The 2009/10 season started with Defoe & Lennon on fire. The injury to Lennon was seen as a bit of a disaster and Defoe never recaptured that early season form. Bale came to the fore and Crouch chipped in a good performance against Man C. to secure 4th spot in the PL and a place in the CL. 2010/11 Saw the introduction of VDV and although the season produced some good performances with Bale shining in the CL we never really achieved the momentum we had the previous season. The strikers all pretty much failed and, the Liverpool game apart, the last half of the season was an anticlimax. So what happened? Did the introduction of VDV disrupt the team overall? Too many injuries and changes to the lineup? Had Harry reached the limit of his powers at this level? Assuming you agree with my summarys of the two seasons why were we unable to push on and achieve another top four finish? We all know we needed a top striker but we hadn't just one season before, so theoretically with Lennon back plus Bale & VDV we ought to have been stronger.
i belive Harry has his favourites....and he sticks with them through thick and thin..and with such an attitude i am not surprised that he is no tactical genius as he will do muchos possiblas to please his love children ive always said we brought harry in because he is a relegation specialist..and he did a great job of getting us to 7th that season we had the infamous 2 points from 8 games blah blah!! then last season...the quality of the squad showed...we do posess a good squad..and that showed...no doubt harry played a part... this season gone we stepped up another level..CL!......so now this good squad needs rotating....harry isnt very good at that...and he wont admit it...plus he is very 1 dimensional...hardly have i seen him change something in the style that i see Mourinhio do it and change a match on a sixpence...that is the diffrence...that is the next level for us....but i dont think Harry is the man for that...and on top of that he is a 2@ that puts fans down just because they brought his tripe about being championship contenders yet they ,us the fans had the audacity to question why our team had 1 win in 13 at the business end of the season.....
We started the season with a ton of defensive injuries (Bassong and Huddlestone at centre-back v Villa at WHL, for example) and with the late transfer of van der Vaart meaning that he didn't have a proper pre-season with us and we hadn't got an opportunity to experiment and see where he fit into the side and the system. Defoe was carrying an injury and then he got an even worse one with England, which put him out for months, damaging his confidence in the process. Redknapp was new to European football as a whole, never mind Champions League, so he struggled to adjust to the amount of games. He tended to pick the same side, week in, week out, wherever possible, didn't rotate enough and ran some players into the ground (BAE, Bale, Gallas, Gomes), while leaving other out far too much (Kranjcar, Bassong, Cudicini). Hopefully he'll have learned his lesson from this, but I don't think that we'll find out whether he has next season, as he won't see the Europa League as a priority. None of our strikers suits a lone role, so we kept experimenting, chopping and changing from one week to the next and never really settling on anyone or any system. The same was true of our right-back position, which seemed to affect Lennon, who was constantly adjusting between Corluka, Kaboul and Hutton, with even Gallas making an appearance or two there. In all, there was no proper pre-season for some of our team, no real system established and stuck with, too much messing around up top, not enough rotation in other areas and some unhappy squad players in the dressing room. Whether any of these problems will be sorted this time out remains to be seen.
Yeah, the thing about Harry is that I don't see him fixing these problems. Even if we sign a new striker like it looks like we are with Leandro, I half-expect Harry to barely even start him in place of playing Crouch with VDV off him. I think if we play fully to our strengths then Parker or Crouch would not have a look-in as starting in the first team unless they come on as late subs. Worst thing is, I see Harry considering these two as part of his best 11.
PNP.....despite all these injury problems etc...we were not that far off 4th and we messed it up with tactics and for me HR's arrogance
Good summary PNP, it appears, as I thought, that despite his experience Harry was on a steep learning curve throughout the season. His limitations were showing hence his defensive attitude at the end of the season.
Redknapp's arrogance only goes as far as his comments about the fans and the odd player, in my opinion, DM. I think that he made a number of tactical mistakes, but you could say the same about virtually every manager in the league, it just seems more pronounced to us because he's our manager. Ferguson totally messed up the Champions League final, for me, for example. I felt that he should have tried a few things that he didn't and that Kranjcar should've been given at least a couple of chances in the van der Vaart role, but then I'd never have picked Rose as a left-back, so it's swings and roundabouts.
I think that Harry tactics were questionable at times. Eg..playing VDV on the right wing with Lennon on the bench,playing huddlestone immediately after his injury break despite Sandro doing a great job in that position,totally isolating Krancjar from the team despite the fact that he was a matchwinner on at least two occasions. It did not help that our strikers were utterley useless.The failure ny levy and Co to secure a quality striker in January.Lots of mistakes which i am sure will be improved upon this season.
true say PNP.........thelikes of Krancjear was a glaring mistke....he did the business 2 games on the trot...but never got a third...i too would think forget this im off! VDV should have been dropped a few times...these are not risky decisions these for me were glaring issues....this season really will make or break this squad of ours
erm... harry's pedigree is one of trying to save teams in danger of relegation. that is where we were 2 yrs ago and why he was brought in. he has no experience nor pedigree at the other end of the table and the previous season was more remarkable for that and props to him and the players...but.... he is no mourinho etc, does not have the experience of the subtle nuances needed to change games( which he has to start getting somehwere, granted), has a mania for playing some of the more average players, weird tea choices occasionally, and we had horrendous injuries. Our defence was always dodgy last year-gomes is a liability..Primarily, we stopped scoring when it mattered. Can't get points with no goals. We never had so many draws in a season before for donkey's years. That and a few clangers like west ham and wigan at home and we should have matched city's total. Big shame, but unless we shore up the defence and get another top striker, emperor's new clothes, methinks.
