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I think Pochettino's basic approach is wrong. But I also think he's willing to keep trying new things until he comes up with something that works. I'm not so sure that even AVB, who was he most frustrating coach we've had recently, wouldn't have turned it around given time. So give Pochettino time, a minimum of 1 1/2 years, I think, if for no other reason than that we'll be able to attract better managers if we don't keep sacking them left and right. It's not like we're in danger of winning anything other than (if we're very lucky) a league or FA Cup in that period.
 
Spurm said:
As others have said, a lot of the players just aren't good enough. We clearly aren't gonna buy our way to any glory so that leaves us one hope - youth development.
As soon as it gets to the point where people are saying "should <insert young up-and-comer> be in the team over <insert aging/older player>?" then they should be in. The young players WANT to play and lots have grown up with their goal being to play for SPURS.
Right now, for me, that means putting Dier into central defence. Kane up front. Mason stays in. Bentaleb in too. Townsend is arguable, watching him winds me up, but at least he tries. If Townsend could be told not to shoot so much then bung him in.


Lloris (c)
Kaboul Dier Vertonghen Rose
Mason Bentaleb
Lamela Eriksen Chadli
Kane

Townsend rotated in for Chadli/Lamela.
For width when required we could even put Lennon right and Rose/Townsend left with Davies at LB.

Sell Adebayor, Soldado, Dembele, Capoue and recoup some of the money we've wasted. Lets go back to buying 19-22 yr olds and trying to develop them. That and the odd master signing (VDV/Modric) is how we got in the CL in the first place.
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There's a lot to be said for this. One way to increase our chances against teams with more resources is to build a team of players in the 20-22 year old range. Assuming reasonable progression, they should be much better in three years.


The Huddlefro said:
I think its less true of a case with football than tennis because football is a team game, and unless you have a world class player to carry the team like Bale did for us in his last season, then a lack of effort or backbone from others can become very apparent. If successful tennis requires strokes, strategy and nerves then successful football requires technique, strategy and nerves (both require a healthy dollop of fitness too but you get what I mean), but the difference in football is that the whole team has to meet the standard. Unless you have a player who can win the game single-handedly, you are only as strong as your weakest link. I know I probably talk too much about 'systems' and 'tactics' on here but clearly if you're trying to play a pressing game then if some players don't commit to the press then teams just play around it.

I agree with your second paragraph though, although with the caveat that a 4-4-2 will leave us light in midfield against the top teams and even exposed against other teams IMO - I know City play it sometimes but they have players an another level to us across the board - and a midfield diamond will leave us just as reliant on fullbacks for width as we are now, but could be a good option regardless.
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Interesting post. Is there something in Spurs' culture that makes the team sloppier, more liable to get caught on kickoffs, etc.? Possibly. But I watch us pressing all out all the time and think that any team that does this will get hit on the break, regardless of the content of their hearts.

Also, as I've said elsewhere, 4-4-2 only at home/against teams that sit back. A 4-2-3-1 against better teams/away. Have it sit back against the top teams, as against Arsenal.
 
Spurm said:
Einstein had a good quote on the definition of insanity:
Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.


We keep sacking managers, nothing changes. So we sack Poch for a comment?
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For some reason that quote keeps coming up on our board. I'm not sure if it's you doing it everytime :D

Anyway, the quote lacks any context. I'm not even sure he did say it but if he did I doubt it was in reference to situations where the variables are constantly changing. If you drop the same ball from the same height 100 times it's going to keep bouncing back up to the same height it did the previous time but if you change the conditions, eg the height the ball is dropped or switch from dropping a tennis ball to a bowling ball then you're going to get a different result. It doesn't even have to be a change that's as noticable as that, if you flip a coin, call "tails" and lose, you're not insane for calling "tails" again on the second flip. In football there are infinite variables some obvious and some hardly noticeable so it's wrong to base your opinion solely on such a specious quote.


But yeah, lets not sack Pochettino.
 
Yid Vicious said:
For some reason that quote keeps coming up on our board. I'm not sure if it's you doing it everytime :D

Anyway, the quote lacks any context. I'm not even sure he did say it but if he did I doubt it was in reference to situations where the variables are constantly changing. If you drop the same ball from the same height 100 times it's going to keep bouncing back up to the same height it did the previous time but if you change the conditions, eg the height the ball is dropped or switch from dropping a tennis ball to a bowling ball then you're going to get a different result. It doesn't even have to be a change that's as noticable as that, if you flip a coin, call "tails" and lose, you're not insane for calling "tails" again on the second flip. In football there are infinite variables some obvious and some hardly noticeable so it's wrong to base your opinion solely on such a specious quote.


But yeah, lets not sack Pochettino.
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drop a bowling ball on your foot,and you'd probably get a good quote <laugh>
 
There's one simple quick fix that we seriously need to sort out ASAFP - work out which central midfield partnership is going to help us control games, rather than control the game for the first half followed by being completely anonymous for the second half as happened both against Newcastle and last night.

To put it another way, for our better seasons here's the partnerships we had...
2005-6: Carrick and Davids
2009-10: Modric and Palacios
2011-12: Modric and Parker
2012-13: Sandro and Dembele (before the injuries started to mount up)

If you dropped any of those four partnerships in for Capoue/Stambouli last night, or the Capoue/Mason pairing used against Newcastle and Villa, it's highly unlikely we would've been overrun for long periods in those games, just as it's likely we would've killed the games off.

The question is what the partnership is - Capoue or Stambouli alongside one of Bentaleb, Mason or Dembele? Or are we going to have to wait until January and for an answer?
 
It's Mason with either Bentaleb or Stambouli, for me. I think Bentaleb protects the back four as well as anyone else on the team at this point, I think. He works hard and tackles exceptionally well. I like what I've seen of Stambouli so far, but I'd still take Bentaleb. Both of them are fairly good going forward as well.

What about playing an all-effort team for a while, for the encouragement of the others? Let's see, Kane, Dier, Mason, Bentaleb, Townsend...more debatably Rose, Naughton, Lamela, Kaboul, Lennon. Come to think of it, Stoke would be a good team to try it on...4-4-1-1, Lennon on the right, Townsend on the left, Lamela behind Kane...you'd think they'd perform better than the teams we've been watching...
 
Never play the 4-2-3-1 inverted winger high press system again. We have the following history. Last year, AVB started with that system. It wasn't great in the beginning, though we did decently. Then we fell apart and AVB was fired. Sherwood installed a 4-4-2 which seemed to semi-intentionally sit back. He had the highest regular season win percentage of any coach in our history. We fired him and brought in Pochettino, who went back to the 4-2-3-1 inverted winger high press system. We promptly fell apart again. He varied it significantly twice, in games where we got our first result at Arsenal in years, and in another game we won. In the games in which we played with the system more or less intact, we've been worse than we have been in years. The seemingly straightforward solution is to never play that system again.

What we should switch to is debatable, but a 4-4-2 looks like a good choice. Playing a 4-2-3-1 but sitting back, as we did against Arsenal, looks promising as well.
 
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