Ratings vs Stoke City

[amathews3416]

Hugo 6 - Felt like he could have done better of the Stoke goal, wasn't far from him w/ not a lot of pace.
Verts 6 - Made some great runs in the 2nd half but felt like his final ball and touch were a bit off his standard today
Dawson 7 - Type of game that is made for him, battled well all day. Good header from FK, unlucky not to score.
Caulker 6 - Don't remember much right or wrong that he did today, which I suppose is a decent thing for a CB.
Walker 6 - Always brings it from an energy standpoint, but still has those face palming, wtf moments out there.
Parker 7 - Good first half, well done by AVB to take him off in 2nd when we needed that creative spark
Huddlestone 5.5 - Passing was a bit off today. For the love of god, no more corners or FK's from him.
Bale 6.5 - On the ball a lot, but final ball was lacking and just couldn't pull anything off.
Dempsey 8 (MOTM) - Goal, assist. Thinking back in the second half, it was always him almost on the end of all goal scoring opportunities.
Lennon 6 - Something seems off with him. No longer willing to get to the byline and take fullbacks on, which is really his game.
Adebayor 7.5 - Good goal and link up play. Felt like he kept dropping too deep in second half.

Defoe 6 - No real impact
Sigs 6 - Good work rate when he came on.
Dembele 7 - Exactly what we needed at that point in the game. Drove right at them.

 

[jonnyp]

Lloris 5 - Why didn't he save their goal?
Walker 7 - Did well again
Dawson 7 - Did well
Caulker 6 - Did ok
Vertonghen 7 - Did well for the most part.
Parker 7 - Did well but makes some horrendous misplaced passes at times but his attempted pass to Lennon created our first goal.
Huddlestone 6 - Controlled the middle of the park well pinging off passes to everyone, but set pieces were awful
Lennon 6 - Just doesn't get involved enough and doesn't move intelligently enough to create space for himself or others.
Dempsey 8 - Goal and assist.
Bale 6.5 - Should've scored and had an assist. Doesn't seem to have much urgency lately.
Adebayor 7.5 - Worked hard as usual. His touch is a lot better lately but he needs to understand that he's the striker and needs to get in the box more quickly. I don't understand why he's coming down to collect the ball in our half when they're 10 men. So many times we have no-one in the box to cross to.

Dembele 7 - Excellent when he came on.
Defoe NET
Sigurdsson NET

Why do we hand over the initiative to them in the last 10 mins when we're 11 against 10? We do this everytime. Just hoofing the ball clear and surrendering possession again and again. We had the ball for most of the game, how hard can it be to just continue that after we took the lead and still had a man more on the pitch?

Also again we lack creativity. There's no enough movement in the final third. People just standing around waiting for the ball to come to their feet.

 

[mattdefoe]

adebayor and dempsey our two best players... what the hell is going on

 

[C0YS]

Ref = 10

We saw what can happen a couple years back at Stoke City with Chris Foy if the referee does not take control of the game early on. He made it clear from the word go that he was not going to let Stoke kick at us all day and they would be booked properly if they did. Didn't succumb to the constant crowd pressure of penalty shouts and free kicks. If Kevin Friend was not the ref today and we were stuck with somebody like Clattenburg or Foy, we probably don't win.

The ref was good in the fact he did not allow the Stoke bulling tactics to go one. But if you go on decision by decision he was terrible, made a hell of a lot of mistakes in my view, although the distribution of these mistakes were without bias.

 

[al_pacino]

Am I the only one that thought Ade spent far too much time thinking he's Andrea Pirlo?

 

[kazzah9]

Defoe was the one who disappointed me most when he came on.

Anonymous for the first 5-10 mins, as in didn't even spot him anywhere near the ball...

Then when passage of play came near him, he was just hogging the left wing; brainless footballer... Can't wait to cash in on him in Summer.

Did he even touch the ball in 15-20 mins?

3 touches in 24 minutes = lol

 

[seanwhite1961]

3 touches in 24 minutes = lol

Impressive as he's made the 19 minutes he was on the pitch last for 24.

 

[kazzah9]

Impressive as he's made the 19 minutes he was on the pitch last for 24.

My bad, i was never very good at physics

 

[only1waddle]

Am I the only one that thought Ade spent far too much time thinking he's Andrea Pirlo?

Or rather why did he see the need to keep dropping back, the 15 mins before Dembele came on our play was turgid, so slow it was painful, Ade dropped back out of frustration at the total lack of vision in our midfield.

 

[matthew.absurdum]

Kevin Friend is really our friend!

 

[Black]

Hugo - 7 - I think should have saved their goal, did well with everything else
Walker - 7 - You could see the commitment to win
Dawson - 7 - Solid
Caulker - 7 - Solid
Jan - 8 - Offers so much more than benny at LB

Hudd - 6 - Poor corners again, movement in front of him pretty meh
Parker - 6 - He wants to play in the CL
Lennon - 2 - Plays every game offers nothing, how long will this go on

Demps - 7 - good goal and assist, needs to get involved in play more
Bale - 7 - He tried
Ade - 9 - A second good game in a row, third time lucky ?

Avb - 5 - Poor starting 11 I thought, subs took too long

 

[KILLA_SIN]

Hugo - 7 - I think should have saved their goal, did well with everything else
Walker - 7 - You could see the commitment to win
Dawson - 7 - Solid
Caulker - 7 - Solid
Jan - 8 - Offers so much more than benny at LB

Hudd - 6 - Poor corners again, movement in front of him pretty meh
Parker - 6 - He wants to play in the CL
Lennon - 2 - Plays every game offers nothing, how long will this go on

Demps - 7 - good goal and assist, needs to get involved in play more
Bale - 7 - He tried
Ade - 9 - A second good game in a row, third time lucky ?

