Match Day Thread Tottenham Hotspur v Burnley

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Sunday 28th February 2pm
Premier League
Tottenham Hotspur Stadium​

The win over Wolfsberger was an increasingly rare positive performance and result.
It's something that needs to be harnessed for the Premier League, if we're to get anything our of this season.
Our next few matches lead into the derby against Arsenal and they're all winnable, on paper.
That means nothing, of course, even less so in this weird campaign than it normally does.
Can Mourinho turn around our appalling league form or can Dyche drag his side away from the drop threat?

The summer transfer window was another quiet one for Burnley, even by their standards.
They'd finished the previous campaign strongly and managed to secure a top-half finish.
Perhaps this lead to a false sense of security or maybe any spending was just deemed too risky?
Either way, it hasn't really worked out for them and they've largely struggled.
The start of the season was extremely poor, though their erratic form has seen them pull up the table a bit.

It looks pretty likely that they'll remain in the Premier League again, but I doubt that's enough for Dyche.
He'll want them to repeat their finish from last time and will have one eye on the top half, again.
They've only lost a couple recently, but they'll be frustrated by their form against sides around them.
A good win over Palace was surrounded by draws against Brighton, Fulham and 10-man West Brom.
They face Leicester, Arsenal and Everton after this, so he'll be focusing on being hard to beat.

This fixture in the last campaign was one of the highlights, where we won easily and played well.
Kane and Moura put us 2-0 up in the first ten minutes, before Son scored the goal of the season to make it 3.
It stayed that way til half-time, despite a number of good chances, including Sissoko hitting the post.
Kane made it 4-0 shortly after the break and Sissoko made up for his earlier miss by making it 5-0.
One of our better performances and one that was replayed a lot on TV, too:

The match at Turf Moor was more symptomatic of this season, being a struggle and fight for the points.
Early fouls by Barnes and Lowton set the tone, as Oliver kept his cards in his pocket and failed to ref, again.
Good chances were at a premium and we didn't create much, despite having much more of the ball.
A goalline clearance by Kane kept things level as things moved into the later game.
Son spurned one good chance, then put another away, as Kane headed it to him from a corner:

Lo Celso is our only absence for this one, as Aurier returns from injury and is available.
Gudmondsoon and Barnes are out for the visitors, who also have doubts about several other players.
Neither side has any suspensions.

Lineups for each side's last league game:

Spurs: Lloris; Tanganga, Sanchez, Dier, Reguilon; Ndombele, Hojbjerg; Moura, Lamela, Son; Kane.
Subs: Hart, Doherty, Alderweireld, Davies, Winks, Sissoko, Alli, Bale, Vinicius.
League form: LLLWLL.

Burnley: Pope; Lowton, Tarkowski, Mee, Taylor; McNeil, Westwood, Cork, Brownhill; Vydra, Rodriguez.
Subs: Peacock-Farrell, Norris, Bardsley, Dunne, Long, Nartey, Driscoll-Glennon, Benson, Mumbongo.
League form: LLDWDD.

Ref: Kevin Friend. VAR: Martin Atkinson.

TV: Sky Sports.

How would you like to line up for this one and what would you change from the Wolfsberger game?
Would you stick with much of the same lineup, make a few changes or go for a wholesale switch?
Which system and tactics would you use and what are you expecting Burnley to go with?

 

Paul Stewart

 

Under a minute!

 

Might be worth noting that Burnely's bench against West Brom had two keepers and five defenders on it. They were stretched.
Also, "he was super f... super f... super tired after the game".

 

Great, it's time to slap on a fake grin and go through this **** one more time...

 

Too sharp for your own good

 

Early bird catches the Paul Stewart.

I like to think that Spurcat has his own fixture list, with all
Paul Stewarts marked well in advance.

 

"Pressure is oxygen for coaches like me" ,

"oxygen thief" remarks incoming ...

 

We're not winning this one 5-0, are we.

 

Don't suppose Levy is willing to open one of bars so he can meet the pint and packet of crisps Sean Dyche is asking for Nick Pope?

 

Eric Dier says he hasn't been in a bad place this season.
Spurs fans would probably disagree, seeing him week-in, week-out on the pitch! That's definitely not the place we wanted to see him!

On a serious note, I'm hoping that Dele's midweek resurgence continues - as Diers form drop-off appears to mirror the decline of his best mate over the past couple of seasons.

 

He didn't think about what he was saying, given the obvious response is to bring up the various goals we've conceded due to him being in a bad place

 

I really don't get why players in poor form do this. Just STFU, own your poor form and try hard to put it behind you. Dier's a decent bloke most of the time but his form is not much better than Doherty...and against RZ Pellets FC he was properly dreadful. I'd not be picking him or Sanchez right now, unless I had to. Neither look like they actually understand how to play centre back, as they're regularly out of position, making rash challenges and just switching off.

Last week, a mate told me that we've only played the same centre back pairing, in back-to-back games, a couple of times this season. I'd like Mourinho to pick our two natural centre backs - Alderweireld and Rodon (who are a natural left and right pairing) and give them a run of games to see if they can gel as a proper pair.

What have we got to lose?

 

Ali Gold thinks we are missing Vertonghen because he was the vocal one that guided Sanchez (who is still young) Toby does not fill that mentoring role and Dier can't. We are lacking the experienced head but to play Dier and Sanchez together is asking for trouble. It seems Jose has been blinded by Dier's willingness to work and has not taken on board his lack of experience in the role. Having said all that Toby and Rodon could well be our best shot until we import an experienced CB. We also have Tanganga who could be a CB

 

Tanganga & Rodon could be the future and will just have to learn on the job, but will probably not be given a chance under present management.

 

Midweek resurgence? He was still pretty ****e in that game despite the clean sheet!

edit: scrap that, read it wrong, I read Dier not Dele in my head

 

Hugo
Aurier, Tanganga, Rodon, Reguilon
Hojbjerg, Ndombele
Bale, Dele, Son
Kane

Dele deserves a start after his midweek display and it’ll be travesty if any of Lamela, Lucas or Bergwijn start over Bale now. That team is what I want to see most games from now on too, injuries permitting of course, with Lo Celso possibly coming in for Dele when he’s fit, unless Dele can suddenly recapture his first couple of seasons form, which personally I don’t hold much hope for.

 

can’t see Bale rocking up on weekends and Thursdays so I can see some rotation and substitutions and wheeling and dealing to navigate the games. Personally I’m not too bothered about that so long as we have our strongest XI in the Europa.