Match Day Thread Tottenham Hotspur v Burnley

Of course I am, which is why it was said in a jesting fashion hence the big grin

 

Just watching Pool vs Goons on MOTD2. Its glaringly obvious what Pool have in abundance and we have virtually none of..,pace!!

It murdered the Goons today..

 

Cheer up lads...(DT's rant is epic)

 

You know,I come from Tottenham.I can't understand what these Arsenal "fans" are saying half the time.

 

What an utterly flat performance. But I can't say I didn't expect it. I've come to the realization that we tread a fine line between exciting dynamic football that can result in our opposition getting hammered, to AVB clueless sideways "huff and puff" non penetrative football. It's like there's two completely different Tottenham teams and we don't know which will turn up. However, it's starting to get a bit more predictable when you see the starting line up and/or the shape of the team.

Yesterday I said that I'd rather we played 4231 in order to support Davies and Trippier's lack of pace, and Poch literally named the team I predicted. Whilst those two will do a decent enough defensive job most of the time (seemed like they had bad games yesterday), it literally feels like they need someone in front of them who they can play the ball to and say "on ya bike". Trippier can cross, as we all know, but in general what they both offer in the gap between our defensive line and the 18 yard box, is pretty much bugger all. And that's a key area where lots of creativity needs to happen. (This is one of the reasons I don't like seeing them in a 352, as they simply can't do it on their own out wide). And this is where the further problems lie. We don't have the right players to play in front of either of them. Yes, Son can do it on his day. But a performance from him like yesterday, and we're stuffed. There's no one else who has that "directness".

Auriers signature along with the return of Rose will give this team much needed threats in wide positions, as we've discussed a million times. But there's a bigger problem IMO now, and that is that we are unable to change shape effectively if required. Rose and Aurier (who has never played for us) are quite possibly the most important players in the team. Take them out, and a different set of full backs come in, and the rest of the line up needs adjusting with almost no one in the squad to support the attributes of the replacement FB's.


We need to address this issue within the attacking side of the squad, otherwise any matches without Rose and Aurier (should he sign) are going to be nothing short of painful.

 

I agree.

Liverpool just hammered the Gooners with, arguably, their Lamela, Lalana, and their Eriksen, Coutinho, out of the squad.

Could we do the same? They also had a striker come of of the bench and score. Seems like ages since that happened over here, it's too rare. I do hope we improve the squad where it's needed. We need more goals in the team. If we were 3-0 up, Burnley's last minute draw simply can't happen.

We can't talk about challenging for the league or competing in the CL without scoring more goals, and I don't mean relying on Kane winning the golden boot again.

 

Kane, Dele, Son and Eriksen all have goals and assists in them. But those will only come when the team is set up to play to their strengths. everything is currently so tight and compact, partly due to the way we're set up, and partly due to the way the opposition is setting themselves up. - one of those situations we have a say in, but we're not getting it right.
The evolution of our football over the last few years has been amazing under Poch. We've transitioned from predominantly one formation (4231) to another (352), and quite seamlessly in the grand scheme of things. But the next stage IMO, is being able to switch between the two when one isn't working, or adjust ourselves based on the individual circumstances of the squad members available for the game. We're nearly there, but speed is something that devastates the opposition, and we do not have enough of it throughout the squad, like our rivals.

 

That table officially becomes meaningful for Spurs on April 22nd 2018, as that's the first date where there are like-for-like comparisons with last season.

Coincidentally we only have three games to play after that date...

 

I didn't think Sissoko played badly(certainly not by his standards) but he was going off on marauding runs leaving all the defensive duties to Dembele, who struggles to complete 90 minutes. We'd have been better off not switching from a back 4 if that's the sub we wanted.to do, that way Sissoko's naturally higher up the pitch.

I think you're being harsh on DIer, he had an okay game but made a couple of mistakes when he was moved into the back 3. I thought everyone did okay really, it was just we didn't have the right players in the right positions and for some reason we had Winks and others bombing forward in the last minutes when what we needed to do was just keep the shape, make safe passes and run the clock down. I had similar frustrations when Sherwood was manager, we wouldn't do the sensible thing and just see out the game. Pochettino's fault entirely for the draw imo, there was nothing for us to gain by getting a second goal so late but we went for it anyway.

 

I never thought I'd see myself defending Sissoko on a public forum, but the player he replaced (Son) has probably the 2nd or 3rd least defensive responsibilities in the side. He was brought on in the 70th minute - too early to sit back and hold on to the lead. His job description was clearly to create opportunities for a 2nd goal, and that is exactly what he did. Together with Jan, Toby and Davies he was imo one of the few players who actually stuck to their job description and contributed meaningfully to the game.

Our shape in the last 10 minutes was frankly pub standard. I don't think this constant changing formation in between and even during games is doing us any favours. The players seem lost. By the closing stages of the game, Dembele was playing on the left wing, Kane was somewhere in midfield, Trippier was far too close to Toby, Alli was wandering around up top, Winks was pretending to be Alli. It was a shambles. We were all over the place and credit to Burnley for persevering for their goal.

 

If we played that game 10 times we would win 8 at least. We were not that bad. We made a lot more chances than them, Kane had 5 or 6 on his own and would have got two most games.
I'm not worried about the rest of the season. Walker is a loss though.

 

Or stranded upfield leaving us exposed!

 

I do the like-for like on a per-game basis.

