What's new

►►►►►► Match Ratings VS Stoke City ◄◄◄◄◄◄

MOTM?


  • Total voters
    88

ajspurs

Well-Known Member
Jul 7, 2007
22,964
31,146
As for Defoe he contributed little but was given so little of the ball I'm not sure what he could have contributed.

That happens too often with Defoe though, why does he see so little of the ball, is it just shit positioning?
 

JUSTINSIGNAL

Well-Known Member
Jul 10, 2008
15,978
48,486
That happens too often with Defoe though, why does he see so little of the ball, is it just shit positioning?

Mainly becauuse Defoe is a selfish player. He isn't really that interested in getting involved in team play and making space or chances for others. His main aim is to get the ball with a clear sight of goal and hit as hard as he can.

If that chance never comes then he is pretty much just a passenger.
 

talkshowhost86

Mod-Moose
Staff
Oct 2, 2004
48,074
46,927
That happens too often with Defoe though, why does he see so little of the ball, is it just shit positioning?

He definitely doesn't help himself. He doesn't have the ability to drop deep and pick up the ball and he doesn't run the channels particularly well.

But Saha should have been doing that in the formation we were playing at the time so I'm not sure you can blame Defoe for that. I'm not a big Defoe fan really but he was never going to do well in that 2nd half lineup.
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
It was definitely a stupid substitution as it put VdV out of position and further weakened our presence in midfield.

But I think Kranjcar deserved to go off. For me he didn't contribute anything going forwards and as soon as he lost the ball they were away from him in seconds. He's a more technical player than Lennon but don't think he is able to make the most of that due to his lack of pace and quick thinking.

As for Defoe he contributed little but was given so little of the ball I'm not sure what he could have contributed.

There was actually one occasion when Kranjcar lost the ball but chased back and won it back. Something Bale could learn from and Defoe for that matter.

I don't think Kranjcar should have gone off at half time at all. Especially not when the change made us tactically weaker. If we had a better option that gave us at the very least tactical parity maybe, but Kranjcar for Defoe didn't.

And the reason Defoe doesn't see much of the ball is largely his fault and his limitations.
 

jamesc0le

SISS:LOKO:plays/thinks/eats chicken like sissoko!
Jun 17, 2008
4,974
944
as i mentioned the other night, if you told defoe to do the sturridge role in a 4-3-3 he would see much more of the ball. he's not bad at picking passes out and he could easily be a success in that role if needed.

in a 4-4-2 though it does expose his limitations, he seems to switch off his team-mate awareness priorities, and i hate it when he tries to run in behind the defence, when the ball was so obviously going to be cut out by a defender and he just needed to drop short and collect the pass.
 

talkshowhost86

Mod-Moose
Staff
Oct 2, 2004
48,074
46,927
There was actually one occasion when Kranjcar lost the ball but chased back and won it back. Something Bale could learn from and Defoe for that matter.

I don't think Kranjcar should have gone off at half time at all. Especially not when the change made us tactically weaker. If we had a better option that gave us at the very least tactical parity maybe, but Kranjcar for Defoe didn't.

And the reason Defoe doesn't see much of the ball is largely his fault and his limitations.

We should have brought on Sandro and had Bale, Modric and VdV behind Saha.

Buy you are right Kranjcar clearly should have stayed on the pitch for that one occasion where he lost it and got it back :grin:
 

mpickard2087

Patient Zero
Jun 13, 2008
21,884
32,496
Thinking about it, Kranjcar's presence in a right of centre position did coincide with Parker and Modric making runs from midfield in the first half, which was when we had our best opportunities. Second half this didnt happen, even if Stoke tightened up the defensive wall a little, because I guess they had to be a lot more disciplined.

I would have kept it the same at halftime in all honesty, If it was me and I had made a change it would have been one of Sandro/Livermore to keep the extra man in there and allow others license to get forward. Bringing Defoe on and putting VDV right just killed much of the movement as well as affecting shape.
 

talkshowhost86

Mod-Moose
Staff
Oct 2, 2004
48,074
46,927
Thinking about it, Kranjcar's presence in a right of centre position did coincide with Parker and Modric making runs from midfield in the first half, which was when we had our best opportunities. Second half this didnt happen, even if Stoke tightened up the defensive wall a little, because I guess they had to be a lot more disciplined.

I would have kept it the same at halftime in all honesty, If it was me and I had made a change it would have been one of Sandro/Livermore to keep the extra man in there and allow others license to get forward. Bringing Defoe on and putting VDV right just killed much of the movement as well as affecting shape.

