Match Ratings Ratings vs City

[@Bobby__Lucky]

KWP had a fairly good game despite his few mistakes and despite what you may think.

Man City's front line have made mugs out of seasoned right backs in both the premier League and in Europe, much less KWP who is still learning his trade. I for one am encouraged by his performance considering the opposition

I agree. I think he did very well against the toughest player he will face with 1on1 battles the whole season.

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

Love VAR!!

On a serious note, it was an embarrassment, the game that is. We were lucky to get a point.

Players were all bad but will give it to Lamela for his goal and assist.

Agree, as good as city are we set up wrong and failed to threaten them at all, horrible watch.

Poch 2/10 for setting us up awfully again!

Team: 4/10 all round.

Thought KWP did well actually and Sanchez not too bad but tactically we were so so poor, I fully blame poch on this one I’m afraid not the players.

Erisken LM in a 4-5-1/4-4-1-1 , not starting Lucas when we already have no son? Really strange as we just offered no threat at all which plays so much into their hands.

 

[eddiev14]

Best performance from Sanchez in a Spurs shirt

 

[richard_gleeson]

Lucas has to start. Not as a wide player or a striker but as someone advanced of the midfield but can run and run

 

[dtxspurs]

I’m having a feeling that DM is going to be priority number 1 next summer. Neither Winks nor Sissoko are good enough defensively. Need a player like prime Wanyama or Dier to get back healthy and in form.

 

[DenverSpur]

It was mostly a carbon copy of this fixture in the last couple of seasons.

City's whole MO are those triangles on either side between their fullback, the outer central midfielder, and the winger. They manipulate both the ball and the opposition, and work in harmony in order to release one of them as the spare man and look for the pass/cross/shot and expose a destabilised defence. It's advanced tactical stuff pretty much perfectly drilled into them, 'them' being already extremely talented footballers, and every week we see teams almost powerless to stop it.

But......

Every time we rock up against them it seems like we've paid no special attention to how they play, and then get cut apart. No attempt to block the half spaces, make these interchanges difficult, we seem to get quite awkwardly trapped in retreat behind the ball but with no real organisation, particularly in those aforementioned half spaces and towards the flanks, and the end result is our fullbacks hung out to dry whilst the likes of De Bruyne just run riot.

And again today this is exactly what happened, for 70 minutes at least (the end of the game we half dug in, their performance level dipped and seemed to tire). People rave about City but I don't think they were having to work for it that hard. I gave up counting on the 20th occasion that KWP was left either 2, or even 3, versus 1 in the first half and it wasn't much better on Rose's side either and he got hung out to dry maybe for the first goal and definitely for the second. None of the midfield did a good job in their positioning or desire/willingness to get back and help out, and there was little in the way of organisation.

Both goals aren't great from our point of view, but were inevitable because of how exposed we were. Yes it's brutally efficient work from City, but the first is just a calamity all round - De Bruyne picks it up unattended beyond our midfield, feeds it wide, all of our players belatedly get back but all get sucked towards the ball, popped back to him for a cross, and the whole right hand side of our defence is asleep as two of them steal in at the back post. The second is just a perfect example of the tactical issues, Rose is left overloaded, but then the pass goes in behind him and midfielders still cant be bothered to track runners and you could question some of the centre back work after that.

Also with the ball we aren't finding any solutions to a good high press and how to get out. What we always see are the back four + cm2 really deep trying to get out of our third, and the other four attacking players all stood up front waiting for the ball to be worked up to them, the problem is though when there is no way out, the ball gets lumped forward, we don't win it and the second ball falls into a huge gap for the opposition to then attack us again. Compare this to how City work, they move the ball, often at one touch, and the shape everchanging and players dovetailing to what others are doing. If say the fullback has gone to the inside for a pass, the central midfielder might come to the outside angle that's been opened. They do this across the pitch. It's one area where we, and Poch's coaching and ideas, looks some way off and needs to take a quantum leap......

There really wasn't anything positive to talk about, there was a lot of utter bollocks and failing out there. And yet, despite this, we somehow managed to keep it down to two goals, and out of almost nothing steal an equaliser out of nowhere twice. For the second week in a row a goalkeeper gets his angles wrong (and then is a little unsighted) and a fairly harmless shot finds its way in, and then a midget Sub just on the pitch finds himself unmarked and leaps to head home with the aplomb of someone twice his size.

And after that we just about clung on. It did take some more help from VAR, after yet more evidence of our set piece vulnerabilities, to come to our rescue in stoppage time, but we eventually fell over the line and demonstrated yet again that this Spurs team will scrap and find a result from somewhere even when it looks impossible.

A great point in the end in the circumstances, and a very decent one always away to the best team in the league. Lets try and learn from it though please, if we want to make even greater improvements as a club one aspect would be to find the solutions against a team like City. Too many repeat failings that we wont, usually don't (despite the last couple of games...) get away with and yet aren't learning or trying to adapt.



