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The Mauricio Pochettino thread

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DEFchenkOE

Well-Known Member
Feb 13, 2006
10,527
8,052
One thing I'm disappointed with Poch is that he hasn't dipped into the Argentinian market more often. I was hoping he'd be able to unearth a few attacking gems from his homeland but so far all we've seen is Foyth. I understand that he likes English players etc etc but it doesn't seem like he thinks most of the attacking youth players are ready yet. Surely he could have found someone more dynamic than Llorente and more useful than N'doudou.

On another note, the whole book thing while we haven't won anything, and being released mid season, not for me. I don't like it. If Redknapp had done that...... just saying!
 

coys200

Well-Known Member
May 22, 2017
8,436
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I’m definitely caught in a chicken and egg mindset at moment. Have Kane dele Toby etc made Poch look good or has he made them look good. I’m honestly unsure.
For me player wise 2 things really stick out. It took 2 years to realise mason wasn’t very good and still thinks sissoko can play football. It’s kind of basic stuff.
 

E17yid

Well-Known Member
Jan 21, 2013
16,984
30,494
I’m definitely caught in a chicken and egg mindset at moment. Have Kane dele Toby etc made Poch look good or has he made them look good. I’m honestly unsure.
For me player wise 2 things really stick out. It took 2 years to realise mason wasn’t very good and still thinks sissoko can play football. It’s kind of basic stuff.

Mason was 10 times better for us than Sissoko. In fact he did a very good job for us on numerous occasions. Even when he wasn’t at his best his passion for the chicken badge and dedication to the cause always shone through.
 

Wsussexspur

Well-Known Member
Oct 2, 2007
8,918
10,176
Certainly until Toby is back I feel Potch needs to change to 4 at the back and move Dier into midfield again. We really are missing not having a designated DM in centre midfield. Looking at this poor run that is one of the major changes between the form and performances prior to the Real Madrid game and the awful current form we are playing without a designated DM. Or the players asked to do that role are not capable of doing it to the level of Dier and Victor. Ideally we need Victor back but am slowly giving up hope that we will see him again this season.

Also it would be good to see Potch have the Bottle to bench Alli and Eriksen for few games neither have warranted a place in the starting line up recently. I suppose problem is can’t really bench them both due to lack of replacements barring Son. I would imagine after a year out Lamela probably isn’t going to be near starting matches until the new year at the earliest. Probably just be 20/30 minute cameo apprerances throughout December to build his fitness up.
 

Trix

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Jul 29, 2004
19,335
329,023
We need to go back to our pressing game.

I'd rather finish second or third because we have burnt out towards the end of the season, than to fail to be in the mix at all.

I know Poch has said we can't keep it up for a season and if hurts is late on but the problem wasn't the press itself, it was the lack of rotation options in certain positions.

We need to start playing a more aggressive brand of football again before it's too late.
 

Kiedis

Well-Known Member
Aug 4, 2013
2,926
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Being able to play on the counter have yielded some excellent results, but it does seem that we have a bit of a hard time to switch between the lower block and suffocating teams like we have been doing in the past.
 

Real_madyidd

The best username, unless you are a fucking idiot.
Oct 25, 2004
18,792
12,448
I’m definitely caught in a chicken and egg mindset at moment. Have Kane dele Toby etc made Poch look good or has he made them look good. I’m honestly unsure.
For me player wise 2 things really stick out. It took 2 years to realise mason wasn’t very good and still thinks sissoko can play football. It’s kind of basic stuff.


Mason I disagree with you about, but there must be something more to him picking Sissoko. We need to get rid of him ASAP (plus we need Toby and Victor back sharpish)
 

spursfan77

Well-Known Member
Aug 13, 2005
46,679
104,956
I just hope the players are still listening to him after 3 years together. It's usually about this time that managers struggle as players get fed up of the methods. Even a drop off of a few percent may be the reason for our lacklustre performances in the games against the cannon fodder in the league.
 

Spurs 1961

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
6,665
8,739
We need to go back to our pressing game.

I'd rather finish second or third because we have burnt out towards the end of the season, than to fail to be in the mix at all.

I know Poch has said we can't keep it up for a season and if hurts is late on but the problem wasn't the press itself, it was the lack of rotation options in certain positions.

We need to start playing a more aggressive brand of football again before it's too late.