Avb - 5 - Poor starting 11 I thought, subs took too long

AVB 5? WTF...Who was he suppose to start

 

[vegassd]

Avb - 5 - Poor starting 11 I thought, subs took too long

What?!? It was a great starting 11 in my opinion, apart from Dempsey who then went on to have a good game!

Dempsey was productive today but I still think Ade gave more overall and gets my MOTM. Vertonghen had a good game and has put Benny to shame quite a few times this season, although he's not the solution at LB.

Walker's attitude is brilliant but I do think he gets quite predictable at times, doesn't play with his head up and seems to force himself into making hospital passes at times. Only gonna improve with age though I think.

 

[Y.I.D.O]

Can anyone tell why / how sky sports gave motm to Steven N'zonzi? Pretty sure they never give to a) a player on the losing side, b) someone who was anonymous apart from the goal or c) anyone other than Gareth Bale!

 

[BringBack_leGin]

Lloris should have done better on their goal, it's not as of he was leaning the other way and had to readjust, though it was admittedly a clever free kick. Rest of the game played well and attacked their crosses despite the usual Stoke bullying.

Walker had a good game, one awful pass aside. As against Chelsea, he continuously brought the ball forward, and I don't remember and crosses coming from their left flank.

Dawson played well enough. Some iffy distribution but dealt with Crouch just fine.

Caulker looked like a guy who's not played much recently, but he improved and made some good interceptions.

Vertonghen's side was attacked the most but I don't think he was beaten that much. Pushed forward well too, albeit with a poor end product.

Parker was very good, one of his best games for ages. He fought ck standing until coming off and brought us play forward well.

Huddlestone was dreadful. Terrible set pieces, took no responsibility for creating, and passed by off the ball. He improved a lot in the final half hour admittedly but I was very frustrated by him.

Lennon was hard working off the ball as ever, and on the ball a bit more dangerous than last week, but he was largely anonymous and ultimately disappointing.

Dempsey equalised just as I'd lost it completely with him. He started the match dreadfully, giving away a ridiculous free kick for them to score, and unable to control anything, but his instinctive hit got us back into the game and from there we dominated, and he did gain in confidence and probably play his best game for us. Far more impressive than his goal was his assist, he show fx composure under pressure for the first time that I can remember in our colours.

Bale was kicked to shit as ever, but he kept taking the ball and running at them, probing and looking for ways through, ultimately leading to our winner. Not vintage but he constantly tries, and was unlucky to not score with at least one of his efforts.

Adebayor, Adebayor, where was this form, for 9 months before? Good game again Ade, worked very hard, linked play, came back to take the responsibility that our midfielders weren't, showed real strength and ability a number of times and, by far most importantly, scored the winner. Very pleased.

Dembele improved us, he wasn't his best but he brought the ball forward and made their defence think.

Defoe came on apparently.

Siggurdsson was unfortunate not to start, but when he came on didn't get much of a sniff.

 

[Bobbins]

Why do we hand over the initiative to them in the last 10 mins when we're 11 against 10? We do this everytime. Just hoofing the ball clear and surrendering possession again and again. We had the ball for most of the game, how hard can it be to just continue that after we took the lead and still had a man more on the pitch?

Also again we lack creativity. There's no enough movement in the final third. People just standing around waiting for the ball to come to their feet.

I don't think we did - we had a few minutes where they came at us and we cleared it to no-one, but generally in the last ten we held on to the ball and they had little to no threat.

Sometimes we do it, sometimes we don't. We didn't today.

 

[Bobbins]

Defoe was the one who disappointed me most when he came on.

Anonymous for the first 5-10 mins, as in didn't even spot him anywhere near the ball...

Then when passage of play came near him, he was just hogging the left wing; brainless footballer... Can't wait to cash in on him in Summer.

Did he even touch the ball in 15-20 mins?

Yeah he touched it once and played the pass of the game to put Bale through in the last minute.

 

[Mr-T]

Hugo 6 - Felt like he could have done better of the Stoke goal, wasn't far from him w/ not a lot of pace.
Verts 6 - Made some great runs in the 2nd half but felt like his final ball and touch were a bit off his standard today
Dawson 7 - Type of game that is made for him, battled well all day. Good header from FK, unlucky not to score.
Caulker 6 - Don't remember much right or wrong that he did today, which I suppose is a decent thing for a CB.
Walker 6 - Always brings it from an energy standpoint, but still has those face palming, wtf moments out there.
Parker 7 - Good first half, well done by AVB to take him off in 2nd when we needed that creative spark
Huddlestone 5.5 - Passing was a bit off today. For the love of god, no more corners or FK's from him.
Bale 6.5 - On the ball a lot, but final ball was lacking and just couldn't pull anything off.
Dempsey 8 (MOTM) - Goal, assist. Thinking back in the second half, it was always him almost on the end of all goal scoring opportunities.
Lennon 6 - Something seems off with him. No longer willing to get to the byline and take fullbacks on, which is really his game.
Adebayor 7.5 - Good goal and link up play. Felt like he kept dropping too deep in second half.

Defoe 6 - No real impact
Sigs 6 - Good work rate when he came on.
Dembele 7 - Exactly what we needed at that point in the game. Drove right at them.

Agree with this

 

[Mr-T]

2 people has actually voted for Huddlestone - lol

 

[Artemis]

@BringBack_leGin "Lloris should have done better on their goal, it's not as of he was leaning the other way and had to readjust, though it was admittedly a clever free kick." I see a lot of such comment but I don't understand because as far as I can see the ball was just deflected by a stoke's player in front of him , so probably really difficult to save ! Eventhough he was not far away from saving it.