Tottenham Vs Leicester: Match Thread

finally watch the game yesterday - clearly a different game that many on this thread saw. Would encourage watching it again. So much good stuff. Laughable to compare to AVB. Heading to work but will jot a few thoughts on positives later.

Chimbo! said:

If you read this thread, you might forget Spurs are unbeaten and averaging two points a game – without their top goalscorer of the last two seasons.

Click to expand...

I don't disagree with your sentiments, and this is no slight on Harry, but he wasn't exactly making the net ripple before his injury and this wasn't his fault either. We do not have enough goals in the rest of the team and especially from Lamela, Eriksen and Dele, that much is clear and i for one cannot see that improving. Our pace in the final third is woeful, and we are so easy to defend against because of that fact.

London Derby or not, i would start GKN and Son next week, with Dele in-between the pair of them. For those who think that's plain stupid here are the facts.

1-1
0-0
0-0
2-1(EFL Cup)
1-1

I rest my case.

Gaz_Gammon said:

I don't disagree with your sentiments, and this is no slight on Harry, but he wasn't exactly making the net ripple before his injury and this wasn't his fault either. We do not have enough goals in the rest of the team and especially from Lamela, Eriksen and Dele, that much is clear and i for one cannot see that improving. Our pace in the final third is woeful, and we are so easy to defend against because of that fact.

London Derby or not, i would start GKN and Son next week, with Dele in-between the pair of them. For those who think that's plain stupid here are the facts.

1-1
0-0
0-0
2-1(EFL Cup)
1-1

I rest my case.

Click to expand...

I see your point but do we really have the answer within our ranks at this time i dont think we do.
He has set us up to defend as a team better than any previous spurs manager and yet our creativity is poor and what we do have is easily smoothered by the opposition.
It looks like a serious oversight was made recruiting during the summer where by we are left with a powerhouse of a team without anyone to pull the strings.

shelfboy68 said:

I see your point but do we really have the answer within our ranks at this time i dont think we do.
He has set us up to defend as a team better than any previous spurs manager and yet our creativity is poor and what we do have is easily smoothered by the opposition.
It looks like a serious oversight was made recruiting during the summer where by we are left with a powerhouse of a team without anyone to pull the strings.

Click to expand...

We are slow and ponderous in transition. Although Liverpool's defence can be shocking they have pace and are scoring for fun. Klopp has made a huge difference in just over a season with some very good buys.

I look at the players we have such as Sissoko, Wanyama, Dembele, Lamela, Eriksen, Dier and Dele and wonder where our pace in transition of play really is supposed to come from?

Gaz_Gammon said:

We are slow and ponderous in transition. Although Liverpool's defence can be shocking they have pace and are scoring for fun. Klopp has made a huge difference in just over a season with some very good buys.

I look at the players we have such as Sissoko, Wanyama, Dembele, Lamela, Eriksen, Dier and Dele and wonder where our pace in transition of play really is supposed to come from?

Click to expand...

Agree our build up play is far to slow with so many sideways and backwards passing we are easy to set up against.
As you say klopp has done this quite quickly compared to poch who is now onto his third full season in charge.
I still rate and want him to stay at this club but Im slightly dissapointed that we are still suffering the same problems as last season which have not been addressed.

Gaz_Gammon said:

We are slow and ponderous in transition. Although Liverpool's defence can be shocking they have pace and are scoring for fun. Klopp has made a huge difference in just over a season with some very good buys.

I look at the players we have such as Sissoko, Wanyama, Dembele, Lamela, Eriksen, Dier and Dele and wonder where our pace in transition of play really is supposed to come from?

Click to expand...

IMO, it is not just about pace.. Liverfool is really technically drilled in their passes.. Opponents have no time to chase the balls, giving the illusion Liverfool players are pacy.. They are quick, but not that quick.. The scums are quick, Walcott, sanchez, Bellerin etc.. These are really pacy players.. If they have the technicalities in their play as Liverfool, mark my words they can be invincible..

Now comes the frustrating part; we have probably the most balance of players between the scums and Liverfools... But we play neither here nor there.. Just imagine if we are playing the strength of the scums with the strength of Liverfools...

Having some pace is important, but the biggest thing lacking in our play is urgency. Off the ball we can show that high intensity, but we need more aggression and purpose on the ball....

Lifting the tempo, more one and two touch passing, zipping the ball about which manoeuvres the opposition about and creates space.

We're simply not doing that enough and it's clear as day that's what we should be working on.

Doesn't matter who's selected, its the way we pass and move is what needs to be addressed.

guiltyparty said:

Yep. All dangerous teams have super-quick forward/attacking mids in the mix to stretch teams out

Arsenal have Sanchez, Walcott
Man City have Sterling, Sane, Navas
Liverpool have Mane, Coutinho (not even including Origi, who's super-quick too)
Chelsea have Hazard, Willian
Leicester have Vardy, Musa

Spurs have no attacker with any real pace, we rely almost exclusively on our full backs overlapping. Vertonghen, when he gets forward, seems to have more pace than a lot of our attackers.

