What's new

One Step Beyond

Krafty

Well-Known Member
May 26, 2004
4,768
2,099
Madness, utter madness. That is what I go through every time the ball goes up to our striker, or out to a winger, and every other player stands where they are and waits to see what they do.

Our players, and I am looking especially at the midfield here, are so reluctant to get out of their comfort zone it makes me sick. Taking yesterdays game as a prime example, there were so many players who did not really want to win the game. So few were willing to go that extra yard. Pavlyuchenko not challenging the keeper on a spinning high ball. Zokora sitting with the centre backs marking Zamora, while Johnson was halfway in his own half, picking up easy second balls and relieving the pressure on his defence. Jenas, playing square ball after square ball, never looking to run into the box. Its not exclusive to our team, but not every team has 30 cap England internationals, £10 million+ players, highly paid players who are content to make sure all they do is not mess up, which is ironic given the number of times they do make a mistake.

A player would misplace a very simple pass, the crowd would moan and the player would break a sweat to redeem himself. That’s great, and what we want to see, but it should not take a mistake for them to work hard and play well.

One of my absolute pet hates is the situation at a goal kick. It’s going to be a long ball up to the striker. If he does win the ball there is absolutely no one running beyond him. If he gets a piece of the ball and it drops around him, often the wingers are not interested, the two central midfielders are sitting far too deep, and its left to Modric to out fight his marker, a spare centre back and probably another midfielder. It’s ridiculous.

Is it a surprise our best chance of the game yesterday came from our left full back bursting through their defence and putting in a cross for the right winger who had run into the box, or that our goals against Spartak came from Modric being 6 yards out or a central midfielder getting on the end of a touchline cross from a rampaging left back?

There are times when you need to be solid, rigid almost, when you need to get into position and stay there. And we are pretty good at that. Wonder why we have done quite well against the better teams who look to take the game to us? Again, it’s not exclusive to us; even the teams at the top are finding it easier when they are playing away from home, when the impetus is not on them. But they are generally better at breaking teams down and getting men in the box.

We might be alright tomorrow. WBA might look for the win. But now we have had the Harry bump, teams will take a point off us happily, and look to sneak a win. It’s what Everton have done for the last three years, and we have failed to break them down.

I can see why Harry wants another striker, the options are not great and at least with two upfront we should have more men in the final third of the pitch, but I feel all we will end up doing is having two frustrated players upfront instead of one. Some of our players need acclimatise, some need time to get to know their teammates, and some of them need replacing. Some of them just don’t have the positional intelligence, the game vision or simply the will to make a move that will result in a goal. Ultimately, that is not good enough, and we will need to take a step up to the next level of players.
 

spud

Well-Known Member
Sep 2, 2003
5,850
8,794
I couldn't agree more, Krafty, and made exactly this point yesterday in relation to Modric. Time and again he would be given the ball in tight areas (a good thing as he has the ability to make something happen when he is tightly marked) only for the rest of the team to stand back and watch. Net result: he was ultimately crowded out and we lost possession.

Perhaps the worst example against Fulham was when the ball was cleared to Campbell, who then carried it the length of the pitch to the left wing. When he checked his progress to play in a teammate there was none. My TV view showed about five Fulham players and not a single white shirt. Appalling.

We have to support the ball carrier. We have to try to win games and not settle for a point because that's all the opposition are playing for. The players are good enough. They have to start to show it.
 

speccy_spur

Active Member
Aug 2, 2005
1,192
0
Well, there will be more england games in the new year - so you will see JJ suddenly starting to make an effort again. He does remind me of Anderton in that respect. And hopefully Harry will bring in a few to challenge for places and to kick our rich stars out of their comfort zones.
 