Lloris - A few good stops in amongst it all, but did help put us under pressure numerous times and in scenarios like this I don't see any marshalling of the backline/team and getting some organisation.

KWP - Wasn't perfect, made a couple of silly errors on the ball and switched off for the opening goal, however got hung out to dry by the tactics and some of his team mates and had a thankless task when often totally overloaded and under constant bombardment. Just about got through it though and kept going, and hopefully a game like that is worth the equivalent of like 20 games against the also-rans sat behind the ball doing nothing.

Alderweireld - A bit slow on the ball at times and often needs to move it one touch. Defensively was ok, but flatfooted for the Aguero goal. In fact he was as asleep as KWP was for the first too, thinking about it, so question both goals. And, like Lloris, I'm not seeing much evidence of marshalling or organising those around him which is what you're wanting from senior players.

Sanchez - Shaky first half, got better in the second.

Rose - As with KWP, not perfect and some errors, but mainly let down by the system and his team mates (especially for the second goal).

Winks - Defensively really bad. With the ball not much beyond basic.

Ndombele - A few flashes here and there, but I think he needs to offer himself more at times. Often just trotting around not really making an angle to be an option, this is probably one of the ways fitness issues manifests itself... Defensively, like Winks, was also not a good screen in front of the back four.

Sissoko - Got a bit better when he went into centre mid, as he held his position. On the right, and so for the vast majority of the game, he was absolutely terrible. Work rate was really poor and didn't offer any help to KWP. Seemed unable to get about the pitch, a real cynic would suggest too many birthday beers last night......

Eriksen - With the ball one of his quietest games I can recall, what with us under the cosh most of the time. Without it at times tried to muck in and get back behind the ball, but often wasn't that diligent and I think he was one of those at fault for the opening goal.

Lamela - Worked hard as per and was one of our better players at getting back in behind the ball, but not always to good effect. With it a little wasteful in the few key moments we had. The goal was a bit fortunate too, but very welcome to get us back into it.

Kane - Piss poor effort. Too many of these games where we're under the cosh and he's just going through the motions. Yeah a game like that is hard, but to me they're the ones that are the measure of you. Ambling about with token pressing and offering no hold up play isn't good enough.

Subs:
Moura - Great header, mugged Zinchenko after that and caused panic, but that was about it and it was like someone flicked the off switch. One burst he wasted playing left to Lamela too early when he should have kept going, and then seemed reluctant to run at all and his defensive work wasn't great. There were three opportunities for him to relieve pressure and counter attack in the dying minutes where he did the totally wrong thing.

Lo Celso - n/a.

Skipp - n/a.

Post of the season so far especially the part in bold. Thought Eriksen was at fault for the second goal as he should have tracked KDB. For the first Sissoko is just standing on the edge of the box watching KWP trying to tuck in to help the CB and mark 2 players outside of him. Disgraceful lack of desire to help the defense. The whole midfield did a terrible job of tracking runners in behind.

 

[Shanks]

Post of the season so far especially the part in bold. Thought Eriksen was at fault for the second goal as he should have tracked KDB. For the first Sissoko is just standing on the edge of the box watching KWP trying to tuck in to help the CB and mark 2 players outside of him. Disgraceful lack of desire to help the defense. The whole midfield did a terrible job of tracking runners in behind.

Not really sure it’s post of the season.

Man City didn’t win and we didn’t lose - considering just how strong city actually are - i’d Say job well done.

2ng game into season, unsettled squad, city away (hardest game of the season), a well fought out draw.

Yes we didn’t create much, set up differently from previous encounters. Yet we still didn’t lose, doing better than last year.

Interesting stat - in the last 16 home games, city have conceded 8 goals. 5 of them from Spurs.

Suggests that this point was a good point, happy with it considering the pressure we were under.

 

[Bulletspur]

I re watched the game and although we could have played much better and were poor in parts, it was not all that bad as I had first thought. It seemed we basically set out to suppress them and hit them on the break. Feeling more positive now as we have actually got a point playing away against the Champions who have actually improved since last season.

 

[LDNYid]

The bottom line is, given the disparity in spending, they should be beating us and doing so convincingly. We held on and completely rode our luck but we got a point. I’m frustrated mostly with tactics but I believe, post September 2nd, we’ll see a more settled team and hopefully a clearer plan tactically - with all committed and our new signings further down the road regarding adapting to both league and manager.

 

[Flashspur]

Post of the season so far especially the part in bold. Thought Eriksen was at fault for the second goal as he should have tracked KDB. For the first Sissoko is just standing on the edge of the box watching KWP trying to tuck in to help the CB and mark 2 players outside of him. Disgraceful lack of desire to help the defense. The whole midfield did a terrible job of tracking runners in behind.

Thought KWP was terribly positioned ball watching completely lost Sterling who he was supposed to be marking. Awful Kyle. Your a FB man, track your player.

