I'm not going to go through every game of last season to try and find out - that game was just what came into my head. You have just picked a small part of what I posted and tried to use that to argue against what I wrote. I stand by what my main point about M.P. He's a one trick pony, until he can prove otherwise.
My answer is somewhat in your post mate, the fact it was a cross that went in (I personally don't believe Diouf touched it and if he did, it was strands of hair) just screams bad luck and it being a freak goal, Diouf probably impeded Hugo's view which didn't help and resulted in him being flat footed. The ball was moving at ants speed in comparison to usual crosses or shots, it's just something happens down to bad luck I feel and we probably won't concede another goal like that all season. If I was to picky and blame someone for the goal I'd say the onus is on whoever should've tracked Ireland's run, I can't remember who was around him, whether it was one of the DMs/ RW/ Walker, because he got through far too easily in order to make the cross.
As has been pointed out; the phenomenon of throwing away silly points against teams we really should be beating comfortably has been a classically Spurs thing to do since as far back as I can remember. It certainly isn't a problem unique to MP's system - in our top 4 breakthrough season we lost twice to the mighty Wolverhampton Wanderers without scoring a goal. With those 6 points in the bag we would've finished above Arsenal in 3rd. Our performances against the 'big clubs' improved dramatically last year, and based on the first 20 minutes at OT, that has carried on to this year too. What concerns me and I guess from an egocentric perspective bothers me is how we seem incapable of dealing out a proper thrashing to teams who we really can take to the cleaners. Last season, and to their credit, Southampton dealt out a number of results that honestly left me jealous. Compare 2014/15 results: Southampton thrashings 4-0 against Newcastle 3-0 against Everton 8-0 against Sunderland 6-1 against Villa Tottenham thrashings 4-0 against QPR 3-0 against WBA Extend this further: of the 14 games they lost last year, only 4 were against teams where they really should've done better. By contrast of the 12 games we lost, 6 were really disappointing. In summary: we need to be better - much better - at killing teams off.
I'm wading into this thread a little late, but as you say, thats been a Spurs problem for as long as I can remember. Which isn't to say that its ok that Poch isn't managing to fix it yet, but he's doing no worse on that front than any of the other Spurs managers I've seen in my 22 years on this Earth. No better either though, it has to be said...
I can't argue too much with that. The only thing I would say is, if not M.P. Then WHO is going to finally get to grips with this perennial problem?
Thats the million dollar question. The bottom line is that although we've had one or two fantastic teams in my time as a Spurs fan that I can really remember, we've always deep down had a soft centre - you'd never ever bet against a Spurs collapse. Find someone to fix that and if they're half decent at any other aspect of management then they'll probably be fantastic for us! No idea who that would be though!! Probably why I'm just about in favour of giving Poch more time.
Our attitude after scoring always seems to be: "It's your turn to score now!" That really contrasts with what some of the top teams do. It should be pointed out that the weaker teams have gotten stronger. The top teams averaged fewer points than in previous seasons, meaning everyone dropped more points against them. An even bigger problem last year was the way we consistently let poorer teams get the better chances against us. We had nobody who acted like a DM so we were constantly letting teams of all types, but especially weaker teams, get great chances on the counter against us Seeing how we look better on that front with Dier acting as DM, is more of an indictment of Pochettino than an endorsement.
A few managers have tried to fix our soft underbelly. Everyone always says that you build a good league team based from the back. Graham tried to do that, as did AVB to a certain extent, and Poch. Maybe Santini, although can't be sure as wasn't around long enough. The problem is that we moan about the soft centre and then as soon as someone tries to correct this glaring weakness we moan about the entertainment Hopefully Poch can fix the soft centre, then the entertainment gets built on that foundation.
That's pretty accurate. The gap in quality between our players and those of the mid-table sides is not sufficiently high that we are bound to beat them and because we always employ attacking open systems we do concede more goals than we need to. The only long-term solution is better players which is a possible outcome of our new youth oriented policy.
Yeah agree with that, you can't really win at Tottenham because we don't have the calibre of players like Barca/ Real/ Bayern do where you can play openly attractive football and rarely concede due to constantly being on the front foot. If we play an open attacking style we'll leave ourselves open for high scoring games which may or may not work in our favour but it'll definitely entertain. But if we try playing a rigid defensive system, we all moan as it's boring (and rightly so, hate that style of football). I think Poch is trying to find that balance but obviously it needs a lot of work, though with a young squad learning game by game it could work out well in the future, it's just a question of patience.
The problem is that patience and Spurs fans don't mix. The only thing that seems to mix worse is patience and Levy.
The funny thing is that the balance looks better than it’s been to me in the first two games. But we got one point from them while deserving four, where last year we tended to get four points when we deserved two.
We did have a DM - until he talked himself out of the team and, ultimately, the door following that match against Stoke.
For me, a soft centre has nothing to do with how you've built a team, it's to do with a certain mindset - a way of thinking that you either have naturally, or has been inculcated into you. It's that ability to dig deep, to all pull together, to refuse to be beaten, etc. The number on the back of your shirt has nothing to do with it.
Not really, as there's been plenty of times where we were sorely lacking a midfield enforcer and had a midfield that was utterly incapable of protecting the back line, be it the Jenas/Zokora midfield partnership in the late Jol/entirety of Ramos period or last season's Mason/Bentaleb pivot. Graham toughened up the midfield with the addition of Freund, Jol did with the Davids/Carrick partnership, Redknapp used Palacios, Sandro or Parker at various points, and AVB did well in his first season with the Sandro/Dembele pivot. The problem is that whenever the partnerships that clearly work are broken up for whatever reason, we dither instead of replace the missing component immediately, which often leaves us with an ill-suited central midfield that undermines the rest of the team.
Again, toughness has nothing to do with where you play - the number on your shirt. It's either inside you, or it's not, in the case of most of our lot, it's not! Some of the toughest guys I've ever known were not big, or even particularly aggressive in their everyday lives, but they had that mindset once you put them on a pitch.
I'm with NSIS on this one. The Real Madrid defensive midfield pairing is Kroos and Modric which shows that you you don't need a specific style of player to make 4231 work. But you do need them to have the right mentality.
