He is still head and shoulders better than Rose and Naughton and we need a decent left back now - not a hopeful 'PERHAPS HE WILL DEVELOP' or 'WITH THE RIGHT TRAINING'....... If not a return for Benny (which after all carries no financial outlay mid-season) then get someone decent in PDQ!! But unfortunately, logic and common sense don't seem to be high on the agenda on this topic. Rose has had 4/5 seasons to develop as a LB and where he is now - still a 'potential'. Naughton has had the excuse of 'playing the wrong side' to fall back on, but has now failed to show anything of merit in his preferred position. Fredericks showed more in his one EL outing but has disappeared from view for some reason. Friars is also no FB - not sure what he is to be honest - and is certainly in no position to take a first team place.
Rose's youth is just an excuse for him being ****. Being young doesn't necessarily mean they'll improve, Rose has shown nothing of note to me that he's going to turn a corner. His defending is atrocious and for a former winger, his attacking play is a huge let down. Naughton is ok enough as back up at right back in my opinion, it's hard to get "great backups" when you're a club like us. If we're challenging for honours like the likes of City and Chelsea do, then they can keep players like Zabaleta/ Richards and Azpilicueta/ Ivanovic etc happy (the high wages also help). Dawson, I've mentioned many times that while I love the guy as a player and pro, he's not 1st team material anymore. Unfortunately, this season he's HAD to play due to the injuries we've had and has therefore been consistently found out. He's always been relatively slow but this year it's as if he's been wearing 10 stone boots. Soldado can go back to Spain. I'd arguably give Valencia another £26m to take him back . Gylfi is a good squad player and can grab some goals but is anonymous if he isn't scoring. Probably needs to be in a team where he's the main player, like he was at Swansea. Fryers must either be extremely **** or just very unlucky. To be backup to Rose means one of the two. Bentaleb will be a good/ great player and I love seeing academy players given chances, that said he shouldn't really be starting all these games. He was immense against NUFC and so his starting place against NCFC was justified but keeping him on for the whole 90 was a huge mistake as he was extremely bad. This Sherwood-Bentaleb relationship is having a detrimental effect at times, there are better players being dropped for Nabil and it's wrong. Holtby I can see going back to Germany unless Fulham stay up, keep Magath (I know he has 18 months but relegation will see him leave in my opinion) and therefore offer to build a team around him. Townsend is good enough to be in the squad and overall, has been our best wide player this season. We'll keep hold of Sandro, I doubt anyone will buy him after his recent injury problems. He's only played what, 20-25 games in the past season and a half? Vertonghen I've become more positive about in terms of holding onto. His recent form has been very disappointing, plus he's had an injury so any interested parties would be buying him based off of last season's form. I've said that I think he'd be a perfect fit for Barca but Koscielny's form for Arsenal who's also been linked with the Spaniars COULD result in Barca going for him over Jan. Lloris - it's been an absolute pleasure having him here but he'll be off 100%. Valdes has confirmed he'll definitely leave Barca and who would be the perfect replacement goalkeeper for an attacking team that plays with a high line? Hmmmm. Like Roo said it's amazing we sit 5th in the table, some of the shambles we've witnessed this season is deserving of a far lower place.
Good shout on Fredericks, completely forgot about him and I'd be happy seeing him given a chance to challenge Walker (he's on loan at Millwall 'til the end of the season by the way).
Yes I know - should have been clearer as I was speaking metaphorically saying 'disappeared'!! He is clearly not in Sherwood's view as a youngster worth elevating into the first team.
Ahh right. He might be in Tim's future plans, I suppose there's two ways of looking at it. After his impressive cameo in Europa, Tim may have felt that there's definitely something there in Ryan to suggest he has some sort of future but to determine that, he'd need to play consistently and therefore a loan move could aid in getting an idea. From what I can tell, Ryan's been good for Millwall. So this may well be Naughton's final season as a Spurs player as in the Summer, Ryan will come back and challenge Walker. OR Ryan's been loaned to Millwall to put himself in the shop window.
The worse thing about the defeat yesterday is not the fact that we're going to miss out on CL football again its the fact we're going to finish 5th which means more EL next season, I'm already pissed off about the defeat away at Hull on a Sunday in Dec 2014....3 days after taking the first team to Azerbaijan even though we've already qualified!!
Ditto. Though this is Spurs, so it means Naughton stays while Fredericks joins Swindon on a perm deal!
