Rival watch

The manager didn’t have to select Udogie and Bentancur, he chose to rush Udogie back especially when it was clear he wasn’t fit and if we can’t beat Ipswich without one first choice defender then we really are in a pickle.

The fact that we also lost a large amount of games last season with pretty much a full team too shows that injuries really aren’t the only factor in such poor results and form.

 

And did a large chunk of those losses happen to come in the period where our defensive shape was a mess due to Mickey Van being injured while both Romero and Udogie were suspended?

The issue is that our system is overly reliant on the CBs to start attacking moves, and there's a very clear drop when you take Mickey Van out of the team as he's the main catalyst and this is being compounded by picking a midfield which sacrifices passing in favour of protecting the back line - and it has to be said we blundered into that issue in the Ipswich game and have seen it repeatedly in the last month or so, as having Sarr and Bentancur in front of Mickey Van makes a lot of sense as that provides a shield for him to get forward, but having them in front of any of Dragusin or Davies only creates a space between midfield and defence that can be exploited as both of them tend to sit deeper

That's also the reason why at the start of the season so much of our creative play was down our left flank, as Mickey Van created space which brought Maddison and Son into our attacking play, but without him our attacking moves often require 3-4 more phases of passing to get started which allows teams time to close gaps - and it has to be said dropping Maddison isn't helping either, because our solution to not having one player who bridged the gap between defence and the opponent's half is to also remove one of our main creative outlets, so instead there's more pressure being put on the wide players to try and make something

 

Nope, van de Ven and Romero were both fit in our final run-in of games where we lost 5 of the last 6.

 

Putting aside the minor fact that we didn't lose 5 of our last 6...
- Romero and Mickey Van weren't our CBs for the run-in: Udogie was injured for our last six game so Mickey Van moved to LB, with Dragusin at CB
- We played the Bottlers, Chelsea and Liverpool in the space of six days - even though the Chelsea game should've been played in February
- We didn't have a striker for the last three games, with Richy getting crocked (again...)
- Vicario was fouled at a corner during an NLD (funny how that just keeps happening, isn't it?)
- The Mansourites were in Terminator Mode, though a front two of Son & Johnson was certainly a choice
- Various injuries meant we couldn't make tactical subs, best summed up by having Austin and Whiteman on the bench against Sheff Utd
- Frankly our run-in was a **** Referee Gauntlet: Oliver for the NLD and Tierney for Liverpool, though Burnley and Sheff Utd were so **** that we won in spite Gillet and Madeley being refs for those respective games

Which takes us right back to the system only working with certain components, barring utterly hapless opposition

 

5 of the last 7 then, hardly much better.

And we did have a striker but surprise, surprise Ange will barely touch our academy unless a gun's held to his head. As has been the case this season too with Lankshear enjoying a good view of games as Solanke gets ran into the ground and Dorrington watching our second choice RB (wait, third really seeing as Ange prefers Gray) and a midfielder at CB.

So it seems the system only works if one or two things will be in place:
A) A 100% fit side which almost no team has for an extended period, more so with Ange's style of football.
B) The opposition being ****.

Option A could be somewhat helped by the board by giving him better quality to utilise throughout the team and squad but we all know how likely that is...
Option B is less out of our control.

 

Last season we did give Donley some minutes, though as Maddison's understudy - and it does need to be said Orient are playing him as an AM this season

Dorrington missed the best part of a year with a hamstring tear, so it's not surprising that he isn't rushed into an injury-blighted team - though he probably didn't help his case when he nearly gifted Southampton with a hospital pass when he came on against a few weeks ago. This is likely why there was talk of recalling Ash Phillips, as he's good to play at this very second (and drags us back to the question why Phillips didn't get a look-in when we had 0 CBs at points last season)

If it hasn't escaped your attention, countless sides fail if one component of their system is missing
- The Sheikh Mansour Team are doing so **** right now because Rodri's missing
- Poch's team only worked when Dembele was fit, and fell to bits when he fell to bits
- Wenger's system never recovered from Patrick Vieira leaving
- The Dutch lost the 1974 World Cup final because Barry Hulshoff was injured before the tournament

The issue of not tweaking the system to accommodate the lack of Mickey Van is only exacerbating the issue, because our midfield is set up to shield a player who isn't in the team and the lack of creative passing is being exposed and exploited

 

Donley played about 8 minutes of football, I think he's played about the same amount of minutes as Alfie Whiteman has for the first team and most have probably forgotten Alfie Whiteman actually has first team minutes. Lankshear played 0 that season, despite being the PL2's top scorer and POTY.

I said last season Phillips and/ or Dorrington should've played. Just as Dorrington should've been given a chance in the side now. Both Dorrington and Lankshear should head out on loan this window or even permanently to be honest, there's even been permanent interest in Lankshear, both are being KWP'd at present and that does nothing for them or us. When you also consider we're being linked with Kolo Muani plus a CB being on the cards this month as well as Phillips and Vuskovic arriving in the summer, you have to wonder just what exactly is the point of them remaining?

Poch's team actually (surprisingly) won a ton of games over different years when Dembele was injured. The rut more came from when Eriksen's form dipped.

