I’d say it’s pretty fair to suggest another manager wouldn’t be able to do much worse at the moment. This is a squad packed full of talent - even excluding the wantaways - yet the style of football and the results it’s been delivering have been shocking. This isn’t just a bad start to the season either, this has been a problem since around January. Nearly a full year of essentially relegation form. In fact right now we’re actually closer to a relegation spot than we are a top four spot.
I don't see why Kane and Lamela being injured makes it a foregone conclusion that Eriksen will start? He is literally a passenger right now. Even the argument that Gio and Sess are lacking match fitness doesn't cut it as there were still numerous options we can go with in these circumstances, all of which are better than watching him mope about for 88 minutes: Gazza Aurier Toby Dave Davies Sissoko Winks Tanguy Son Lucas Alli Or Gazza Aurier Toby Dave Davies Sissoko Tanguy Son Alli Bloke Picked at Random from the Crowd Lucas
I thought Dele had a point in his interview....The Everton player elbowed him in the head and he instinctively reacted. VAR can’t give the decision that Dele was fouled. If he wasn’t fouled it should have been a penalty under the new ruling.
Disagree tbh. Both should have had a penalty...that was hand ball under the laws and I would have been pissed if we hadn't been given it. The red was wrong imho. But we drew cos we were incapable in the final third. No attempts on target in the first half. Both Son and Moura played out of position and were completely ineffective yet it took until half time to sort it. Eriksen was embarrassing in virtually every aspect of the game other than running. This is not a surprise yet he is continuously picked. Their keeper had very little to do snd that is why we did not win This is a huge issue...particularly as we can not keep a clean sheet. This calendar year our league scoring is: 29 matches Failed to score ...7 Scored one...10 Scored two...7 Scored three...3 Scored four...2 Total scored...41 Goals against Clean sheets 7 One 12 Two 9 Three 1 Total 31 We have only kept a clean sheet in a quarter of our matches yet have also failed to score in a quarter of them. We have only scored more than 2 goals on five occasions. We have scored 1 goal or less on 17 occasions. These are long running issues and Pochettino's not solving them...snd thst is why we are not winning imho.
I agree but the ref didn't know that...the hand ball law is fundamentally wrong imho but under I was amazed it weren't given snd would have wanted it if it had been an everton hand ball.
I suspect the problems have been brewing for a while, and that Levy promised to sort them out this Summer. The problems didn’t get sorted and Poch has loyally tried to deal with the consequences. No doubt Poch could have done better, but I’m betting he’s been strung a line and wasn’t expecting to have to deal with the crap he’s been left with.
Levy signed all four of the players Poch wanted this summer though. Levy also can’t be blamed for Poch refusing to make subs until it’s too late in the game whilst persisting with so many under-performers in his XI despite there being other options. Not saying Levy’s perfect but for me this is all on Poch. He’s creating problems for himself and failing to deal with them and we’re suffering as a result.
We’ve been getting worse defensively for some time and while it’s a recruitment issue to an extent I also feel that Poch could possibly be doing more to fix things on the training ground as well. I look at the section and I can’t see a plan. Even Everton today, a team with their own set of problems on the pitch, set up with a balanced team and a gameplan. I don’t see that from us and it affects our game going forward and defensively. This worries me a lot.
This! Why can’t some fans see that Poch is done at Spurs, the man is making the same mistakes every game and imo he doesn’t know what to do anymore to turn things around. He won’t quit because financially that would cost him a lot of money, so he’s just waiting for the sack to get his massive payoff.
It’s another disappointing result, which we’re becoming accustomed to. I’m normally in the negative camp, but at the start of the season I looked at the fixtures and knew the first 10-15 games were going to be tough, as we were due to play nearly all of the “big teams” away. It was bound to cause us mixed-poor results as we have a history of getting **** all on the road against decent teams. Couple that with poor performances, the issues with the squad, and some other no-so-good results, and we are where we are. I’m reserving judgement for now. The final 24 games of the season see us only having to go away to Chelsea, with other “tough” matches all at the lane. That’s when we can really put some sort of run together. But we have got to have a busy January. We need to get rid of the issues within the squad and actually back the manager. Our team is aging and the days of our pressing nature has all but vanished. For me, Poch has earned the right to be backed. But it’s the same old story. Keep the faith lads. - even if that does mean purposely finishing 3rd in the CL group and then going all out to win the Europa. - it’s looking like our only hope for CL qualification now! After just 11 games.
These are all optimistic outlooks based on what Roo? Our home record/performances at fortress WHL? Our Away record? Our record/performances against any team with anything to fight for? Our superb squad management will allow us to go for the Europa? Where is the basis for this pipe dream that the January TW is going to be fruitful?
It hopefully never will but if it does - the minute the Jan window closes. By all counts, we'll need it to be a record breaker in terms of incomings. We'll get fack all for outgoings at this point, so that dreaded net spend line will need to be drawn higher on the graph than ever before. This with the growing likelihood that by Dec 31st, we could be completely out of the running for top 4 and facing the very real prospect of no CL money next year. Lewis is going to have to return that Mona Lisa or sell one of his super-yachts or it really is the end for them.
Well I'll start writing the draft up then because nothing of note will be happening in January....ENIC are ENIC. We only had a decent spend this summer gone because we had 2 barren windows prior. I had hopes on Dybala but even he's loving life in Juventus again.
Dybala would be amazing but I doubt Juve would let him go mid season without a ready replacement. So unless we can fool them into working Eriksen or Alli into the deal, it is highly unlikely. Bruno Fernandes is one we should revisit being as the player seemed keen to join us in August (though I doubt he'd fancy a relegation scrap). 8 goals and 6 assists in 15 games is exactly what we need right now. Wages would also be far lower than Dybala but it would take a record bid to prise him away from Sporting. I just want to see real intent in the winter window. Moving on as many players as possible. Even if we make agreements with players then loan them back for the rest of the season to join us in June, I don't mind. Bottom line is there HAS to be a recognition that there is now far too much to fix for it all to be done in the summer - especially taking into consideration the Euro championships taking up half of it. We'll need to spend appx. £120m in Jan on 2 top players (AM and CB) and the same again in the summer on 3 good players (RB, CM, ST or CB).
I think the defence need to be looked at more than anything else in Jan. It’d be great to add Fernandes but hopefully by then Gio will be playing more than just a cameo role and we may see a bit of link up between him and Tanguy which could help us out going forward. Defensively though we really need some additions. I’d probably say that Ben Davies is the only reliable player at the back right now we know will more or less give us some defensive solidity on a regular basis. We probably won’t get two but we’ll definitely need one new CB, Ake is personally top of my wish list. A RB is also a priority, Aurier is too unreliable and KWP isn’t trusted so both may as well be sold. Then there’s also a new DM, Wanyama is finished and it seems Dier is well out of favour. Winks isn’t good enough whilst Sissoko’s box-to-box style probably doesn’t suit Tanguy’s style the best as we need someone who can give Tanguy more freedom. So Jan for me is all about adding some steel - CB, RB, DM. In the summer that’s when we can look at another CB whilst going over attacking areas.