None of you have seen enough of Federicks at this level to comment on if hes worthy of a place, especially based on 45 minutes of EL football. I'm no fan of Rose or Naughton, but both players done a fine job whille out on loan at premier league clubs so at least their backers have more substance to go by, when discussing their right to be given a chance as they have performed at a decent level in the premier league. You can be sure if federicks was called up, once shown to be out of his depth, he would get slated and called useless, just like what is happening with Bentaleb, as at the start of the season a few on here where saying how great it would be to see him part of the squad, now it happens and hes turning into the next target for fans.
There needs to be a happy medium though, Bentaleb isn't just part of the squad at the moment, he seems to be one of the first names on Tim's team sheet which I think is wrong as he's not ready to be a constant starter. I was one of those wanting Nabil to get 1st team appearances but he's kept his place over the likes of Capoue and in recent games, Eriksen which I don't think is right. Give Nabil starts in cups and Europa and then some minutes in the league but making him a starter at the moment is too much of a jump for a guy who had never played first team football before. Especially as we're now in the business end of the season, each mistake and poor performance is highly scrutinised. If Fredericks is managed properly he could be a good squad player. If I remember rightly, Ryan's last game for us prior to this seasons Europa game was a Europa match against Rubin Kazan when Harry was in charge and in that game, he was one of our best players, youngsters need more games like that to build their confidence and then get the chance to play in the Prem. Unless you have a Rooney or a Barkley, most youngsters need to be blooded in, not just thrown in like Bentaleb has.
Most never knew Federicks had featured before, when he played this year virtually everyone was saying "that kid making his debut". the only reason some are talking him up is because they dislike Rose and Naughton, its not because they have taken any real notice of him as a player! But sure, I know Bentaleb has been thrown in and shouldn't be playing every game but hes doing the job handed to him by the manager and becoming the focal point for criticism, to the point if we play bad, fans are targeting Bentaleb.
Not strictly true, as it is only at RB that I have considered Fredericks - and yes, it is too soon to make grand statements about his potential, but frankly, he showed more defensive nous and attacking capability in those 45minutes than Naughton has shown in 3 seasons!! Fortunately, we do have a good first choice RB, but we need a decent back-up and Naughton ain't it.
Much will depend on who's manager next year, if it's not Sherwood then all players start fresh, especially if a foreign manager, so Ekotto could find himself back in the fold! Or Naughton could end up impressing at RB. The one player I don't understand at all, is Fryers, I'm sure we only signed him as Levy believed he was getting a kid that slipped through the Utd youth system, but he's meant to be a LB.
To think we've missed out on certain quality players due to penny pinching, yet we were happy to spend a few mill on fryers who we didn't need, is beyond me.
We've got players like that too though. Trick is to get them playing which is obviously down to the coaches and manager.
Yeah I noticed a few never acknowledged Frederick's prior appearances for us, I remember his debut against Hearts at WHL, looked ok then at RM, could tell he was nervous though and I think he was subbed at about 65 mins. I don't mind Naughton, I even said prior to Spur of the moments shout on Fredericks that I'm happy to have Naughton as back up right back. Rose on the other hand I've lost patience with, he had a few grumbles over the years about possibly leaving if he's not given chances and now he's had chances, I wish he does leave. Massively unimpressed me and problem is, he doesn't look like he's improving one bit. Like I said RE Bentaleb's criticism, he's playing every game at the moment in the business end of the season, so any mistakes, little or large are being heavily scrutinised. He's had some really impressive games but also had a few mares, namely Arsenal, City and Norwich. Tim should take the flack though as I don't think he's managing Bentaleb well, sure it's great he's showing confidence in him but it's as if Tim's too stubborn to drop him, as though he wants to be the man that "made Nabil Bentaleb, star of Tottenham Hotspur", the worry is, if Bentaleb has more performances like Norwich, more and more fans will get on his and the manager's back, causing more of a negative atmosphere than there already is.
Fortunately for you guys, your deficiencies - mostly defensive, are covered up to some extent by players like Suarez, Sturridge, Coutinho....we don't have that potency at the attacking end.
I'm so envious of this current Liverpool squad in terms of the way they're playing and the players they have. The likes of Suarez, Sturridge and Coutinho remind of the time we had Rafa, Bale and Modric I do have faith that Eriksen and Lamela will become "superstars" but we've not got one single stand out player at the moment that can win a match with a moment of brilliance (unless you count Ade's recent resurgence to form).
Often the CL teams play tuesday-saturday or wednesday-sunday so its more rest than thurs-sun so the EL will have more of a detrimental effect (and the journies are longer too).