Also intriguingly, of the top 20 fastest footballers last season according to this study thing, Leicester have 5 in there (Vardy, Schlupp, Albrighton, Da Laet, Morgan). Spurs have two: Walker and Sissoko (then for Newcastle). So that's what Sissoko needs to bring to the party as it certainly won't be many goals (31 in 305 games).

But it's not all roaring pace, there's also quickness of thought. City, Arsenal, Liverpool even Chelsea have quick brains, fast moves. This is what we need to get back to and what the likes of Eriksen and Lamela really can bring to the table.

Leicester don't play like that, they sit back, soak it up, lump it forward and run on to it fast as they can.

Click to expand...

I would give my left bollock for Origi. It's a shame to see a player with that kind of raw ability sitting on the bench.

Vincent30 said:

Come on how can you blame our transfer window, we signed Wanyama for 11m, most other clubs will be looking at that thinking fuck, what a signing. We signed Janssen for 17m, whilst some don't rate him already. I really like him as a number 2 to Kane and he was the half the price of Michy who has done zero. That's two very good and needed signings.

Sissoko is an easy one to just lament and say it was a crap signing, he's rubbish etc (it seems the cool thing to do currently just laugh at him based on nothing - which is weird when i actually think the guy needs our support as a new signing). But against Man City, one of our best games this year he was excellent, he hasn't started a run of games and has struggled with fitness. But people are being a little crazy and start questioning our transfer dealings when you look at what we do in the transfer window and our budget it's actually quite remarkable.

Click to expand...

In my opinion, someone ought to be pilloried for deciding to buy a striker who is so painfully slow.

Mr Pink said:

Having some pace is important, but the biggest thing lacking in our play is urgency. Off the ball we can show that high intensity, but we need more aggression and purpose on the ball....

Lifting the tempo, more one and two touch passing, zipping the ball about which manoeuvres the opposition about and creates space.

We're simply not doing that enough and it's clear as day that's what we should be working on.

Doesn't matter who's selected, its the way we pass and move is what needs to be addressed.

Click to expand...

A great observation but the current way of playing is surely being asked of by the manager is it not, seeing as we were playing pretty much the same last year.
A lot of critisism is being labelled at janssen mainly because he is not scoring, but we were struggling with kane in the team earlier on before his injury.

jonathanhotspur said:

I would give my left bollock for Origi. It's a shame to see a player with that kind of raw ability sitting on the bench.


In my opinion, someone ought to be pilloried for deciding to buy a striker who is so painfully slow.

Click to expand...

So you're saying if Janssen was rapid we would have won more games and he would have scored more goal beacause of imaginary service?

glacierSpurs said:

IMO, it is not just about pace.. Liverfool is really technically drilled in their passes.. Opponents have no time to chase the balls, giving the illusion Liverfool players are pacy.. They are quick, but not that quick.. The scums are quick, Walcott, sanchez, Bellerin etc.. These are really pacy players.. If they have the technicalities in their play as Liverfool, mark my words they can be invincible..

Now comes the frustrating part; we have probably the most balance of players between the scums and Liverfools... But we play neither here nor there.. Just imagine if we are playing the strength of the scums with the strength of Liverfools...

Click to expand...

Straight line pace, as most are reading into the phrase"pace" is not what I think most and yourself are talking about.

2 passes can cover 20-30 yards in a matter of seconds. Ping 3 or 4 together and you have the opposition moving and recovering. The key is these passes need to be risky and cut through the line of defense. Currently we do far too much side to side until we creep towards the box and then we look to cross/dink it in.

Pool, the Scum and others that are banging goals in are playing with pace because they are utilizing the forward pass to break the chains.

We are not, thus we lack pace.

Gaz_Gammon said:

We are slow and ponderous in transition. Although Liverpool's defence can be shocking they have pace and are scoring for fun. Klopp has made a huge difference in just over a season with some very good buys.

I look at the players we have such as Sissoko, Wanyama, Dembele, Lamela, Eriksen, Dier and Dele and wonder where our pace in transition of play really is supposed to come from?

Click to expand...

From pretty much all of those players in my opinion. Pace in transition is a mindset not a physical attribute.

I dont doubt for a second we have players capable of shifting the ball from defence to attack quickly, but thats impossible when everytime we look to check back and look for a safe sideways/backwards pass.

Lesser players than we have at our disposal manage this.

1 goal scored in open play from last 5 games?

DCSPUR said:

finally watch the game yesterday - clearly a different game that many on this thread saw. Would encourage watching it again. So much good stuff. Laughable to compare to AVB. Heading to work but will jot a few thoughts on positives later.

Click to expand...

