Tottenham Hotspur v Internazionale Match Thread

Sorry Relayer, every keeper makes saves during a game, the important thing is how the mistakes influence a game. Bad defending in front of him? yes, but how much of it was down to the uncertainty he brings to our defenders, of course Lloris will make errors too, but they're far fewer than Brads. Gallas (not that I want him used other than emergency) and Vertonghen were in front of Lloris in the early rounds without the catastrophe we saw last night. Time has caught up with Brad very quickly in the last 12months imo.

 

We got Basel - great!!

 

In the earlier rounds our midfield was shielding the back four (WARNING: Tactics may be discussed)
Lazio (H) Sandro & Dembele in a 4231
Panathanaikos (A) Dembele & Huddlestone in a 4231
Maribor (A) Sandro & Huddlestone in a 4231
Maribor (H) Huddlestone & Carroll in a 442
Lazio (A) Sandro & Carroll in a 4231
Panathanaikos (H) Sandro & Carroll in a 442

Going to the San Siro with a formation we had previously used in home games against Maribor and Panathanaikos, with a player who has been used to protect the back line for the rest of the season on the right wing whilst Livermore started in the middle, was asking for trouble.

 

Thats all very well hbic, and while iagree with most of it, I'm talking about the 'last' line of defence ultimately, shall we include Ade and JD for not closing/defending from the front?

 

By having a central midfield that was wide open and offering little protection is what made the back line so weak.

Friedel isn't as good as Lloris, no question about that, but we made his job that much harder. The same happened when we had the Zokora/Jenas pairing in central midfield a few years back, fans were clamoring for Dawson and Robbo to be shipped out because they were being exposed due to the midfield being utterly useless.

 

Which begs the question, if Avb is such a tactical genius, why did he allow us to have such an open midfield?

 

Along with what Boss has said, the back4 did a pretty good job of undoing themselves, no organisation in itself, we hardly saw a flat line. Yes that makes any keeper busier I agree, all the more reason to have one thats the most capable, to cover all eventualities, still no guarantee, but you have to give yourself the best chance.

 

There were so many things wrong with the tactics, formation and system last night that it's hard to know where to start, honestly.
I really don't want to criticise the players too much individually because of that.

I'll start with the basic, obvious ones.
Friedel likes to hug his line, so having our defence push up and trying to play the offside trap is risky, at best. When you add in the constant changes and Gallas' lack of pace, then it's plain dangerous.
Having two out-and-out strikers that have absolutely no chemistry was a mistake, but pairing it with two holding midfielders that also haven't gelled was a very poor choice.
That allowed a big gap to develop between our deep-lying central midfielders and our forwards, which allowed Inter plenty of time on the ball to pick passes in past our defence, between them and our keeper.
Both wingers were wrong-footed (L on R, R on L) and lacked pace, so we lacked impact on the break or expansive width to stretch them. Having Naughton at left-back just exaggerated this problem.

Villas-Boas had a very poor night and we're lucky to still be in it. Hopefully he'll learn a few lessons from this and we'll push on.
There are aspects to our squad that need to be addressed in the summer, but he still needs to get the best out of what we've got now, which he generally has done.
It'll be interesting to see what sort of side he picks for Sunday, though.

One final dig at Walker and that should be it from me on this tie.
How many times did he get done by Cassano cutting back inside onto his right and playing a diagonal ball into the box? I lost count towards the end.

 

again on Walker - how many times did each of you shout "WHERE IS OUR RIGHT BACK!?!?!?" at the telly. Followed by "there he is" followed by "oh, no, thats Lennon"
???

 

It would seem that young Kyle is not the sharpest tool in the box!..

 

Lennon's defensive game is so underrated. Works his arse off and actually acknowledges that it's part of his job, unlike a lot of talented, pacy wingers.

 

One of the big problems with our now clapped out Bentley!...

 

To be fair, in my house that was a shout that was matched by "WHERE IS OUR LEFT BACK!?!?!?"

 

On the bench.

 

Indeed. IMO he isn't the most natural "tackler" but he works his little cotton socks off, has the pace to catch up, and quite often can spot a dangerous situation. Half the time just getting back and getting in the way is enough for the defence to recover.
For me, Lennon is our 3rd most important player, part of which is for his defensive work.
(1 - bale, 2 - dembele)

 

I don't think many have said that. What we have in AVB is a young manager who's still learning but likes his team to play with control of the ball and flowing attack that most top clubs around Europe show. Like most managers he has his positives and negatives but ultimately it's the results over the season that we'll judge him by. There are of course going to be times when he gets it wrong, or at least we as fans feel he got it wrong, but what manager doesn't have games like that? Even the best managers can be criticised but it doesn't mean you should start talking about him as "naive" and make sarcy references to him being a tactical genius.

We all agree that AVB got it wrong yesterday and no doubt will make more mistakes in his career but instead of judging him only after mistakes and claiming you saw it coming how about putting the premature judgement to the side and just waiting to see how we do? He's earnt that by now.

 

indeed Yid. Take the Utd-Real match. IMO Fergie was massively at fault for spending 10 mins encouraging the crowd while Mourinho plotted Utd's exit from the CL. That is the most successful manager in our league's history.

 

The thing that I don't get is that both Redknapp and Villas-Boas have made exactly the same mistake, despite the massive differences in their approach to the game.
They both moved a player out of position to play two holding midfield players and failed to notice that it didn't work.
I can only assume that there's something on the training pitch that suggests that it's a good idea, though I fail to see it myself.

 

Lol - good point!!

 

Bale isn't playing right wing though, yet. If we line up like that on sunday them i'm gonna start ****ting it