Spot on! I think Poch learnt from the season before last and last season we did finish very strongly having added more flexibility into our game. This season though we seem to have abandoned what got us here rather than using this as the default which is intelligently tweaked for the opposition. In the early days under Poch we had one way only of playing, now the players have been shown others yet there is no question the pressing game is what most are scared of.
 

Phil-spur99

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Jan 27, 2011
1,585
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This is absolutely spot on and I don’t know what has happened to the pressing game we played. I appreciate it does not work so well against teams that sit back but it seems to have gone altogether.

The players have to take some responsibility for this form, they seem to coast through the first half and try and win the game in the second. The only games I can recall where we have really come out of the blocks and started fast are Liverpool and Huddersfield. The best teams win games early go 2-0, 3-0 up then coast. We seems to try to do the opposite.

I think the best we can hope for this season is a top 4 finish (which is looking increasingly hard) and hopefully the FA Cup. Problem is we still have City (twice), Liverpool away, Chelsea away, Utd at home and Arsenal at home. I don’t see us getting anything out of at least the first four if not all 6 which would give us 10 losses...

We need Victor and Toby back!

Seriously pissed with the lack of application from some “key” players lately.

We need to go back to our pressing game.

I'd rather finish second or third because we have burnt out towards the end of the season, than to fail to be in the mix at all.

I know Poch has said we can't keep it up for a season and if hurts is late on but the problem wasn't the press itself, it was the lack of rotation options in certain positions.

We need to start playing a more aggressive brand of football again before it's too late.
 

mpickard2087

Patient Zero
Jun 13, 2008
21,886
32,512
I just hope the players are still listening to him after 3 years together. It's usually about this time that managers struggle as players get fed up of the methods. Even a drop off of a few percent may be the reason for our lacklustre performances in the games against the cannon fodder in the league.

I can see where you're coming from with this post. In the summer a few times I nearly made this type of point when the group consensus was one about keeping Poch and this team together for 10 years. It's just highly unrealistic.

Managers who demand absolutely everything from their players, even if things are by and large going well for the team, have a shelf life - reckoned to be 3-4 years by a lot of people. Witness some of Guardiola's comments in the past for instance about the topic... Eventually the players stop responding and you lose that total buy in to what is required. Some of those senior integral players start to feel they have earned taking things a bit easier. The manager himself has run out of ways to motivate the squad and fresh ideas... And so change is needed. At that point, it's either the coach or the team.

I'm not saying it's at that point yet, not at all this, might just be another early season blip, but it will come eventually. And then the big challenge happens, can he rebuild a team? In any case we're in year four of Poch, he might buck the trend, it wouldn't surprise me if he did, but on the average lifespan of a football manager/team you'd have to say he's likely closer to the end than the beginning of his tenure.
 

14/04/91

Well-Known Member
Jan 13, 2006
3,526
5,693
Some pretty amazing comments on here.

Poch has enough credit in the bank for what he's done for our club over the past 3 years.
To even contemplate that he's struggling or losing the dressing room or out of ideas is frankly, nonsense.
We're in the middle of a mini slump. At least wait for us to have a bad 4 months, not 4 games before finger pointing.
 

spursfan77

Well-Known Member
Aug 13, 2005
46,679
104,956
I can see where you're coming from with this post. In the summer a few times I nearly made this type of point when the group consensus was one about keeping Poch and this team together for 10 years. It's just highly unrealistic.

Managers who demand absolutely everything from their players, even if things are by and large going well for the team, have a shelf life - reckoned to be 3-4 years by a lot of people. Witness some of Guardiola's comments in the past for instance about the topic... Eventually the players stop responding and you lose that total buy in to what is required. Some of those senior integral players start to feel they have earned taking things a bit easier. The manager himself has run out of ways to motivate the squad and fresh ideas... And so change is needed. At that point, it's either the coach or the team.

I'm not saying it's at that point yet, not at all this, might just be another early season blip, but it will come eventually. And then the big challenge happens, can he rebuild a team? In any case we're in year four of Poch, he might buck the trend, it wouldn't surprise me if he did, but on the average lifespan of a football manager/team you'd have to say he's likely closer to the end than the beginning of his tenure.

Is he even recognising it here with these comments. It's probably just him trying to provoke a reaction from his players though more than anything else:

When reflecting on the team's latest setback, Pochettino didn't mince his words, questioning the application of his players, per Stuart Jamesof the Guardian.

