I know it’s easier said than done and very obvious but turning some of these losses to draws would go such a long way to ‘fixing’ Spurs
I have all the time in the world for Ange...though being no less fickle than many fans, that may change in a heartbeat. IMO, Spurs are playing the way Spurs should play, and long may it continue. Conte and especially Mourinho still seem like living nightmares. I'd give him a 10 year unbreakable contract if given the chance and if such a thing existed. (Edit--decided to edit out bizarre attempt at joke, on second thought) But I'm honestly not optimistic. The wolves circle awfully quickly around Spurs managers. An unhappy player or two in the dressing room can poison half the squad in no time during a bad run. I think Ange had better figure out a way to stop fielding tired teams soon or he's in trouble...there's one CB in particular who could use a really long break. Maybe reserve a table for him at the restaurant at the end of the universe. The fixture congestion will go on and on this year thanks to the Europa. The only way I can think of him refreshing the squad is to cut practice time way down, and neither he nor most managers seem the kind to try doing less in times of trouble.
If you go and watch back all the league goals we’ve conceded this season, it’s apparent that we’re weak at defending our box. A lot of the time it’s crosses and second balls that lead to shots and goals. Our back post defending is also frequently suspect. This suggests that Our FBs are not performing defensively, likely due to form We lack a CB who is an organiser of a defence, and sometimes struggle with defending the ball in the air We aren’t doing a good enough job either a) funnelling the ball into the middle of the pitch, where we can defend more effectively on the ground or, b) protecting the FBs so they don’t get isolated For me there’s some coaching issues in there as well as recruitment and squad depth. I think Ange deserves a chance to sort the former out, and the latter takes time. We’re on that path but we need to make more good recruitment decisions.
The three midfielders mentioned are massively overrated - great marketing and the odd good game but generally average EPL players.
Who was that little guy with all the skills in the final third for Ipswich? Made him look like Messi lets sign him
Correct! But don't get me 're'started on that particular subject... I still seriously wonder how that decision to play Kane ahead of Moura - something that defied both logic and common decency - impacted the team's focus on the day. If there was already some disquiet in the dressing room (as Lloris alludes to) then dropping the guy who single-handedly got them to the final would have done nothing for team morale.
To be burned out as early as November is inexcusable imo. We have a deeper squad than last year and have rotated pretty heavily for the cup competitions. Liverpool and Arsenal (and probably City and Villa too, I haven't checked) players have each made on average 4-5 more appearances than ours already this season, due to the simple fact that no one can afford to rotate heavily for CL games and certainly not in the new league format which has so many more variables and permutations than the old group stages. I understand how and why a number of posters look at the problem and see 'tiredness' as the solution, but it doesn't ring true for me. I see an entrenched lack of quality and experience across almost the entire team, with a terminal lack of leadership thrown in for good measure. Not a single member of the current first team would get into Poch's 16/17 team. That's a huge concern.
For me it's slightly more than that. We're weak at defending our box because in most cases the players doing it are arriving there at a sprint from being completely out of position. It is inevitably chaotic and panicked. There isn't time to get things organised. There was a point against Gala (one of their offside goals iirc) where the 'line' looked more like the hypotenuse of a triangle. It was all over the place and we were lucky it was flagged offside. We are not doing enough to stem opposition attacks at source. We are very good at winning possession back in the opposition half, but once they've beaten our press and cross the halfway line (i.e. once we are forced to turn and try to keep goal side of them), there is zero resistance between that point and our box. Again, I turn to the midfield on this and again wonder out loud why we didn't make more of an effort to sign someone like Onana from Everton to give us more protection in the middle of the park.
My first instinct was to challenge this....but you're 100% right! Some have the ability to get there, but as a unit now I wouldn't swap any of them.
Agree with most of this, but would add that we also have no on-field leader/s and a keeper who - although a good shot stopper - is erratic in distribution and panicky, inspiring no confidence in his team. That cannot help add discipline to the unit.
It's not even a close call. Micky and Udogie possibly have the potential to reach the levels of Jan and Rose, but beyond them the gap player by player is enormous. Poch's Spurs would beat Ange's Spurs 5-0. They would just toy with us.
I said this about 2-3 months ago, I think I even said it to you, lol. One thing I will say though is that the quality of football is decreasing for arguably the first time ever, or since I’ve been alive anyway. The recent Balon d’Or reflected it, Rodri and Vinicius for as good as they are, aren’t patches on both former winners and non-winners. And so whilst I absolutely agree that Poch wipes the floor with Ange with his team (and as a manager), we also have to take into consideration how our quality of players are relative to its market. I don’t think they’re as bad as what 10th place in the table currently dictates. I think a good indicator as to whether these players are top 6 worthy or not is assessing if you believe they are within the best six of their position in the league - but you have to do it based on their ability/ quality, not their form, as their’s or other’s form could be affected by injuries/ tactics/ other reasoning. Chris Wood currently being the second best striker in the league highlights as such. I think around 70% of our first XI are top 6 players but not many are top 4 and it’s why we needed 2-3 first team quality additions this summer to make top 6 a guarantee and top 4 very possible. Poch’s team in comparison back then had most if not all the XI inside the top three of their position in the league and our finishes of 3rd, 2nd and 3rd backed it up.
Omari Hutchinson, we had him on loan from Chelsea last season and he impressed once he got into what he calls Big Boys Football ( he's very young ) so we signed him in the summer.
I saw Ange took responsibility for the poor performance in his post match interview. Didn't complain about a possibly penalty not given or having a goal ruled out, just said it was a poor performance. Hopefully this is a case of not throwing individuals under the bus publicly while laying down the law in the dressing room. I get losing...I am bizarrely optimistic about our potential to have a positive season but the manner of the second half player performance v Brighton, and the performances v Palace and Ipswich suggested the players were not up for it for the want of a better word. And that's unacceptable for me.
I agree here. We’re one of the more effective pressing teams in the league but the FBs get out of position and can’t recover to help the 6 in transition, or defend the wide areas as effectively in the next phase. I think it comes down to the FBs again and also, as a secondary concern, lack of a consistently top, top player at 6. Bentancur can be that player but he’s inconsistent. Yeah this also probably doesn’t help. I don’t think his distribution issues are as major as some say but his lack of confidence and authority commanding his box is a problem. He doesn’t project an aura. Vic is a good keeper but he’s not one of the game’s elite, if we’re being realistic.
This concerns me too. The points dropped against Leicester, Toon and Woolwich came out of solid performances where we were either the much better side or at least more than held our own. By contrast, the points we've dropped since have been from woeful performances that if anything should have been even heavier defeats.
I don't think that is true of Ipswich. We had the three best chances of the game and their attacking play was very poor except for the good finish of the first goal. The second goal was just a gift.
We don't need to be more consistent just better. Our goal difference for the last 28 matches last season was dire but we still scored a lot of goals so won enough matches to get fifth. This year we have improved goals conceded dramatically but somehow contrived to lose 5 games by a single goal. It would be bizarre if that continued. My fear is that we will revert to last years ending form though which would not be acceptable. By the way your post is a case book study of how not to use statistics. You're hardly likely to find evidence of a consistent Winning run if you leave the only one out as a matter of policy!
