please log in to view this image Monday 25th April 8pm White Hart Lane Premier League Four games left and five points to make up, as it stands. Two better than last week, at least. By the time that this fixture kicks off, our opponents will all have had their games, once again. We have the disadvantage of the additional focus and pressure, but a possible boost if they slip up. Our performance against Stoke will already have given the players some real confidence to kick on. Arsenal could close the gap to us to a mere two points with a victory at the Stadium of Light. Relegation-battling Sunderland will be hoping to build on their big win at Norwich, though. There's no love lost between the managers either, so it could be an interesting one. Leicester could re-open an eight-point gap by beating Swansea on the same day. The late Sunday kick-off will give both teams plenty of time to plan for this one. Which Italian coach will come out on top and will Vardy's absence be noticed? West Brom have reached the magic 40 point mark and look extremely unlikely to get relegated. They didn't offer much against Arsenal last night, by all accounts and I'd be fine with a repeat of that. Pulis will be looking to grind out some sort of result though, if history tells us anything. His style may be dour, but it's effective and stifling. This fixture was a rather frustrating one in the last campaign and ended badly. A post-Europa Sunday game saw a languid, lethargic performance from our players. The Baggies sat back, soaked it all up, watched us waste a few chances and then took one of their own. James Morrison scored the only goal of the game with 15 minutes to go. Lescott had a notable performance, frustrating Soldado and Adebayor, which shows how long ago it was. Our visit to the Hawthorns this season was equally frustrating, though for quite different reasons. Dele Alli scored fairly early on to give us the lead, with this lovely finish from a great ball: The team dropped off towards the end of the first half though, which allowed James McClean to equalise. He then went on to further his image as our villain of the piece, making a horrible tackle on Dembele. The ref's reaction still has me mystified, to be honest: Who was the mystery official that day? Jonathan Moss. No fuss that time, eh Jon? Nobody could find a winning goal and the game finished 1-1. Bentaleb is our only confirmed injury again for this one. Brunt and Morrison are out for the visitors. Spurs: Lloris; Walker, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Rose; Dier, Dembele; Lamela, Eriksen, Alli; Kane. Subs: Vorm, Trippier, Wimmer, Davies, Mason, Chadli, Son. League form: DWWDWW. West Brom: Foster; Dawson, McAuley, Evans, Chester; Fletcher, Yacob, Sandro; Sessegnon, Berahino, McClean. Subs: Myhill, Olsson, Gardner, Leko, McManaman, Anichebe, Rondon. League form: WLDLLL. Referee: Mike Jones. I'm not expecting any changes after our superb result at the Britannia, but does anything need changing? Do we need to do anything to address West Brom's tactics, as our results against them have been poor recently? Should anyone be brought up to the bench who hasn't been making it in the last few games?
A win will basically guarantee us champions league football (in at least the qualifying round) regardless of other results, because of our superior goal difference over Man U. We couldn't even be stiffed by City winning the Champions League and Liverpool the Europa, because that could only happen if City finish outside the top 4, in which case (if we win on Monday) we'd be guaranteed 3rd or better. A win would also herald St Mouser's Day and St Manure day, regardless of other results. And if City fail to beat Stoke (unlikely), a win would herald St ****ty's day as well. So even if Leicester win Sunday, still plenty to play for!
According to the Grauniad, Poch has barred our players from attending the PFA Awards and focus on the game 24 hours later: http://www.theguardian.com/football...banned-pfa-awards-dinner-west-brom-pochettino
Sensible, what's the point of a ceremony anyway? I missed my own graduation ceremony because I had a job to start and wanted a holiday in between.
It would be good to think that with this group of players Poch wouldn't need to 'ban' the attendance, that their own commitment would make the issue a non-starter. But maybe I guess they are placed under pressure by peers, friends and agents etc? Hopefully no one breaks the curfew to spoil team morale at such a vital time.
So, assuming Spurs still have an interest in Berahino, that young man may face a bit of a dilemma on Monday......... Play out of his skin to impress his potential suitors - but by doing so risk stir his current team into a match winning performance and end our (outside) chase for the title and also potentially put our CL place in doubt for next season - when he might be with us!! Just saying....... Personally, don't think anything he - or WBA - can do will influence the result: from here on in if we play to our recent standard then the results will come. COYS!!!!
if his performance against Watford is anything to go by, he can stay where he is. CL football is looking extremely likely next season, and personally, I hope we move on to someone else.
Not that I'm defending his attitude as it does seem to stink but I think Berahino's been below par as he's quite frankly not wanted to be there, a fired up Berahino is a very good striker and I'd happily have him at Spurs if the price was right. I think Peace shot himself in the foot last Summer, while you can look at it as being commendable for not selling your top asset, the offer we made was extremely generous and I'm certain that if we still hold an interest, we won't be offering anything near the rumoured £24m bid we made last year. Saido has 12 months left after this season, I think they'll be lucky to get offers of around £15m this time around, whether Peace would accept that or not will remain to be seen but he's crazy if he thinks he'll get upwards of £20m for him. As for the game, going to be a tough one as WBA always seem to cause us trouble. Hoping our recent form continues though, play like we did at Stoke and the three points will be ours. Same team to start, that really is the settled and strongest XI.
I've been saying this all season, but if anything this is a major tick against Berahino: when Modric was denied the move to Chelsea that his agent wanted, he knuckled down and played his dupe off to such a degree Los Ladrones thought it was worth their while to publicly tap him up - yet when Berahino didn't get the move he wanted, he sulked and spent a chunk of the season playing second fiddle to Rondon
If Modric played well and Spurs got CL, then he could remain if he so chose. If he did well but Spurs did not qualify, then it seems Levy had said that offers would be listened to, but from OVERSEAS clubs. If WBA did the same, then it seems that Berahino will not be sold to Spurs not because they are rivals, but because their chairman wants to play the big man in public. If Berahino has been told he can go to Spurs, subject to terms and him putting in a shift, then neither he or WBA have done themselves any favours regarding putting him in the shop window. With Spurs CL qualification imminent, and Pochettino having intense dislike for players who are deemed either disrespectful or not putting a shift in, IMHO this saga is done and dusted.