"We need to learn from this game, that we need to start every game with the first idea being fighting and competing," he said. "If you don't compete and fight in the Premier League, the gap, or the quality, is even and you are sure that you are going to struggle. And of course the performance today was a very clear example [of that]."
 

dricha1

Well-Known Member
Jul 26, 2005
1,311
2,579
I can see where you're coming from with this post. In the summer a few times I nearly made this type of point when the group consensus was one about keeping Poch and this team together for 10 years. It's just highly unrealistic.

Managers who demand absolutely everything from their players, even if things are by and large going well for the team, have a shelf life - reckoned to be 3-4 years by a lot of people. Witness some of Guardiola's comments in the past for instance about the topic... Eventually the players stop responding and you lose that total buy in to what is required. Some of those senior integral players start to feel they have earned taking things a bit easier. The manager himself has run out of ways to motivate the squad and fresh ideas... And so change is needed. At that point, it's either the coach or the team.

I'm not saying it's at that point yet, not at all this, might just be another early season blip, but it will come eventually. And then the big challenge happens, can he rebuild a team? In any case we're in year four of Poch, he might buck the trend, it wouldn't surprise me if he did, but on the average lifespan of a football manager/team you'd have to say he's likely closer to the end than the beginning of his tenure.

I’d love Poch to stay longer but I think it’s 2 1/2 years max he’ll be with us. He’ll definitely take us into the new stadium and maybe stay one more. I don’t want him ending up at United but feel the 2 1/2 years will coincide with Mourinho moving on.

Poch’s 3 seasons so far have each had a blip period , November last year as now, April the year before. He does learn and I trust he’ll sort the issues out coinciding with Lamela and Wanyama’s return. We can still get top 4 and I actually think we’ll finish 3rd
 

Damian99

Well-Known Member
Mar 17, 2005
7,687
4,771
I suppose we might well be about to find out just what Poch is all about, cos for the first time in a long time, some serious questions getting asked right now. Does he have the balls to totally drop one of, if not both of, Dele and Eriksen as on current form, they could probably be sitting on the bench, if only for a bit of thinking time. Very quickly we have gone from a team nobody wanted to play, to a team everybody wants to play.
 

stevel

Active Member
Aug 28, 2003
58
134
Disappointed to read that Poch is slamming the players. My overriding impression from the recent games is that teams have figured out how to defend against us - using the time afforded by our slow build to get deep and in numbers. They now know to get men around Kane and to track Alli's runs from deep.

And we are clueless about how to break defences like that down. You can't pass or shoot through them often enough to win games and Trippier aside our delivery of crosses from wide is not good enough. So we need to penetrate on the sides with pace and deception - like Son did a couple of times in the first half against WBA but then inexplicably stopped doing in the second half.

But Poch hasn't brought in players like that. He referred this week to Lamela bringing something different with his ability to go past players, but I don't think he's that sort of player. And it doesn't look like he is training the team on tactics on how to penetrate packed defences because we had no real plan against them today as usual.

So stop blaming the players Poch - look in the mirror.
 

mpickard2087

Patient Zero
Jun 13, 2008
21,886
32,512
I’d love Poch to stay longer but I think it’s 2 1/2 years max he’ll be with us. He’ll definitely take us into the new stadium and maybe stay one more. I don’t want him ending up at United but feel the 2 1/2 years will coincide with Mourinho moving on.

Poch’s 3 seasons so far have each had a blip period , November last year as now, April the year before. He does learn and I trust he’ll sort the issues out coinciding with Lamela and Wanyama’s return. We can still get top 4 and I actually think we’ll finish 3rd

Yeah, as I said this could very well just be another blip and I didn't say it was terminal... But it has the feel that this is possibly Poch's biggest test so far. For the first time that hunger, energy, and work rate is missing in our play and people are starting to ask a few questions, and can he get us out of this slumber.

Hopefully in a few weeks we already have our answer, and all is well again!
 

Sophos151

Well-Known Member
Jul 31, 2016
792
2,559
So stop blaming the players Poch - look in the mirror.

Dele and Sissoko both fired one-on-ones at the keeper, Eriksen and Llorente both missed the target from six yards - Kane too although no one seems in a rush to mention that - and Rose was blatantly fouled in the box. Meanwhile, Leicester scored two wondergoals after individual mistakes gave them space. Not sure what Poch can do about that.
 
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