City also look like they've halted their rut now - somewhat thankfully! Quite enjoyed their drubbing of West Ham.

 

It's been a while since you guys have trusted in your youth. Whether its because they aren't good enough or not no one will know as they are never really given a chance. It was similar to us under mourinho when everyone but the youth players were being played even if the first teamers were **** or out of position.

You are 100% right they should just be sent out on loan to develop rather than rotting on the bench.

 

We've become a real graveyard for youth and it's a shame as it was something we really prided ourselves on.

What doubly irks me - and this isn't exclusive to Postecoglou - is that we'll keep a promising youth player on the bench, not or barely play them and also keep them out of U21 games. It's just bonkers.

Our 21s won the PL2 last season and Lankshear was both the PL2 top scorer and the PL2 POTY, he needs game time, here or elsewhere.

 

**** For Brains wants to buy Liverpool, according to the child groomer that **** For Brains sends a Father's Day card to every year

 

A large part of the reason why is due to Poch letting a generation of Academy players stagnate (with the exceptions of Harry Winks and Oliver Skipp) in the U21s without sanctioning loans, so not only did we see several youngsters jump for the chance to play first team football somewhere else but it did have a knock-on effect that agents were reportedly urging potential signings to wait and see if somebody else might offer a contract

I always bring up the WindyCOYS article from a few years ago that outlined that once a player turns 18 the priority in their development is giving them first team football, be it loaning them out or introducing them to the first team, and the fact we just didn't offer that for the majority of Poch's tenure is a black mark on his time

 

As much as pochetino was to blame for the latter part of his stay (he got lots of out the ones he inherited), it's been 5 years now since poch has gone. The acadamy now has some real good talent culminating with you winning the youth league last year. The use of the youth since poch has left has still basically been non existence

 

The opportunities for home produced youth players in the PL are very limited. The pressures and demands mean that managers often can’t risk giving them the game time they need to develop.
Cole Palmer got few minutes at City and had to move to play regularly and develop into the superstar he has become.
Spurs are no different. Although with little chance of achieving anything in the PL, perhaps there will be opportunities later in the season to give youngsters a run of games with little riding on results. Gray has been given a chance, although he came with some experience, having played regularly at Leeds.
But generally speaking, the days of teams having three or four youth players in the first team squad and getting minutes in the team or off the bench are long gone. The preference seems to be to loan them out. But how many return ready to play? Amad is an exception at Utd - but probably due to lack of other options.

 

So yes, Donley got minutes last season. As did Mikey Moore, for that matter

Dorrington needs a loan because while being in our U21s will help with his fitness, it won't claw back the year of development he missed so a loan is the best prospect there as that would (hopefully) set him back on track. Lankshear is a more difficult one because while first team football is needed, what he needs is a few starts - but if he can't hold up the ball effectively, within half a dozen games he'd be getting 5-10 minute cameos from the bench in much the same way Dane Scarlett's loan career has gone, so we basically need to find the right loan for him rather than send him to the first club that makes an offer

Eriksen missing for Poch really wasn't an issue, because we needed to get the ball to him - and that's why Dembele being crocked/suspended was always an issue for Poch's team, because that cut off the supply line for him (and anyone else, for that matter), outside of Toby pinging one 80+ yards to Dele's feet, of course. And that's the thing about Rodri, Vieira et al: a team can handle a striker being out as there's always (alright, usually...) somebody else they can call on to replicate their role in the team - but where teams fall apart is where the player who is key to their transitional phase isn't available, which Mickey Van certainly is for us

...though that does also betray an issue in our midfield, because Bissouma had the transitional role in the team early last season but he just doesn't do that anymore - and while this change was most likely due to Mickey Van vastly exceeding expectations that made Bissouma's role defunct, that does open up a whole bunch of questions about not looking for a DM with a very different profile to get more value out of Mickey Van's forward runs, as well as why we haven't switched back to Bissouma (or more likely Sarr, let;s be honest here...) taking on the transition role with Mickey Van absent because there's an obvious and regularly exploited gap there

 

Here's the issue: it's not use which is the barometer, it's how their development is handled

Case in point, Harry Redknapp didn't give many minutes to youngsters until his final season when he was blatantly sacking off the Europa League - but he did handle their development by loaning out various players, and that did pay off as the likes of Andros Townsend and Steven Caulker did start to break through under Villas-Boas, and a little later some bloke named Harry Kane got into the team under Dim Sherwood. Even Villas-Boas would let youngsters out to develop, most obviously Danny Rose's loan to Sunderland

And this is where saying we don't give youth players a chance doesn't stand up, because we do - but they're getting those chances on loan so they can develop, and last season saw various successes such as Troy Parrott, Alfie Devine, Josh Keeley and Ash Phillips boost their chances (or sale value, in Parrott's case) which has seen Keeley step up from Conference to League One starter comfortably while Alfie Devine's gone from League One to Jupiler League starter in the space of a year

 

North London is.....black and white!

 

Is it me or does Trossard look like an older version of (50 year old) Robbie Williams?

 

Especially when they fail to win a penalty after Saka dived near the centre circle

please log in to view this image

 

Was that a level enough playing field.

 

The ball’s fault according to Arteta. Pathetic.