We have had 3 very closely thought games this season. The gulf in the league table has never shown yet you ended up with the 6 points All the best for the rest of the season and hopefully we will be back at WHL for a league match the season after next
"Lots of people trying to claim credit for "always knowing" he would make it. I am talking about Sherwood etc here, although in fairness, Les Ferdinand who did **** all at Spurs as a coach, did at least have faith in Kane. Personally I believe Kane himself deserves the most credit for quite simply having a fantastic attitude." The thing is, he is not playing any different to how he did for the U21s in 2012-13. Putting in a shift (chasing down the back four etc) , team/percentage play (not head-down greedy) , fairly clinical strike rate. It all seems to have transferred to the PL quite easily. Perhaps that is the template the Academy need to use for prospective forwards.
The refs gifted us the first, and you outplayed us yesterday. I've never seen such a gulf between how a team looks and the number of points they have. Best of luck to you, too. I've enjoyed the team and its fans. You could get some pretty good odds on a double of you staying up and us getting a top four spot. With good reason, unfortunately. I thought both the pen and the dive were correct calls yesterday, though. It was a bit of a foul on Chadli, though one that's not called more often than not. When he kicks his heels up he makes it a dive, which deserved a yellow. I don't understand all the complaints about the pen. The defender clearly barrels into Rose and knocks him flying. I guess the argument is that he didn't have the ball yet, but it's certainly a foul, to me. I've been very critical of our players lately. I wonder if we don't need some sort of tactical adjustment. A high pressing team will always be vulnerable to counterattacking to some degree, but we seem to be getting more vulnerable rather than less, which is disturbing. I also find it inexplicable why we don't have more players in the box when we have time to get them back. Every time our opponents attack, I see acres of space where I'm hoping to see white shirts. It looks like time to try a change or three. Paulinho, Dembele, Lamela, Stambouli, Chiriches and maybe Fazio are all ideas. The player who seems likeliest to address our biggest problem is Stambouli, to me. Walker doesn't look back to his best yet. I like Dier but like almost all young CBs, he will make costly mistakes occasionally. Mason and Bentaleb haven't done enough to protect the back four. Bentaleb had a bad game yesterday. Try Stambouli instead of him, or, perhaps, Mason? Keep Eriksen in the center, but put Dembele on the left or try Lamela there, and/or Paulinho on the rightt? (I don't like Lamela on the right.) As I say, at least our games are entertaining: you can't always be good, and you can't always be exciting, but you never have to be both bad and boring.
Pretty much agree with all those sentiments. The defence does seem to be the biggest issue - and it is more than just Walkers last 2 poor performances. The FB's - particularly Rose - neglect their defensive responsibilities and get caught out of position far too often and slow to track back. Yesterday it cost us the first goal and almost 2 more. I can only assume that this is a tactical plan on Poch's part (allowing Rose to over-commit, rather than conceding goals!! Lol) - but if that is the case then the MF needs to provide that cover. And neither Bentaleb nor Mason are doing that effectively enough. You would hope that a stronger 'leader' at the back might be able to Marshall the troops more effectively, but that highlights the other key deficiency in the current team......
Walker and Rose are simply doing the job instructed by the manager and in terms of their speed and their overall individual athletic qualities they are capable. AVB at one point had us with one of the leagues best defensive records in his first season and in that defence was Verts and Walker yet AVB was more defensive minded and had Sandro protecting the back four with the experience of Dawson. Looking at the stats, we have the 5th worst defensive record in the league. In terms of attacking, we have the 5th best attacking record. Take out Harry Kane and swap him with an ineffective Soldado or Adebayor and we would be battling it out with Swansea or Stoke. If you want to be optimistic you could argue that its a relative simple fix, sign a better (more experienced) and defensively minded DM to partner Bentaleb while signing a centre back that can instruct and lead from the back. Yet Levy is at the club, we're restricted as to which type of player we can sign and mentioning a player with premier league experience will probably cause our board to panic about the money involved. Yet mention 100 million worth of foreign talent and its a risk worth taking. Still, Pochettino has us playing a set way which clearly brings goals, chances created and relies on Eriksen playing to his best and Kane to a level no one expected, but next season if Kane's form drops, a star is sold and our new signings are duds (again) then that is more likely then us fixing the issues we have within the team.
There are only 4 teams in the Premiership who have conceded more goals than us. Three of those are, Leicester, QPR, and Burnley - the current bottom three!..