DC_Boy

New Member
May 20, 2005
17,608
5
well if we examine why so many play it safe

the first culprit for me is the large section(s) of our crowd who are so quick to groan and moan at the slightest mistake especially from the elected scapegoats

i'm amazed jj and bent for example aren't shuddering wrecks the unfair abuse theyve received over the years
 

JoeT

Well-Known Member
Jun 7, 2005
3,813
935
Good post 'Krafty', I saw the same thing.....especially after Huddleston went off. I'm not usually a Jenas-basher, but from the moment he came on the midfield seemed to go into a sort of shell...and it started when he got possesion. All he did was slow things down, look around, then play the ball eother square or back. And to think we had O'Hara sitting on the bench!
And 'Spud', I also noticed the incident when Cambell went deep in Fulham's end and looked around to see not one Spurs player within 50 yards of him....even the T.V. play-by-play guy mentioned it!
It's serious 'kick-up-the-ass-time' Redknapp.
 

stemark44

Well-Known Member
Mar 17, 2005
6,598
1,829
Give Modric 2/3 seasons playing for our fans and he will end up a safety first player like JJ.
 

garyhopkins

Well-Known Member
Jun 22, 2008
1,528
903
Juande had the team passing and moving at the start of the season; at times we played one touch football that was very good. Unfortunately we didn't have much luck, errors crept in, goals were conceded, the fans gave up and the rest is history. Patience is vital but results are today's mantra. We have to have patience. This season is now about staying up and collecting 'arry's bonus. Hopefully we'll get an exciting signing and reach a Cup Final or two and everyone will forget how lacking in creativity, flair and attacking options (Modric and Lennon excepted) we have been of late.
 

k9spur

New Member
Mar 23, 2005
31
0
Give Modric 2/3 seasons playing for our fans and he will end up a safety first player like JJ.

At this rate he will be off to a club that can play football. If I was him I would be p*****d off with the lack of effort and ability that surrounds him. Jenas is such a light weight in most games. We need a midfield general. We have just lost to WBA and i fear for our team this year if we cant roll up our sleeves and grind out some results.#Bentley is way off form and its time to give others a chance. Harry needs to sort this mess out and pretty damn quick.
The transfer window will be interesting if not a little worrying.


No more Bentley or Bents please. No to Downing, over priced and over rated:shrug::shrug::shrug:
 

pistol14

Ginola is my inspiration
May 21, 2007
64
0
dont blame the crowd....the players have to want it! and they just dont seem to at all:cry:
 

spurs_viola

Rui Costa,dreamspurs no10
Mar 10, 2005
2,454
0
Juande had the team passing and moving at the start of the season; at times we played one touch football that was very good. Unfortunately we didn't have much luck, errors crept in, goals were conceded, the fans gave up and the rest is history. Patience is vital but results are today's mantra. We have to have patience. This season is now about staying up and collecting 'arry's bonus. Hopefully we'll get an exciting signing and reach a Cup Final or two and everyone will forget how lacking in creativity, flair and attacking options (Modric and Lennon excepted) we have been of late.

Absolutely agree with your point about the style of play that was beginning to show in pre-season and at the beginning of the season (although not consistently then, due to early setbacks).
Especially when Gio Dos Santos was playing and contributing a lot to clever passing moves with Lennon, Modric and even Bentley at that stage. The key was the players were always moving and staying close enough to each other to enable short decisive passes into space in the attacking areas of the pitch.

However, the team and coaches suffered a huge kick in the teeth when no high profile, high quality replacements for Keane and Berbatov were signed before the season, and after a disappointing start to the season, certain players decided that it was not worth persevering with the unpleasant diet, hard fitness regime and new, unfamiliar coaching ideas/tactics and concluded it would be much easier to blame the non-English coaches for their failures on the pitch.
So the coaching regime was replaced to appease the underperforming players and the exciting, potentially successful style of fast, passing, attacking play a la Sevilla was replaced by more direct and briefly successful non-descript "style" without clear definition of where the threat is supposed to come from.

Current Arsenal team, like Spurs of post-Davids/Mendes period, also suffer from soft centre - but they have players like Fabregas, Van Persie, Nasri and Adebayor to provide something out of ordinary to produce results.
Spurs have Modric and ,although not quite consistently, Huddlestone, Gio and Lennon who can provide something special. Crucially, none of them are strikers. If we added Arshavin and someone like Diego Milito before the season as Ramos wanted, we could probably get away with the softish backbone even if we didn't sign a DM like Albelda or Veloso (another wish of Ramos that wasn't fulfilled).
 
Top