Yep our shape was much better when Kranjcar was on the pitch. I just thought his contribution to that shape was very poor. No matter how poor Kranjcar was though, going to 4-4-2 with VdV on the right wasn't the right decision.
 

phil

Well-Known Member
Oct 25, 2004
2,038
1,239
Yep our shape was much better when Kranjcar was on the pitch. I just thought his contribution to that shape was very poor. No matter how poor Kranjcar was though, going to 4-4-2 with VdV on the right wasn't the right decision.

The problem is we cannot play 4-4-2 when Lennon is out (yes I know it worked against Newcastle). Neither VdV or Kranjcar can play on the right.

It was noticeable, however, that Walker got forward a lot more in the second half after the substitution. Whether that was instructions from Harry or just the fact that he feels more confident playing behind VdV. I thought Kranjcar was awful and I would have made exactly the same change.

The decision to loan Pienaar looks stranger by the match. He could have provided that much needed width on the right. That decision may yet come back to haunt Harry.
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
We should have brought on Sandro and had Bale, Modric and VdV behind Saha.

Buy you are right Kranjcar clearly should have stayed on the pitch for that one occasion where he lost it and got it back :grin:

Thinking about it, Kranjcar's presence in a right of centre position did coincide with Parker and Modric making runs from midfield in the first half, which was when we had our best opportunities. Second half this didnt happen, even if Stoke tightened up the defensive wall a little, because I guess they had to be a lot more disciplined.

I would have kept it the same at halftime in all honesty, If it was me and I had made a change it would have been one of Sandro/Livermore to keep the extra man in there and allow others license to get forward. Bringing Defoe on and putting VDV right just killed much of the movement as well as affecting shape.

Yep our shape was much better when Kranjcar was on the pitch. I just thought his contribution to that shape was very poor. No matter how poor Kranjcar was though, going to 4-4-2 with VdV on the right wasn't the right decision.

That's the thing. Sandro on and Modric pushed up for Kranjcar would have been interesting tactically and given Stoke more problems with Parker, Modric, Bale, VDV all interchanging, interplaying and attacking from varied angles and depths.

442 with VDV right and Defoe up top made us a piss of piss to defend against. And this is a mistake Redknapp makes continually. He's even been making it in games in the last month and he still does it.

He made an identical mistake in the Chelsea home game for example. Changed a 433 that had seen us dominate, to a 442 that surrendered the game.


Let's be clear. I'm not sure there are loads of managers out there who are tactical geniuses. But Redknapp has weaknesses when it comes to coaching, discipline and organisation, so it's important that he at gets the tactics right more than he gets them wrong or at least be tactically neutral, what he's done sometimes (like last season and the last month particularly) is weaken us with poor tactical choices.

If your coached work ethic, discipline and organisation are very good you can mitigate the tactical failings (i.e. Wenger's not a tactical genius by any stretch but his coached ethos negates this) but if you are getting both wrong, you find yourself left with hoping purely for individuals to bail you out.
 

talkshowhost86

Mod-Moose
Staff
Oct 2, 2004
48,074
46,927
The problem is we cannot play 4-4-2 when Lennon is out (yes I know it worked against Newcastle). Neither VdV or Kranjcar can play on the right.

It was noticeable, however, that Walker got forward a lot more in the second half after the substitution. Whether that was instructions from Harry or just the fact that he feels more confident playing behind VdV. I thought Kranjcar was awful and I would have made exactly the same change.

The decision to loan Pienaar looks stranger by the match. He could have provided that much needed width on the right. That decision may yet come back to haunt Harry.

I think we can play '4-4-2' as long as one of the '2' is VdV, regardless of whether Lennon is fit or not. I think the setup was largely fine last night but a couple of players (most notably Kranjcar and Saha) didn't perform and then Harry panicked and made a daft substitution.

Having said that I would still prefer us to use Sandro and Parker to allow our attacking midfielders (3 from VdV, Bale, Modric and Lennon) to go and play their game.

Totally agree on Pienaar. Would much rather see him in the squad than Kranjcar, but to be honest we could do with both due to the lack of any other options on the wing. The fact that Gio was involved last night highlights how short of quality we are behind Lennon and Bale.
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
The problem is we cannot play 4-4-2 when Lennon is out (yes I know it worked against Newcastle). Neither VdV or Kranjcar can play on the right.

It was noticeable, however, that Walker got forward a lot more in the second half after the substitution. Whether that was instructions from Harry or just the fact that he feels more confident playing behind VdV. I thought Kranjcar was awful and I would have made exactly the same change.

The decision to loan Pienaar looks stranger by the match. He could have provided that much needed width on the right. That decision may yet come back to haunt Harry.

Strange then that Kranjcar has played in two of our best performances this season, both at RM, and both in 442's I think ?