I don't think that I'd have dropped van der Vaart DM, but I'd have definitely rested him on a few occasions. The Carling Cup game against Arsenal was a ridiculous line-up, in my opinion. Our unsettled striking options was something that never got sorted out. Levy getting distracted by the Olympic stadium cost us in the transfer market. Hopefully we'll get this stuff sorted out and sorted early, this time. Get rid of the players that we don't want or need and don't get bogged down in long-winded negotiations for those that we do. No more loaning out senior players like O'Hara or Keane, either.
Absolutley bang on PleaseNotPoll. Not enough rotation, except up front where there was waaaaay too much. I also think Lennon and Bale should have swtiched sides more often during a game. This makes it more difficult for sides to go two up on Bale. They (Bale in particular) can be devastating when they cut inside - which for me, they don't do enough, either of them. I thought in summary we were great this season everywhere but in the final third. Often hugely frustrated by an almost constant inability (particularly towards the tail end of the campaign) to turn sometimes huge advantages in possession into goals. Once VDV stopped scoring, we stopped scoring. Harry simply has to choose (or buy) his first choice forward, or forward pairing.
I'm no stats man but I wouldn't mind betting we made many more chances this season than last, yet ended up with a lot less goals.
The Kranjcar situation was astonishing. How he did not go in Jan is bizarre. I am glad he didn't, as I really rate the fella, but he simply has to get more games if he is to be kept on.
PNP, Defoe wasn't low on confidence when he got injured. He started well against City for us and scored a hattrick for England. I feel Spurs fans are too quick to blame 'Arry and certain other players, whilst the likes of Defoe get sheltered with excuses. In my view Defoe will never be good enough for a top side, he's capable of striking the ball well, has a good turn of pace but he totally lacks the intelligence. His movement is poor, he's always offside and he makes poor decisions, like smashing the ball at the keeper in one on ones. He first joined us 7 years ago and whilst showing promise, for the last 4 of those years he hasn't improved, the same problems are there that always have been and the same flashes of excellence too. Spurf, I think you've missed out a big change between the two seasons and that's the mentallity of the teams we've faced. When we finished fourth we counter attacked freely and with our pace we could easily sweep through and get goals. Last season we only had a handful of matches where teams would play an open game of football against us and we were caught out by it and lacked the experience to take the game to them properly. There's a few improvements that I'm expecting next season which should help us: We will be more used to breaking down oppositions who defend from the start. Our players will be more used to playing with VDV in their side, which will hopefully lead to Bale and Lennon gambling early on to take up more attacking positions early on when VDV has dropped back. Our defence will have more confidence in our keeper(Friedel/Cudicini) which will improve overall cohesion at the back and in particular help our setpiece defending. NEW STRIKER!!!!
Spurf, I think you've missed out a big change between the two seasons and that's the mentallity of the teams we've faced. When we finished fourth we counter attacked freely and with our pace we could easily sweep through and get goals. Last season we only had a handful of matches where teams would play an open game of football against us and we were caught out by it and lacked the experience to take the game to them properly. Right! that is a very important factor. Yes we were treated with a lot more respect but the the teams in the lower half have always done that and Blackpool to their credit did not and took 4 points to our 1. Basically most of our points were gathered from the top down (excluding Man U) to about 5 or 6 from the bottom. In other words teams who expected to be able to get a result against Spurs left open our chance to win.
Yeah, it's not a new problem. Wolves did the double over us playing very defensively the previous season, Stoke and Hull both beat us at WHL aswell grinding out 1-0s. It was vastly more frequent last season. Sunderland were a good barometer if you compare their performance at WHL last season compared to the previous season.
We made many chances in the first match against City but it ended 0-0 which set the norm for the rest of the season,stacks of chances but few goals. I don't know what the other players thought of our misfiring strikers but RP was not given enough games and bang on Poll,none of our strikers suit the one striker role. I thought some of Harry's line ups were a bit iffy. The players seemed to lose the will to win towards the end and the 4-0 v Madrid knocked the stuffing out of them. Things in the PL were going well until the Blackpool match and then came a collapse,too many draws and not enough wins. I have no idea why our strikers misfired like that and it's obviously disappointed players like LM who is beset by rumours at the moment. We relied heavily on Defoe two seasons ago and I'm wondering whether his lack of form affected the others,it's rare but it can happen. I don't think we'll have such a tough time in front of goal next season.
