I thought Krancjar seemed a lot more mobile when he was at Pompey, but after one of his long injuries he just looked lard-arsed all of a sudden for us. You need workers in the PL, some teams can carry a special player who's not so good at the tracking back and pressing, but I don't put him in that category, you don't build a team round Niko Krancjar. Ultimately, he does better in a slower pace of game, so I wish him well at his new club.
It was a shame that injuries seemed to haunt our back up players at the start of the season just gone. Our second choice XI should've seen us progress in the Europa League and might've kept a few of them in a better frame of mind, too. Being able to call upon a fit and firing Kranjcar to drop into van der Vaart's role would've been a blessing at times. Losing players like this is understandable, but it's hard to see how our squad's going to progress, if we can't keep decent players happy when they're not in the first XI. Who's going to join to sit on the bench, knowing that's it's practically impossible to dislodge anyone ahead of them in the pecking order, barring injury or suspension?
I noticed that too PNP, he had an uncanny habit of getting injured himself, just before someone in the 1st 11 did, he was exceptionally good at picking up knocks on International duty.
Yeah - that's tricky. Now we only have Pienaar (who may well be on his way) and GDS (who surely must be on his way) in reserve for a bit of midfield attacking firepower on the bench. (Unless there something about some of the kids that I don't know about). And in a team like Spurs where there are not many goalscorers we need players like Niko and Defoe on the bench to give us something else if we need a goal. And trying to sign someone who's good enough to add something and not so good that we have to pay a massive fee AND is happy to probably start on the bench in the EPL. Niko was a perfect signing from that point of view.
i dont think he was too happy about being on the bench though Lenny...he looked very disgruntled the last 2 years...even when he had stormers...as soon as one of the main attacking players were fit again..he was benched. i think he was slightly peeved from that time he got us 2 winners in 2 games...Stoke and i think Bolton or Toon not sure...then 3rd match he was on bench again....never saw much of his sublime play from then on really. wish him all the best and i think we will see a player in him that we could have used better now.
This is precisely what I've been saying, without mentioning the R word! it is difficult to get the calibre of player wanted to sit on the bench at Spurs. They don't mind United/City/Chavs benches so much, who wouldn't, but if they're coming to us, its to play every week. So, players on our bench are mostly a tier down if that makes sense, and whatever slight shortcomings they have, they will get exposed at the top levels top table. Applying that to Niko, does well when Spurs are playing well, but when the chips are down and you have to dig in and runaround for the shirt...I think he's been a bit of a disappointment there. Other teams know he's slow and lazy so use his side when they're in the ascendancy. Goals conceded are usually spoken about regarding the last couple of passes leading up to it, if you look back further you'll probably find someones waltzed past Niko earlier, but it goes largely un-noticed...had he done his job when we don't have the ball! Back to how Spurs progress...I don't know, other than having more money, sad, but its the way things are.
I think that he actually went the other way entirely for us though, over the past couple of years. He tried too hard when we didn't have the ball and ended up making poor tackles. Would've been less of a problem in van der Vaart's role, in my opinion, but Redknapp didn't seem to want to try him there, for some reason. One interesting point for me is that he played in both of what most people regard as our best performances last season. We went with a 4-4-2 with Kranjcar provisionally on the right against both Liverpool and Newcastle. Good starts in both games saw the opposition torn apart and unable to recover.
I agree on the 'trying' part, but his languid style still makes him look lazy and half-hearted in his challenges, and being quite evident he's not too good at the 'nicking it back', players still drift past fairly easily was all I meant. As far as Rafa's role, VdV covers an amazing amount of ground during a game to do that role well, think about it, MF one minute, up front the next on the break trying to keep up with Bale!, Niko doesn't like running around for too long, the pace we play at would see Niko out of the game perhaps. He'll get away with it in a slower game, but not in our league. Its for that reason I disagree with you, I don't think he suits VdV's role much at all. Rafa doesn't have top speed, but he does have stamina. Your interesting point about him being perhaps a catalyst for our 2 best performances is more coincidence imo. I do see how you arrive at your conclusion with your scientific approach to things (not a slur, I just see how you piece things together) but to counter, the performances in the Everton at home and Norwich away games were equally as devastating, just didn't have the scoreline to match. Niko took part in 5 minutes of one those. My point is, when the whole team performance is good, everyone looks good.
I'd agree with most of that. Niko never has looked like he was suited to the pace of the game in the Prem.
Can't understand why Harry never really played him and I don't get the comments from some Spurs fans about him not being suited to the prem either. He simply wasn't given enough time at Spurs, but even then when he did come on he usually made an impact. I remember him single handedly winning you 6 points towards the end of last season. He is one of those players who is skillful enough to turn a game in an instant. You can understand why he wants to leave, he is a quality footballer who is being wasted on the bench. But I would have thought that with the possibility of Modric leaving this summer, Kranjcar would have been looking at getting more opportunities in the team. But then with Harry's reluctance to play him, he must have lost confidence with Spurs.
Try reading and more importantly, understand the comments in this thread, if you can't, its over your head, and you should perhaps comment on a less mentally taxing subject....like which other team do you think RVP will definetly be playing for next season.
Can't have helped I suppose, but there's plenty of players on benches that are fit and ready when needed, he picked up a lot of knocks in training, presumably training sessions aren't sporadic.
£4m according to the BBC (although they're quoting the Star, and I have yet to see proof that their readers can count to five...)
Depends how many fingers they've got left. And, whether or not they know how to take their socks off.
