Interesting points, Notso. I think we all expected Dembele to be more of an attacking threat and his unusual ability to keep the ball so well going forward has kept us thinking that he should be the more attacking one in the pair. Capoue has been sitting the deepest out of any of the players we've played in that central midfield 2 but he came to us with a reputation for getting forward and good passing so we might find that it's him and Paulinho that are our more attacking options and that Sandro and Dembele play the more defensive role. It's not something that I thought would happen at the start of the season but if Eriksen offers us a consistent creative threat then we could see all sorts of combinations of the 4 playing behind him. Who thought last season we'd be talking about having so many great different options in central midfield?
i still can't believe that a Spurs team looks defensively solid/sound (touch wood). I was beginning to question whether that would ever happen.
I don't know why Chelsea players keep popping into my head for comparison! , but I forgot about Essien of a few yrs ago, you could say MD is a skilful version of him. He keeps the ball well yes, but ultimately its distribution that is the key element for a DM going forward, and I think Paulinho's passing is more incisive, plus he provided the cross for Sig's second, I don't think I've seen MD wanting to get into that position to do that before, its more like nosebleed territory!
I felt a lot of last season we didn't look solid despite decent goals against stats at times. Lots of last ditch tackles/blocks and lots of lung busting track backs by (normally) Walker (often covering his own arse). We are offering up less chances now, imo
"I don't think I've seen MD wanting to get into that position to do that before, its more like nosebleed territory!" I want Dembele to bulldoze his way into the box more like he did in the Monaco game (that led to the Kane goal) .
I don't understand that, its not necessary anymore. He'll get the opportunity present itself to do that from time to time which is fine, but its not his job anymore to do it regularly, thats the job of our new signings now imo. If anyone gets a chance to see our second goal when Paulinho crosses, you just see Dembele at the bottom of the screen breifly...sitting where he should be.
"He'll get the opportunity present itself to do that from time to time which is fine, but its not his job anymore to do it regularly" Quite a lot of telling the squad members nowadays which toys they are allowed to take out of the box and play with.
