Can't say I've seen KN cut inside from the right for the same reasons as YV...he's hardly been there! he has from the left where I feel he is dodgy, seemed to get away with it at Norwich but has looked a lot less assured there in a Spurs shirt.
SoS : The beauty of Corluka was the combo with Lennon. He may have been slow, but he literally knew his place. His distribution to Lennon was good, and Azza often came back to protect him. The worst game I saw from him, was the PAOK game when he had just returned from injury. IMHO he must have thought trying to copy Walker was the means of "job preservation" , as the number of times he was caught up the wrong end of the pitch when the attacks broke down was a joke. For a FB, the skillset I'll take is : defending + ball distribution + some pace + attacking skills in that order.
I can't remember Corluka having too many bad games to be honest, I don't remmeber the PAOK one well (mainly because we lost!) apart from the fact their fans were smoking spliffs at White Hart Lane!!! I am a fan of the more modern day full back, in the style of Dani Alves/ Marcelo etc but only if the players are actually good at it. An on form Walker is more than worthy but so far, he's been our worst player this season in my opinion and for that matter, I'd happily take a more Corluka-esque full back for the time being, especially with the sort of games coming up and the position we're currently in.
On the whole Charlie was pretty good for us, lost the plot a bit with the business about his missus, not sure he'd suit being further up the pitch as we are now, the only regular groan was his pace, but he made up for that most of the time with nous.
You missed the Coventry game YV - and he didn't over impress that day either!! Don't recall him cutting inside in any of his games, at RB or LB come to that and totally agree with your assessment of him slowing down play. I too want to give him the benefit of the doubt and initially was happy to put it down to the fact he was being played out of his natural position, but he hasn't over performed on the right or left. Bearing in mind we have Adam Smith waiting in the wings for next season (hopefully), KN is going to have to start making the most of his opportunities from here on in or he may be surplus to requirements next term.
I came to this thread to talk about AVB and forgot the last debate here is about Kyle Naughton....I wonder if the pro Naughtons might want to revise that view! Back to AVB, well, where to start! no need to remind everyone I'm one of the sceptics, but at least you can now all see why. First I have to say 2 weeks ago I was commending him for getting us where we were, the Pool defeat was just one of those, but last night my thoughts about him took a severe blow. I cannot for the life of me work out what the intended gameplan was in 'his' head, heard plenty of guesses from commentators and posters here, thats one thing. Then for the likelihood of its success, with the personnel chosen in as many unfamiliar positions, not to mention off form, doing things that made their personal game so ineffective and their faults so openly exposed. I can cope with the odd selection quandary, but to set up an entire team thats never played that way in the positions asked, in such a game, was an idea that should never occur to anyone, let alone a highly paid professional. In his post match interview "there were lots of positives", "the desire to reach the last 8 was there throughout the game"....now there's two blatant lies for a start! mainly blaming the players state of mind...staggering! I'm unsure whether this came from the same state of mind that picked the team ie, genuinely believes it, or a diplomatic statement to not publicly rubbish himself or the team, knocking confidence. All eyes on the Fulham game, a top side and management would recover this at the weekend...we'll see!
Notso,somebody mentioned on the match thread that he should hold up his hands and accept that he got it horribly wrong,but so far he hasn't. Caught a bit of press pass just now on ESPN- Tommy Smyth and Steve Nichol were discussing this. Smyth said its the result that matters and how they did it doesn't matter now- Nichol,however said that AVB 's tactics were mystifying and hard to work out - for Holtby for Defoe (defensive) Lennon for Livermore (attacking) no wonder the players played like they did!