However I do not start to suggest possible final pts totals
until at least the number of remaining games gets down
to "count on your fingers" level.

 

Any more teams going to park the bus against us at Wembley,I wonder?

 

Agreed. There appears to be a commonly held belief that pace is very important. Liverpool were mentioned as having plenty of pace, which notably damaged Arsenal. I agree about how Liverpool's pace really helped them against (the way) Arsenal (play). That's the difference. I don't think it's as important against a side that is going to sit back most of the match. Think about it logically - how does the pace beat people or get into good situations if the players you want to beat are already crowded into their end of the pitch?

Surely what you need is guile and relative pace. What do I mean by that. I mean the second goal against Newcastle. I really really enjoyed that goal. We played right through them at pace - not because anyone ran particularly fast, but we reacted faster than they did. And I mentioned it at the time, but if Rose had scored instead of Davies people would probably be saying (particularly after the weekend) "you see what Rose brings to the team - used his pace there". But it wasn't pace, it was people thinking quickly and getting into the right positions quickly - which is just as important.

Edit: and in this apparently terrible performance we had 28 chances. How many did Liverpool have in their "stunning attacking display" (BBC words) - 18 chances. Of course results are what counts, but if you create a lot of chances and concede few then chances are things will be ok. And I suggest we haven't had as many goals as the number of chances created would suggest, and we've conceded more goals than the number of chances conceded would suggest. Keep up the same ratio and over the season we'll be fine.

 

It's not how fast the players run but how quickly they move the ball. Pace is needed to cause panic and displace the opposing defence but it's how quickly you move that ball that creates the goal.

 

Clough used to say the ball can go much faster than you, pass it.

 

The problem is that many people (including almost all the pundits) have a large number of incorrect beliefs about football. The most obviously daft one is that if you don't score in the first hour then you have to change something. Say you came up with exactly the right tactical plan for your players so that on average you would score 2 goals a game and concede a goal every two games. That would win the title more than not. But it comes down to having a probability of 0.5 of scoring a goal in each 23 mins and 0.125 of conceding. So in one in 8 games you will have not have scored by the 65th minute and in a third of those you will be 1-0 down. That really isn't a good reason to switch to different tactics or bring on poorer players. Kane is a much better player than Janssen. Janssen may well improve if he gets game time. I think he should be brought on early when we are 2 or 3 goals up and not at all when we have a slender lead. If we are down with a 15 minutes to go then that warrants a change of tactics because now the balance between scoring and conceding needs to change.

 

Some of the comments on here have been unnecessarily gloomy. The performance was a somewhat tedious, pedestrian one, but with a little better luck (especially for Kane) we'd have won, and no-one would have complained. In terms of performances, Trippier has been rightly criticised. His positioning and tactical play were woefully sub-standard. But I have at least a partial theory about this. As an ex-Burnley player he may have been targeted. Given his shortage of inches, the ball over the top is a good option against him, and it worked from very early on. Added to which the right back corner was in bright sunlight during the first half, and the sun was directly in his eyes throughout that period (I know - I was sitting directly behind him and not only getting very hot but lso straining to see at times, despite a cap and sunglasses!). I thought he needed far more support than he got, and expected Poch to sort that out within the first ten minutes. But there seemed to be a "you're-on-your-own-kid!" approach. Otherwise, my main criticism is the slow pace of our play. We seemed to turn back as soon as we reached the final third. And I have to say, Spurf, old chap, the ball doesn't always travel quicker than the player - especially when it is tapped gently back towards our own goal. We sorely need a "breakout" player, to replace Walker and (at the moment) Rose: someone who is willing to run at the opposition with the ball at his feet (Son and Dembele are the only players who seem remotely to attempt this, and neither of them is permanently posted way out wide, to encourage that move - surely a good option at Wembley?). (Oh my Gareth and my Aaron long ago!!!) This would make a refreshing change from the slow build-up we now specialise in - which I like, but not every time. Hugo needs more practice at the quick throw-out; and needs to look before he taps it to Verts or Toby, when they've got at least one marker in close attendance! Self-defeating. Finally, I really didn't see the allegedly skilful play of Sissoko. I saw him running about a lot, trying to get involved. But he didn't seem to know what to do with the ball when he got it. Dembele/Wanyama he is not! Why is he always brought on rather than Vincent? Doesn't make sense to me.

 

What you say makes a lot of sense PS, but what I and many others were itching to see as the 2nd half wore on and we looked increasingly incapable of stringing two passes together, was for Janssen to come on and play alongside Kane, not to replace him. Going 2 up front seems to be something we experimented with early last season when Vince was barely a month into his Spurs journey, and have abandoned it ever since. Most of us are in agreement that there is no need to tear up the tactical plan and start from scratch, but what we currently lack is anyone coming off the bench who can give the opposition what to think about. So if, like Burnley, they are a hard working and defensively robust team, chances are by the 60th/70th minute they'll have completely sussed us out and we'll be banging our heads against a wall repeatedly until they catch us on the break and grab an equaliser. Looking at our bench, however little we rate him, bringing Vince on to bully their defenders and try to create more space for Kane would've given them what to think about and may well have worked. Poch hasn't been bold enough in his substitutions since more or less the day he came. I struggle to recall a single game where a sub has come on and actually changed the game in a positive way. It has either been negative or pointless - the only positive being that regular players are given a breather.