Pienaar's a tidy little player but I really don't see what Pienaar would have brought to our season that we don't already have that we desperately need.
 

talkshowhost86

Mod-Moose
Staff
Oct 2, 2004
48,074
46,927
Strange then that Kranjcar has played in two of our best performances this season, both at RM, and both in 442's I think ?

Pienaar's a tidy little player but I really don't see what Pienaar would have brought to our season that we don't already have that we desperately need.

I think the point is that if Pienaar had been on the bench last night we could have brought him on for Kranjcar (who was having a bad game) without completely ripping up the system.

With only three players who can play on the 'wing' (I don't include Dos Santos) we are a bit stymied if one of them isn't playing well/is injured.
 

mpickard2087

Patient Zero
Jun 13, 2008
21,884
32,496
The problem is we cannot play 4-4-2 when Lennon is out (yes I know it worked against Newcastle). Neither VdV or Kranjcar can play on the right.

It was noticeable, however, that Walker got forward a lot more in the second half after the substitution. Whether that was instructions from Harry or just the fact that he feels more confident playing behind VdV. I thought Kranjcar was awful and I would have made exactly the same change.

The decision to loan Pienaar looks stranger by the match. He could have provided that much needed width on the right. That decision may yet come back to haunt Harry.

We can do with Kranjcar there IMO, if he is tucked in then it pretty much gives us another body in the middle but it requires Walker to provide the width and he isnt doing this compared to earlier in the season. He seems to have lost some of his attacking capability.
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
I think the point is that if Pienaar had been on the bench last night we could have brought him on for Kranjcar (who was having a bad game) without completely ripping up the system.

With only three players who can play on the 'wing' (I don't include Dos Santos) we are a bit stymied if one of them isn't playing well/is injured.

I don't think kranjcar's performance was that bad for a start - it was better than many 45 minutes I've seen from Bale and Lennon this year, and our performance was OK first half. Secondly, I'll take Kranjcar as an option over Pienaar in either wide position most days, especially ones where we are at home and having plenty of possession. Pienaar is an industrious little wasp but creatively Kranjcar is much better IMO. Thirdly GDS for Kranjcar would have been more acceptable than Defoe/Kranjcar.
 

Mr Pink

SC Supporter
Aug 25, 2010
54,753
99,289
Kranjcar had a few sloppy moments but he also had a few very good moments as well.

We missed Adebayor's hold up play, but even more importantly we missed his movement. It was just easy for Stoke to defend against, and any decent positions we managed to forge ended up wasted through a poor cross, and again lack of movement for the ball player at the time.

We lost possession far too cheaply and far too often last night...still to pissed off to do ratings yet, but Benny was our best player on the night.
 

jamesc0le

SISS:LOKO:plays/thinks/eats chicken like sissoko!
Jun 17, 2008
4,974
944
kranjcar's through ball inside the defender was amazing. alot of people wanted him off at half-time. you crazy!
 

stevenqoz

Well-Known Member
Apr 10, 2006
2,776
553
Not really reading here what the problem was first half. By playing (a poor on the night) Saha on his own up front and allowing VDV to continually drop to half way we encouraged Stoke to play a very very high line....they had it all played in front of them and bullied us continually into making mistakes of both passing and control. Rarely I have I seen us miss the mark with short easy passes, not since Palacios was in our midfield. Unfortunately playing the one paced VDV and Krankjar in the same side allowed an ugly Stoke to really get amongst us. On the night Kaboul, Walker and BAE had decent games...only in the last ten minutes did VDV (who had 3 penalty area opportunities) and Bale (going wide left) start to their stuff in the right area of the field.
 

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
Not really reading here what the problem was first half. By playing (a poor on the night) Saha on his own up front and allowing VDV to continually drop to half way we encouraged Stoke to play a very very high line....they had it all played in front of them and bullied us continually into making mistakes of both passing and control. Rarely I have I seen us miss the mark with short easy passes, not since Palacios was in our midfield. Unfortunately playing the one paced VDV and Krankjar in the same side allowed an ugly Stoke to really get amongst us. On the night Kaboul, Walker and BAE had decent games...only in the last ten minutes did VDV (who had 3 penalty area opportunities) and Bale (going wide left) start to their stuff in the right area of the field.

I guess because whatever the problems were in the first half, and no matter what we thought of Saha's performance, they were no where near as bad as the problems in the second half caused by the introduction of the invisible Defoe, removal of Kranjcar and moving of VDV into the East Stand Lower.

Personally, I much prefer it when the opposition play higher than when they park the bus, because it gives us the opportunity to pull them out and get behind them, when they have ten men parked on the 18 yard box we tend to run out of ideas (see wolves or 9 home games last year).
 
Top