I watched this game today and honestly I think we played pretty well, we were a bit unlucky with hitting the bar twice and some of our play was encouraging. Reading the match thread I was expecting it to be worse with what had been described and the general feeling in here.

It's no coincidence that the Toby diagonal ball is one of our most effective tools. Actually starts an attack quickly rather than 4 minutes of side to side passing

Shadydan said:

I watched this game today and honestly I think we played pretty well, we were a bit unlucky with hitting the bar twice and some of our play was encouraging. Reading the match thread I was expecting it to be worse with what had been described and the general feeling in here.

Click to expand...

Some of our play was 'encouraging' and a couple of attempts almost went in the goal mouth thingy, but not quite.

CowInAComa said:

Some of our play was 'encouraging' and a couple of attempts almost went in the goal mouth thingy, but not quite.

Click to expand...

Think you need to chill out a bit mate, no need to bet uppity over an opposing view.

DCSPUR said:

finally watch the game yesterday - clearly a different game that many on this thread saw. Would encourage watching it again. So much good stuff. Laughable to compare to AVB. Heading to work but will jot a few thoughts on positives later.

Click to expand...

Indeed, we played pretty well. It's become fashionable to have a giant online tantrum if we don't win and blame Pochettino and decide everything is wrong, to somehow appear knowledgeable. Whereas the truth is less than the width of the crossbar away.

stevenurse said:

It's no coincidence that the Toby diagonal ball is one of our most effective tools. Actually starts an attack quickly rather than 4 minutes of side to side passing

Click to expand...

comments like this affirm my conviction that some people on here are watching different games (perhaps a parallel universe)?
There were two balls yesterday hit brilliantly by Verts and Dier to the full back on the opposite flank - the fb took the ball in stride attacked and made a penetrating pass. The Verts to Walk to Dele (against the bar) was fantastic. Dier also hit one in particular that was Koeman like in its quality.

Had promised to tick through a few positives so here goes:
1. Rose - was incredible - interceptions, tackles, breaking up play, charging forward, getting in good balls and a couple of decent shots. Poch has transformed this guy - best LB in the league
2. Walker - the best moment of the game was the one referred to above. He was strong, powerful, quick and got some really good balls in. Best right back in the league
3. Verts - defensive masterclass + incredible passing from the back + so unlucky not to score with a header and a 30 yard shot in the last few mins. Best left center back in the league
4. Dier - a lot to like from mr utility - only nit picking thing is that he needs to get better at closing off the cross from the byline (see Vardy x 2). Still not at his best but heading in the right direction
5. Dembele - sometimes it was men against boys. Getting back to his best after a stop start season. When he is up to full match sharpness we know he is as good as anyone in Europe in his position (as the data from last season proved).
6. Victor W - while the header was poor, a real lax moment - he showed good desire to try to make it right. Not his best performance for us but lots of good moments
7. Dele - hunting the ball, trying to make things happen, got his shots in and should have had a penalty. Unlucky not to finish what would have been a team goal of the season contender.


The challenges for me from the performance are as follows:
1. Son - not had the sharpness he had before the international break and the trip out East
2. CE - working hard and trying but not as sharp as he can be. Dead ball stuff not quite where it was last season
3. Lamela - we missed him - lack of balance with Son and CE in the same side
4. Victor J - worked very hard, should have had a second penalty and two moments in the second half when he could have scored very good goals with a bit of luck (the free kick and the swivel and shoot) - at other points in his career both have and will go in

There is not much wrong with where we are now - Toby and Kane would strengthen the side + we need Dembele, Dier to get match fitness/ sharpness. If that happens + Victor W continues his form and, crucially, CE gets back to form we will have a fantastic season. My sense is that we have an incredible starting xl from last year + Victor W and a revitalized Son. If Victor J gets close to the level the Dutch think he will and Winks continues his upwards trajectory, that gives us 16 (including Vorm) really good players. Then, if one of the other new signings or youth players can break into that group we are in wonderful shape.

thebenjamin said:

Indeed, we played pretty well. It's become fashionable to have a giant online tantrum if we don't win and blame Pochettino and decide everything is wrong, to somehow appear knowledgeable. Whereas the truth is less than the width of the crossbar away.

Click to expand...

We were the better team and did a lot of decent stuff but it was clear that we were far too laboured and over thinking our attacking play with extra touches and passes, not enough direction to our attack and for the most part we ended up trying to shoot from range with 11 opponents in front of us

By contrast they (as always) did very little with the ball but in the blink of an eye got in to position to create a dangerous situation

Obviously it's small margins - had one of our efforts that hit the bar gone in or Wanyama not had his moment of insanity and we won the game most would be celebrating a great victory in a game we controlled from start to finish

It doesn't change the concerns about our speed of attack, movement to stretch defences and creation of good (rather than speculative) chances

It's not doom and gloom by any means and I am sure a lot of the current issues will be solved by injured players returning and new players bedding in but there are still some fundamental issues we need to change to be a more dangerous attacking force