 

[Japhet]

Very confused by the tactics tbh. City were hunting the ball down like a pack of hyenas so our answer was to dawdle around with it 30 yards from our own goal, often getting turned over in the process. Either the MF weren't showing for the ball or there was an instruction to not try to play it through the middle because everything ended up going to the flanks and then, almost always out for a throw in. Eriksen looked disinterested and Kane could have dropped deeper to help out. We most certainly had more than our share of luck and a point was a massive bonus.

Sanchez MOM.

 

[coys200]

I’m sure Gary Neville got confused between Rose and Sanchez when blaming him for 2nd goal goal because he was talking about channel not being covered. Yes Sanchez could have cut it out but others were more culpable imo. Bar that I thought he was Excellent and only player you could really say had a good game.

 

[coys200]

I’m having a feeling that DM is going to be priority number 1 next summer. Neither Winks nor Sissoko are good enough defensively. Need a player like prime Wanyama or Dier to get back healthy and in form.

It’s Horses for courses. In 75% of the games we will play Winks will be perfect. And tbh he has done well before in the top games. But I thought in pre season and so far he has looked below his best. Hopefully Skipp will be that option. Interesting he came on before Dier yesterday.

 

[Flashspur]

A very poor performance. Horrible regression from when we’ve played them before. No organisation and no game plan. It’s as if we were told just go out there and stop them. If it wasn’t for Hugo, Sanchez, Toby and Rose it would have been ugly. The formation was hopeless. C’mon Poch you can do better surely? We were not able to gain any momentum in MF. Sissoko and NDombele as wingers and Winks in the middle with no support from Eriksen meant we were frequently overrun in the middle. Lamela and Kane effectively pressed with little reward.

First goal a classic City move. The triangular passing moves pull our MF out of shape, then our flank out of shape and they advance down the line and ping the ball across the penalty area, KWP ball watching has lost Sterling who has the easiest of headers. Lloris compounds it by marking the near post where no goal is going to be scored because of the angle.

The second goal is similar except it’s on the floor and across the area where Alderweireld loses Augero. At this stage we’re looking at 4 or 5-1.

I can’t for the life of me figure out how we drew level and then fought ugly right to the end. Pity about VAR but that is it’s purpose. Our MF missing big time for this game. Did little to protect the defence. Poch needs to come up with an antidote to Guardiola. That was fucking painful to watch.

If you are worried about uncommitted players then bin them for fucks sake. Toby played like a professional. So did Broadway Danny. Eriksen was absent as always. No stomach for battle. A half seasoned GLC or even Skipp would have been better. On this performance 10/10 for grit but we’re miles behind on performance.

 

[NickHSpurs]

Sometimes you just have to say your opponents were the better side and they were, hard for anyone in play well in the first half when City pressed absolutely everything we did and our system was to blame rather than individuals IMO.

 

[JCRD]

I thought Lamela played well in regards to the fact he scored a goal, put in a couple of good corners and more importantly he pressed well. He is quite intelligent at the pressing side, tends to nick the ball although needs to cut out his fouling. I dont think it was a penalty although if the penalty was given i could see why. I thought Toby collided/pushed him which cause them both going down

KWP was ok but he was clearly targeted in the first half.

Shitty are a great team but still think they will drop a few points this season as they tend not to finish off chances and will concede a few if targeted right.

 

[mpickard2087]

Post of the season so far especially the part in bold. Thought Eriksen was at fault for the second goal as he should have tracked KDB. For the first Sissoko is just standing on the edge of the box watching KWP trying to tuck in to help the CB and mark 2 players outside of him. Disgraceful lack of desire to help the defense. The whole midfield did a terrible job of tracking runners in behind.

Sissoko was terrible in his application defensively, but I don't think he's to blame for the first goal. We should be man for man at the back post. KWP just doesn't anticipate it and lets Sterling in round the back of him. I have a suspicion De Bruyne was actually aiming for Aguero, who also has the run on Toby as he's switched off exactly like KWP. It just wasn't good from those on the left side of our team initially and then the right of the defence.

 

[The Apprentice]

I know the old adage is “take points when you’re shit”. But, I found yesterday pretty humbling. There was light years of difference in terms of quality. On any other day, they’d have spanked us 6-1.

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

Best performance from Sanchez in a Spurs shirt

Yea he was class to be fair had tons to deal with and generally did well.
Back 4 as a whole did pretty well actually, tactics killed us.

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

I know the old adage is “take points when you’re shit”. But, I found yesterday pretty humbling. There was light years of difference in terms of quality. On any other day, they’d have spanked us 6-1.

Spot on.
And the only player we may lose there is Eriksen and only really missing son so very humbling. People can say enjoy and accept the point all they want but fact is that game showed how far away from city we are still and I really don’t think with that line up that we should be getting battered 30 shots to 2 no way. That was all on poch.