Pretty much agree apart from Janssen. He has been piss poor in front of goal all season so far. His hold up play and work rate is excellent but he is supposed to be a goal scorer and it is exceptionally concerning that in every game I have watched he does not look like scoring (pens aside). I am not anti him and am not scape goating him but after waiting for over 2 years for us to by an out and out goal scorer we seem to have bought one that does not fir our style of play or system ... and I find that concerning for our season.
Yep. No guts, no glory, etc. And I entirely agree about the obvious, and telegraphed passes. I can see them coming from here... Whether these youngsters have no vision, or it's been trained out of them, I don't know, But, I'm seeing the same pattern starting in our league games too.
You got there before I edited...got stuck spelling onamaph (???) ...then forgot my thoughts altogether smartarse
Janssens not the problem. He was largely isolated and had no decent service. When we did have a chance to put in a decent ball in front of him it was inevitably over hit or didn't get past the first defender. (Even Davies, normally reliable, screwed up a great chance to set him up in the 2nd half) Wimmer played like someone who had not played all season and was alongside a CB for the first time - which he was! Carroll is too lightweight at this level and frankly none of the new young crop looked particularly comfortable. Winks looked good against Gillingham - but looked largely out of his depth against a 2nd string 'Pool. Onomah coasted and seriously needs a kick up the arse and a reminder that he hasn't 'made it' just yet. Thank **** for Vorm!! At least the scoreline doesn't look bad.
So,the Football League Cup and the Europa League are now regarded as Spurs reserve tournaments. Will the club start to charge reserve team prices to watch these games in the future? Just imagine going all the way to Liverpool to watch the reserves.Now you've got to be keen to do that. I think we'd better beat Leicester in the League this weekend or say goodbye to that too!
As for Janssen, I think we're hitting a similar obstacle here as we did with Soldado in the sense that the service both players received has been absymal. Unlike the Spaniard, I don't think we've seen him miss that many gilt-edged chances to declare him a write-off just yet. You cannot accuse a striker of 'not looking like scoring' without looking at how many decent chances they're spurning per game. And for those decent chances to flow, you need decent service, which he hasn't been getting - both in the league and in cup competitions. His general all-round play and excellent work-rate indicates that there is a very good player in there somewhere. My main concern now is that the longer the open-play drought goes on, the worse his confidence will be. It'll be interesting to see what happens when the messiah returns from injury. I suspect that Janssen would vastly prefer playing off of Kane than anything else he's seen until now.
Spot on. Had the Harrison chance fallen for Janssen, I would have expected more. Sky MOTM missed more chances than he scored. TBH I would not be happy if Janssen had missed as many but unfortunately he's not getting the chances.
Onomah was the biggest disappointment for me. Closely followed by Winks. But the former is a lot more experienced. Carroll will be 25 by the end of the season, despite looking 13. We've long known what he can and can't do and one of those things is: play as a number 10. One of Lamela, Eriksen or Alli should've started there but I think the Sissoko suspension forced Poch's hand.
Yeah I just don't see what he brings nowhere near premier league standard. As for GKN, hopefully that will put to bed the comments regarding why he isn't getting premier league game time, looks no better than N'Jie
Absolutely. This was a scratch team and only the defensive players had any level of experience. I don't think it gives us any real level of insight into the abilities or futures of any of the players, although it is a snapshot of where some are in their development right now. Not everyone has the precocious nature of a Deli Alli and he had played first team football for 3 years before he came to us. Most young players take time to adapt to the PL. The same with players from foreign leagues, particularly young ones. What it does indicate, is that we have a limited number of players at a level to play a regular starting role in first team football at this time. On top of last season's starting XI we have Vorm, Trippier, Davies, Wimmer, Wanyama, Sissoko and Son. That's 18 players, a team and a bench, if we don't get any injuries or suspensions. Including Janssen and GKN who are taking time to settle, that's 20 players. When we have injuries and suspensions, as we do currently, we're fielding a bench with players that aren't going to be raising our game and who are really there to provide legs in the closing stages of games that we've already won and to gain experience. As Mauricio Pochettino said after the Bournemouth game, we lack depth. The fact that we're content to ditch cup competitions, as we did last season just confirms it. We're probably a minimum of an attacking midfielder and a striker light and the youngsters are make weights at this point. Unfortunately, the likelihood is that we'll not be able to do much about it in the January TW due to player availability and the likelihood that ridiculous prices will be even higher due to clubs not wanting to lose players mid-season and that a limited supply and a desperate need would result in us getting royally ripped off. Secondly, it throws open the issue of loaning out young players, as we used to do against the current practice of keeping them at the club. I'm no expert on the development of young players and I'm not going to tell anyone at the club what to do. That said, young players get to a stage where they need to play competitive football of a standard above development levels and if they're not getting it, then their development is stalling. We know that we have 3 real prospects in CCV, Harry Winks and Josh Onomah and last night suggests we are getting to a stage where they need to gain more first team experience. It's only in the event of a severe injury and suspensions crisis that they're likely to start in the PL or CL. We're out of the League Cup, that leaves the FA Cup as the only likely opportunity gto play competitive games. I would be surprised if that is thought to be enough and the issue is likely to be one that's not going to go away any time soon.