The player likeliest to improve us massively may be Schneiderlin. I doubt we have any chance of getting him.
Levy is the only reason we have a squad as good as we have. His strategy has generated cash by signing players like Carrick, Berbatov, Modric and Bale who were all sold on at a huge profit which was reinvested in the squad. We've got the sixth most expensive squad in the league and it will likely finish sixth and seventh at worst. It still has a good chance of fifth and an outside chance of 2nd to 4th. The teams that Pochettino selects are the youngest in the league. This is definitely a cause for optimism.
We have no chance of 2nd to 4th, 5th only if Liverpool screw up and 6th or 7th most realistic while our chances depend on the form of Eriksen or Kane to bail out the exposed defence. But any debate on Pochettino and his naive tactics, usually results in fans attempting to make excuses for the guy because he is picking a young team and he is a very lucky manager to have had Kane this year as without him he would be really struggling.
I have no idea if you're referring to me there Boss, but for what its worth I think we can both see the problems affecting this Spurs side and I'm not trying to make excuses for Pochettino or indeed for any of the players who have been getting it wrong. Its clearly their own failings. Youth and inexperience are sometimes the causes of those problems but that doesn't somehow make it magically ok. There are benefits and drawbacks to having a young team paired with a young coach who is somewhat stubborn about his philosophy and we've seen both sides of the coin this season. I said on another thread that we're in danger of playing in a 'one size fits all' manner which just doesn't work for most teams. Having an identity is great but there absolutely needs to be flexibility, and the ability to realise when a change of tactical system is necessary. As for us struggling without Kane, I don't think we'd be struggling any more without Kane and, say, Eriksen, than any other team in our position re. squad depth would be without their two best outfield players. Right now there isn't much of a way out of that situation without a massive spending spree, or a large quantity of youngsters magically coming good from the Academy all of a sudden.
Huddlefro, don't be daft! Wasn't thinking of you (or anyone in particular) Just in general. The main reason for mentioning Kane, is because we went into the season without any planning of the team with the current form of Kane in mind, so thats why I say Pochettino is lucky to have Kane, as there was no expectation for him to perform to this level. But at least you can see that we need to be flexible, yet does the manager? I see a stubborn, one dimensional manager in charge of a team outplayed many times by inferior teams (on paper) and Pochettino I would suspect say he is building long term, so we can't expect a finished product (team wise) in one season and I absolutely get that type of thinking as building a team does take time. I just believe the time aspect is going to be used as an excuse until we all realise this is the best we can expect under Pochettino regardless of how much time he is given and all it takes is a terrible run of form, or Kane or Eriksen to under perform and more focus will be on Pochettino.
Fair one Boss I hope Pochettino becomes more flexible in time but whether he will do is my primary concern with him in the long term at the club. He seems a stubborn type at times and that is a concern, as much as building an identity is a benefit to the club it can be a hinderance if it becomes a straightjacket. Look at Arsenal sometimes for an example. I think we can expect better from Pochettino's Spurs though, even if we only get consistently good at playing football in one way because we're not even that so far, but it is early doors in his time here still. There has been a lot of change at this club in the last couple of years and I think there will be yet more this Summer - hopefully we will enter the new season with a squad more to the manager's liking, with the players keen to put the effort in, rested and raring to go. Stability in management and low player turnover is the key to building success in the long term after all, unless you can throw money at all of the problems until they go away and even thats no guarantee of a fix as we found out with the 'magnificent 7'.
I think he needs a full Summer window before he can be fully judged. He's spent a season with us now so he knows where the weaknesses are and who he wants in and out. As far as this season goes, we're still on for around 65-70 points, which is where we normally finish up, we reached a cup final, the deadwood has started to be rotated out and the team are scoring more (just 5 off our final season total from last year). Yes the defence is a massive problem and needs sorting over Summer but, as a first season goes, where we all largely wrote it off before it started, I don't think it's been that bad. Hopefully, we'll see the correct sort of movement in and out of the club over the Summer. If we have the players that Poch wants (who can play his style) then, his managerial career with us will live and die by his decisions.
I agree with most of this. I don't understand why Boss thinks we have to make excuses for a manager who is doing just fine. Spurs have always been an inconsistent team and it needs two or three years of a consistently imposed style of play to fix that. Because of levy's strategy the last few years have been our best in the league since the 60s. Why shouldn't we push on with a young squad under a young manager?