Berahino is the interesting sub plot tonight. The kids a natural scorer as I mentioned on here in January but there has to be severe doubts about his attitude. He has been woeful now for the best part of a season. I think he'd do really well for you though depending on whether he can adapt to coming off the bench or in a wider role (Poch doesn't strike me as a 4-4-2 kind of guy). One thing to say in Saidos defence is that Shearer, Cole, York and Aguero would struggle to find goals feeding off the current WBA midfield and style of play. If Antiques Roadshow were on a Monday id skip the Sky coverage to be quite frank, but il do that on our next Super Sunday. The plus side for you is that you might get him for £10m now instead of 20m, and at that price he's well worth a punt because given chances he will score goals. As for tonight's tactics- as you know, WBA will have all 11 behind the ball and try to pinch one on the break or off a set piece. We are embarrassing and we can't string more than 3-4 passes together. Dele is your key man- if you can get him pressing forward and in behind Yacob, the gaps will appear. 3-0 Spurs. Any chance of Bentaleb and Dembele swapping for Saido? Just watching us pass the ball would make me happy. One can dream. Enjoy the run in lads and the Champs League next year!
This saga has been strange. How much it has affected the boys' play or attitude, we know not. Pochettino appears to be harsh on perceived attitude problems, so that casts doubts. We won't get him cheaper or on original/better proposed terms, because your chairman has to save face. If Spurs get him on far better terms than before, then because of how Peace behaved in public last summer, Levy would ensure that the details of any such deal are leaked to the media.
We won't. I can see you dropping points at Old Trafford, perhaps a dour 1-1 draw. Not that that helps us much but to be honest even though I think you'll win the league, it would be amazing to take it to the final day for the sheer spectacle of it. The tension and nerves we felt in Bale's last season when we needed to beat Sunderland and for Arsenal to draw or lose to Newcastle in order to finish 4th were indescribable. I was at WHL that day and have never screamed as loudly as when Bale thundered in a late, late winner. The next 5 minutes I don't think any of us watched the game going on, we were all frantically refreshing the Arsenal score. To go through that again with much a greater prize at stake may well put a number of older fans at risk of a heart-attack, but it encapsulates the thrill and excitement that the game is all about. ('thrill' and 'excitement' are two words that don't really exist in Italy ).
Cheers mate, it makes a refreshing change on here to have a fan who isn't a Leicester, Liverpool. Chelsea or (bizarrely) Southampton wum. You do seem to have lost your way a bit under Pulis. He's as experienced a manager as any, but I wonder if there was also fallout from the Berahino saga that affected his working relationship with Mr Peace. I say this because the things Pulis was saying in press conferences were very much not from the same hymn sheet as the stuff Peace was saying. I personally feel that the whole saga was a matter of brinkmanship between Peace and Levy. The player clearly wanted to leave, the manager seemed to have accepted that reality, yet Peace dug his heels in - and as a consequence now has an underperformer worth £10m less than he was a year ago. Stupid. I personally think that our obsession with Saido was largely down to the uncertainty hovering over Alli and, more importantly, Lamela. The former wasn't expected to settle and excel so quickly, whilst the latter was supposedly minutes away from a loan move back to Italy. Lamela still isn't perfect, but he has been instrumental this season. Out of the '3' who play behind Kane, Saido probably would've taken Lamela's spot. It is no coincedence that Lamela has played in almost all of our best performances this season, and most posters on here agree that it will now take a player far better than your wantaway striker to improve on what we already have. If Saido is happy starting from the bench most weeks and costs no more than £15m, it's worth a look. Otherwise, he can go and waste his career at Chelsea.
Cheers mate. To be honest there could be a good chance of Bentaleb leaving in the Summer, I think the kid's superb for the record and has bags of potential but with Dier and Dembele in the form they're in, he's never getting back into the starting XI, he actually didn't get in the squad a couple of times this season when he was fit so I'd say there's every chance that if the club received a bid they deemed good enough to accept, he could be off (reckon about £8m-£10m would get Levy to say deal), a loan move could also be an option. However if you're looking for a decent passer, Tommy Carroll is out of contract with us in the Summer and I can't see the club looking to retain him, he won't win many tackles or knock many off the ball (so he'd have to play with Fletcher and/ or Yacob) but he rarely gives away a pass and he has that capacity to hit accurate ones to the other side of the pitch for a winger to run onto, he's also added a few goals to his game this season so he could be a great little pick-up for a solid Prem side. As for Saido, I'd definitely have him at Spurs if he could be got for £15m, his attitude stinks but he's a great finisher on his day. Besides I think he'd need to understand that if he were to join, Poch isn't a man to mess about with, the lads love him as he's a great man manager but as Kaboul, Adebayor, Capoue and Townsend have found out, it doesn't matter how good or how much you've cost the club, if you don't knuckle down you're out. If what you say about setting up to contain is true, then Eriksen and Lamela will be the ones that we'll need to rely on, they're the lock pickers in the side, hopefully the WBA team agrees with you though and see's Alli as key, that way Eriksen and Lamela are given a bit more freedom from which they can be deadly from.
Can't wait for the game. Everything I love about football is back. Guaranteed to be a great atmosphere(no paper rustling Leicester fans ) and we'll either see another excellent Spurs performance blowing West Brom away or we'll get a tense match with plenty of passion. Fully expecting to have lost my voice tomorrow. COYS!
