Agreed DL. You can tell this Spurs team are looking forward to every game at the moment, I fear that resting them, and thus risking losing our momentum with a poor result against Inter, could do far more harm than good.
I think this is a bit of a red herring this top half of the table stuff. Its more nuanced than that and you have to look at the actual games and what happened. If in all those games we were beaten fairly and squarely by a better team who put in a better performance and dominated us for the majority of the game, then I would agree with the stat being a useful stat and data for our likely ability/performance potential against the top 6 teams. In all those games the only times we were completely outplayed and had no case for even at least a draw was Arsenal at home and Man U away (also Villa at home, Stoke away and WBA away did us but focussing on 6 teams above us as most relevant here). The reality is that in some of our matches against the best teams we've had some awful bad luck with atrocious ref calls costing us a W or bizarre one-off individual errors which can't be legislated for. These 2 things has cost us points in games we were the better team on the day, examples being Suarez's winning goal being ruled offside with a late call in the last seconds at Everton, Reina's rush of blood to the head at City or, worse, Skrtel's ridiculous back pass in the reverse City fixture at Anfield at the start of the season. We'd of won all of them I'm certain. Our record on paper against the top 6 makes us seem a lot worse than our actual performances against them suggested. However, one thing that our top 6 record does fairly display, is that their is perhaps a mentality problem with our team and perhaps our players struggle with the added pressure a game against the best teams brings and this leads to crazy lapses of concentration and/or very poor decision making which costs us wins and sometimes at least draws
The other game changer could be that our biggest weakness/vulnerability, is Spurs' biggest strength. Counter-attacking. We constantly get caught out with a huge gap between our midfield and defence in transitions, with several opposition attackers occupying that space who then split and walk right through our last line of defence which is often just 3 players alone by this point, the 2 CBs and 1 DM. If we can stop that happening and somehow find a way of controlling Bale then we have a decent chance of not getting beat. A lot will epend on whose fit on both sides. If Sturridge is still out I'll be a lot less confident.
You could adopt the Wenger approach and say you won't do anything special to stop Bale, that you aren't scared of him and that you will play your own game regardless of the opposition. It really worked for him
Indeed! Bale has now amassed 5 Premier League goals against Arsenal - his best return against any club. Long may Wenger continue to ignore the threat from Bale!
I'm more concerned with this game than I was with last Sunday. When Liverpool came to the lane they outplayed us after we went 2-0 up. If they'd had sturridge playing then they would of converted some of the numerous crosses that they sent in. That was by far the hardest game of the season so far
Seasons can hinge on cup results. In 09/10, United were on a fantastic run. All of a sudden they lost to Bayern then unraveled in the league. It can work either way as you well know as in that season you lost the FA Cup semi and went on a great run but ideally you'd want to keep the winning mentality in the dressing room. The longer you go unbeaten, the easier it becomes to remain unbeaten.
It was Rooney's injury in the first leg v Bayern which proved costly. He was in tremendous form that season- just like Bale is for Spurs now. Keeping Bale fit is key for Spurs, which might mean resting him in EL games if he picks up knocks. Having said that, Bale seems to be a very fit athlete and won't need resting unless he is injured.
If we get anything out of this game it will really show how far we have come. Liverpool are a good side improving all the time. The fact we have a massive game on Thursday and less than 3 days to recover will make it very tough. I used to really not like Liverpool but I have a lot of time for their fans on here and they take our banter, particularly HIAG's thread, fairly well! If they make a couple more signings in the summer they will be a big threat next year especially if they don't have any European football as a distraction.
Not all of the little ****ers!! Certainly not the tosser who goes round repping me!!! Oh bugger - probably got another red bar coming.........
You mean Astroturfnaut? He likes to do that to do people who wind him up, he's harmless really Want me to fix those red bars or do you prefer being unique?
Ha Ha - you're a star!! Sometimes regard this all (red bars) as a badge of honour - but others it just winds me up!! Like this week...... Actually my first encounter was him - "this week I have been mostly" getting it from one of your mods - bow4fowler!! Any assistance gratefully received!
How do you tell? I had red bars and now i have green. I can't believe anyone would positive rep the crap i write
Enricky, seriously.... how on earth have you managed to get nearly 3 million points?! that's insane! How is that even possible?! your rep power could do with a bit of a boost though...