We are one point behind Liverpool who have a harder run in. we don't need them to screw up we just need to play our best for the last 8 matches.
As far as I remember it was Arnesen that wanted Jol to be manager, otherwise I dread to think who we would have employed to replace Santini all them years ago. And Power don't forget if it wasn't for an old man signing proven premier league players we would never have got near the champions league. But of course Levy has been positive for the club in many aspects yet when you look at the high turnover of managers and one of your personal favourites (AVB) losing his job after a poor run of results in his 2nd season then much will depend on the summer, signings made and how we start next year.
We are on for a pretty average season results-wise but we are seeing attacking football and much better entertainement as a result.. Our problem, like United in some ways, is that we don't see the dominance of quality that you'd expect from the team when compared to the opposition. On the plus side we are for the most part seeing us get the results, we're more competitive against the top sides and the faith showed in younger players adds to the enjoyment of watching us. There's plenty up for debate but many of us like to look on the brightside. What's currently holding us back this season is the awful start we had. I think a lot of us feel like the Everton game was the landmark moment in terms of getting performances that are more in line of what the manager wants. If you compare the results in the first 12(pre-Everton) we won 5, lost 5(4 at home) and drew 2 getting us 17 points, since then we've played 18, taken 36 points and not lost at home in the league. Has it been all plain sailing? Of course not, and I don't want to be a hypocrite and ignore the cup results in this time which would surely have us looking less favourably on the success of the time after the Everton match but there's always reason to be positive and always reason to be critical. Does Pochettino lack a plan B? Not for me, but he is undoubtedly stubborn and sticks to his attacking philosophies in games where it's unwise to do so. Sometimes it works, like against Chelsea and Arsenal, and we all have a great time but more often it won't and that's why we can list Chelsea, City Liverpool and United away games in the negative side. Name me a season where we haven't lost to most of the other sides in the top 6/7 and been on the end of a few thumpings though, at least we're giving it a good go and that's what Redknapp did well too. We're fighting a losing battle trying to best sides in the league that can spend 100s of millions more than us, which is why it's so important that we keep bringing through youth players and getting them to a level good enough to keep us competitive. It's probably the closest thing we have to a leveller, being smarter in the transfer market would be another but we've seen in recent years how difficult that is for us to maintain. Whether Pochettino is lucky to be able to bring through these players, or whether his track record means that we can attribute the progress of players to him is up for debate and the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. What matters though is that we are starting to get players coming through again and it's vital we are able to bring through more in the future. We can thank whoever we want for this, we are currently up to 7 players who are performing well and either came through the academy or were bought cheaply as teenagers. If we can get another 5 or so to come through in the next few seasons then that's half a squad that we haven't had to pay significant sums of money for and therefore less chance of us signing flops, which we can't afford to do like the clubs above us can. Lets hope we can make the most of this advantage in the coming years.
...YV, fair summary overall and while there are points we disagree with, one aspect we are all pleased to see improve, is the emergence of youth players, Yes, who gets most credit is up for debate, as I'm sure Mason wasn't viewed by everyone at spurs as being a future 1st team player. Kane was never tipped to be this good and I remember Bentaleb being viewed as not one of the best talents, so Sherwood and Pochettino can both take some credit for different reasons, but also the players themselves. But as for the part in bold, I hope that wasn't a dig at me!
I think Leicester will come straight back up.They'll run their Championship opponents off their feet with their speed.You saw what they did to our defence.None of our defenders could keep up with them,including Walker.
I think you are confusing strategy with tactics. Levy's long-term plan has always been to combine three things to improve the club. 1) Signing younger players in the expectation that they will improve with time; 2) Developing youth (hence the new training centre); 3) Improving the club's income (hence the new stadium). I think he has always tried to appoint managers/Directors of Football with the first two in mind and judges them on how they do against this plan. The appointment of Redknapp was not consistent with the strategy but was a necessary tactic to repair the mess Ramos had made. Harry did that really well, signing a number of experienced players to add to the very strong base that had been achieved through players like Modric and Bale coming good. That led to the very good performances under Harry. But the downside is that the number 1) point in the strategy never happened under Harry and the squad is poorer now because of it. The reason I like Levy is that I agree with his analysis: cementing us in the top four is a ten to twenty year exercise not a short-term one.
