Positives: Sanchez and Dier (minus the pen) actually looked really good together. Hugo didn’t look shaky and produced a worldy. Davies looked like the old Davies, solid. Sissoko was able to go beast mode despite being injured pre-Covid. Lamela was lively, although ****ed up two passes in the final third that could’ve lead to something. Bergwijn is becoming a fan favourite already, his speed is frightening. Would’ve rather kept him on for a bit longer tbh. Negatives: Kane, he was ****ing abysmal and should’ve been hauled off after 55/60 mins. Felt like we played with ten men, Gazzaniga could’ve done better up top. He’s obviously got a long way to get back to match fitness but leaving him on like that done the team zero favours. Son, made one or two runs but didn’t seem to go anywhere. Didn’t look as flat as Kane though. Set piece tactics, don’t like Son on corners and Kane hasn’t scored a free kick since Villa 6 years ago (I think!) which took a major deflection. Jose’s lack of subs. I actually thought our tactics were working, soaking up pressure and countering at pace resulted in us generally having the more dangerous chances and but for the penalty it could’ve seen us get the three points. Though only utilising two of five subs was bizarre, wait not bizarre, dumb. At the very least a third should’ve been made to get Kane off. Not sure why he bigged up Tanguy in a recent interview too only to leave him on the bench.
I had to leave on 60 mins. Seems odd that we only made 2 subs. I thought we contained them well I the first half, not necessarily the game plan we all dream of seeing but by and large it was working. Annoying to give up the lead, it would have been an important 3 points.
Ouch.....and very nearly a double ouch. Ref was in a hurry to give a second penalty. Where did Spurs disappear to in the second half?
I thought both penalty decisions were soft, to be honest. Admittedly, in real time, I thought Dier lunged at Pogba after he went past him, but when looking at the replay, he was clearly looking to go down when he skinned Dier. Fernandes should have been booked for diving after VAR overturned the second penalty decision, too. Moss botched it. So you were unlucky on the penalties front. That being said, if we're talking about the general performance, I didn't think you played well enough to win the game. You were camped in your own half for the majority of the second half. Kane was too deep (also didn't look match fit) and you couldn't keep hold of the ball for more than 10 seconds. When Harry facking Maguire is pushing that high up the pitch, you have to question the tactics of Mourinho. You did look threatening when you won possession and looked to break forward, but you never took the initiative or tried to take control of the match. There was a lot of tactical fouling from both sides, in my opinion, so I don't think either team can complain too much. Mourinho tried to pull of his classic defensive masterclass. It almost worked. But watching it really is sore on the eyes. Granted, it was the first game back after several months and the fitness of the players may not be up to scratch. However, if that's how Mourinho plans to set you up for the foreseeable future, it is not going to be entertaining every week. I don't know if your players will embrace that style in the long run, either. Not a great result for either team, in my opinion. The main beneficiary being Chelsea.
I agree that we were short of options, but as Harry virtually played behind Sonny for the last 20 mins, I see no reason why he couldn't have been replaced by Sessegnon or Ndombele, Sess would have made more sense than Gedson on the left anyway! The only thing we would have missed is that Harry did win headers in our box from set plays and maybe Jose saw that as more important than his lack of potency as a striker last night. I hope we see the benefit of him getting 90 mins in his legs against the spammers.
OK fair enough if we played in that defensive manner against United who are now a very good team IMO but if we repeat that method against West Ham then a lot of us will be unhappy. With the enforced break I had forgotten how frustrating and annoying watching football can be. I always watch in hope of seeing that fantastic exciting game that we see maybe 2 or 3 times a season, sometimes less. Playing is different of course but just watching sport is more about patience most of the time. It reminds of that great round of golf that I play in my head and the disbelief I have with the actual crap I can produce.
My only reason I could see to keep Kane on was that he has the skill and vision to play that killer ball from deep, granted it did not come off last night but with only Son up front we will always struggle
Another big reason we needed to make more than two subs is playing deep can be draining if done for too long, for example if you park the bus for most of the second half, and considering most of our team hadn't played since March (while Kane, Bergwijn and Sissoko since January) some fresh legs were clearly needed but we didn't bring them on
Kane is the main man and both Pochettino and now Mourinho are always going to play him. Would you leave Ronaldo on the bench? These are the players that can always produce something out of nothing you have to play them.
Unfortunately I think he will play in that manner and use that method for most games, he’s a pragmatic coach and the result is more important than the entertainment side.
That will be his intention I'm sure but players like Son and Lol Celso and Bergwyn have natural flair which is hard to repress. Then when Lucas and Dele are there too?
As much as I miss going to see Spurs I honestly can not see myself wanting to pay around £50 for a ticket, £13 travel, £3.50 on a programme and £10 on a drink and food to watch us play such boring football. Over £75 (for a cheap game) and around £95 for a category A game to watch inspid football is not for me.
I've just reread this comment due to a like and realised that Fernandes is explicitly admitting to diving. He kicked the ball and then found Dier's foot. He wasn't kicked by Dier or fouled. He found his foot.
One benefit of the result, it really makes those Man Utd fans who spent the past three weeks camped on our Twitter gloating about the drubbing they'd dish out look like...well, your average Twitter Man Utd fan, given they and Arsenal are the absolute worst of football Twitter
Still waiting for Between The Posts to post the past map, so I'll make do with this for now... Honestly, this makes our sub strategy look that little bit more nonsensical: if our entire front six is shutting down midfield it's going to be draining, and while Sissoko and Winks were nuclear powered last night if the players around them start to tire - which Son and Kane clearly did - they need fresh legs to support them otherwise the structure starts to fail, and by "fresh legs" I don't mean playing Gedson on the wing for some reason
Slightly different highlights to the Premier League ones, omitting the second penalty call entirely, but including some other action.
