Match Day Thread Tottenham Hotspur v Bayer Leverkusen

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Spurs or Sex? said:
I think there lays/ laid part of our problem.

The fact it wasn't a glamorous group meant that our lot probably went into it too confident and complacent as if we were back in the EL. Recent form has been iffy anyway so it's not as if our CL performances have been much different from our league ones of late but I think when you consider our last venture in the CL, facing the reigning champs, a solid Bremen and Twente who'd just won the Eredivisie, it brought out the best in us as we knew we were up against huge opposition. If we drew Barca/ Bayern/ Madrid in our group this time around we probably would've played much, much better against teams like that, albeit still defeated but it would've been performances we could've been proud of.
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I disagree. Our only good performance of the 4 games so far was the least glamorous of them all that at the same time most closely resembled a EL game - the trip to Moscow. My take? We were back in our comfort zone, doing what we've done reasonably well for the past 4-5 seasons. Last night confirmed that the CL is very much not our comfort zone. That's partly down to the manager's inexperience, partly down to the players'. It's no coincidence that with a few small and cost-effective additions to the squad in Gallas and VDV and the vast experience they brought with them, we saw the likes of Modric, Bale, Lennon and BAE flourish against even the highest calibre of opposition.

I find it staggeringly arrogant that we now apparently consider ourselves above conducting that sort of transfer business, and instead appear to be intent on sourcing a team of Dele Allis.
 
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Leicester reminds me of a Chinese chop house. Every game they like to chop the opposition.Amazes me that it works....for them!
They make Chopper Harris look like a choir boy.
 
Citizen Kane said:
I disagree. Our only good performance of the 4 games so far was the least glamorous of them all that at the same time most closely resembled a EL game - the trip to Moscow. My take? We were back in our comfort zone, doing what we've done reasonably well for the past 4-5 seasons. Last night confirmed that the CL is very much not our comfort zone. That's partly down to the manager's inexperience, partly down to the players'. It's no coincidence that with a few small and cost-effective additions to the squad in Gallas and VDV and the vast experience they brought with them, we saw the likes of Modric, Bale, Lennon and BAE flourish against even the highest calibre of opposition.

I find it staggeringly arrogant that we now apparently consider ourselves above conducting that sort of transfer business, and instead appear to be intent on sourcing a team of Dele Allis.
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I don't think it's got anything to do with comfort zones, barring a few exceptional performances against Stoke and City, we've been the same in the CL as we have in the Prem. Our problem is that we can't score/ score enough to kill most teams off at the moment. With the chances we had against Monaco and Bayer at Wembley, we could've easily left 3-2 and 2-1/3-1 respectively but our attacking players have been utter dross. We didn't play much differently against CSKA, we just managed to actually score a goal without conceding, it wasn't a performance I'll remember in 10 years time.

It'd be great to have an experienced head in the side but realistically where do they fit? Poch's system results in high energy and being very fit, in general, younger players fit that mould, Gallas for instance couldn't play in our high press while for as amazing Rafa was, he never tracked back and helped with defensive aspects. It's also worth remembering that I don't think that side from 5 years ago had too many injuries to it barring Ledley but thankfully we had Gallas, Dawson and an inform Kaboul to cover for him. We've been without Dembele, Kane and Toby in games this season and Dembele still isn't match fit, if we were without King as well as Bale and Modric - which is essentially what Dembele and Kane are to us right now - we'd have probably struggled back then too.

Ultimately I just think we're in a **** patch, nothing to do with comfort zones/ arrogance/ lack of experience, we're just not performing like we can. We've shown what we can do to teams when we're in devastating form, we need to rediscover that and hopefully soon, it'll be massively helped when our best players are back and fully fit.
 
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BuzzardFoxMick said:
No mate, celebrating cruising to the Ko stages of the UCL, whilst you lot are left biting your nails in hope..... The irony of all this is quite a few divs on your board were
predicting we'd be an embarrassment to the EPL after losing our games and going out ,when in reality we have won
three,drew one and without conceding a
goal <laugh> epic fail by the bitter yids <laugh>
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So impressed by leicester's CL campaign. The calibre of teams in your group are top class. How you getting on in the premier league.
 
I cant understand how the spurs bench was so weak last night with all the money spent in England and the Bale money tottenham got, Leverkusen have built their team on a much smaller budget, doing good business and not only had a better first 11, but also a much better bench.

Of the Tottenham squad last night the only players I would consider to get anywhere near the Leverkusen team would be Wanyama, Vertonghen and Eriksen. I dont think Son would get in their team now, and while Spurs were missing Kane, Leverkusen were missing Bellarabi.

If I was a Spurs fan id be asking questions about the business the club is doing.
 
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