win.
 
Cheers for thread Boss, and I agree with SOS' team

Lloris,
Naughton, Caulker, Dawson, Vertonghen
Lennon, Sandro, Dembele, Bale
Defoe, Adebayor

though I wouldn't put it a 4-4-2 formation, as I wouldn't see it necessarily panning out like that.

Interesting stat time - if this sort of stat interests you of course

http://www.sportingintelligence.com...-glories-as-generous-tottenham-visit-261002/?

Saints probably aren't the only team that have their best prem return against us, I think Utd are another, for example. It's obviously mainly due to the the fact that of the 7 prem ever-presents, 4 have done much better than us over that particular era. Doubtless Villa and Everton have provided a few top returns for other clubs.
 
A somewhat negative stat here, but we have played 5 times at Southampton's new stadium, St Marys, and have lost all 5 and have yet to score a goal there. I am confident we'll break that duck on Sunday and win handsomely.
 
Boss said:
Apologies if i sounded negative towards AVB & his tactics, yet my head is nearly hitting the keyboard from late hours working so am not in the best of moods ha! hopefully his tactics on sunday will shut me up and we can repeat the 2-6.

Roo, like you I remember that game like it was yesterday and couldn't believe we went 2-0 down, yet for rocket ronnie to score that hat trick, was one of the best games cup games i've watched.
Click to expand...

Amazing memories of that game. I was away skiing in Austria at the time and forgone going on the aprez in order to watch the game in the chalet. At half time I was seriously wondering about my sanity and decision making process. Anyway good job I stuck with it. I'm glad others remember it so fondly too.
 
My Spurs side would be.

Lloris
Walker
Naughton
Vertonghen
Gallas
Bale
Lennon
Sandro
Dembele
Ade
Defoe

Tottenham should have to much for Saints and in an open and entertaining game im expecting a 3-1 win for Tottenham, there midfields outstanding and that for me is where the game will be won.
 
Kyletoon said:
My Spurs side would be.

Lloris
Walker
Naughton
Vertonghen
Gallas
Bale
Lennon
Sandro
Dembele
Ade
Defoe

Tottenham should have to much for Saints and in an open and entertaining game im expecting a 3-1 win for Tottenham, there midfields outstanding and that for me is where the game will be won.
Click to expand...

Hi Kyle,

Believe me, if you've seen enough of us lately, you wouldn't be sticking Gallas in your team over Caulker (who's been really impressive). Gallas, along with Walker have been our major weak links and very much to blame for a lot of the goals we've conceded. Naughton deserves a chance to impress in the RB birth over Walker but seeing as he's just returned from injury, it's understandble if he's left out after playing Thursday night.
 
Another top thread, Boss. Well done. <applause>
That game was my Favourite Game on my profile on old606. It isn't, but it was a great memory and a little less obvious than others. Went on to beat Liverpool at Anfield in the next round, IIRC.

Team selection should be interesting, to say the least. We need a good 90 minutes.
 
we've had some great matches v southampton and some awful ones too...

didn't we once score 4 goals against them in 6 mins at the lane?

I also think we scored 7 against at the lane in the late 90's...after being 2 down.

I think we won promotion with a dire nil nil draw with them in the last match of 1977/78 season...led to us signing ossie and ricky.

But on the down side I remember losing 4 nil at theirs in the FA cup in 2003- I was celebrating my 35th birthday and the birth of my daughter!

And I think Hoddle's last match was a bad defeat to them at the lane...

with this in mind ... I have gone for a draw on Sunday
 
Spurs or Sex? said:
Hi Kyle,

Believe me, if you've seen enough of us lately, you wouldn't be sticking Gallas in your team over Caulker (who's been really impressive). Gallas, along with Walker have been our major weak links and very much to blame for a lot of the goals we've conceded. Naughton deserves a chance to impress in the RB birth over Walker but seeing as he's just returned from injury, it's understandble if he's left out after playing Thursday night.
Click to expand...

Well said SOS, I have a horrible feeling Gallas will play though.
 
Good piece here from verts ahead of the game.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...-list-ahead-of-southampton-clash-8228423.html
"I think the Chelsea game was just one incident," Vertonghen said.

"We missed so many players and I hope a few can come back against Southampton.

"It has been an unlucky season for us with all those injuries and I am looking forward to playing with our best team very soon because we can be so strong.

"The Chelsea game was just unlucky. We made a couple of wrong choices.
Click to expand...

I wonder what he feels the couple of bad choices were?...Gallas at centre back :biggrin:
 
I have been trying to think of players who have played for both clubs, not very successfully it seems.

Without doing a google search, I remembered Bale, Jamie Redknapp, Lee Barnard, Iago Falque, Tommy Forecast, Tomas Pekhart, Dean Richards, Rasiak and of course Harry and Kevin Bond as links with both clubs.

Any additions to my list of 8 players ??
 
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