Ratings vs Watford

[dannythomas]

This whole Pochettino (or any manager) is always right - which is what you are inferring by suggesting they always know best - is a misnomer of the highest order. If managers always knew best they'd never make mistakes and they's all be in jobs longer then 14 months. It implies that anyone employed to do a job where multi-faceted decisions have to made will always make the right decisions. Which as we've seen every day in football, from politicians and even presidents isn't the case.

Your first point might be true, like all things, but anecdotal evidence suggests not, in fact there is a fucking great big body of anecdotal evidence of Pochettino making poor choices with regards to tactical subs, resting players and rotation, and it biting us on the arse, and you could argue maybe last last season's end of season collapse was possibly a symptom of that and we now find ourselves in an identical situation, and here is Pochettino again, passing up the chance to get some rest and rotation into the legs of some key players. It wasn't just the Kane scenario, he could (and should) have maybe got some rest and reduced risk of fatigue/injury into All & Eriksen - absolutely key players facing a mentally and physically challenging 3 weeks.

And the point about Janssen is, we have twice now this season lost Kane, Janssen has played really well this week in three game, helped us win one with a crucial piece of skill, done all the things we need in this system, if Kane's injury (and it's the same ankle twice now) doesn't hold up, surely there is common sense in having a back up striker with a bit of confidence and feeling he's valued than one totally demoralised. And the point is he didn't have to sacrifice anything to achieve that, the team didn't need Kane - it was 4-0 up at home - Kane could have got another week of training and conditioning in and then started Bournemouth if necessary.

And making the Kane sub just completely wasted a tactical substitution that could have been used to give both/either of Onomah and/or Nkoudou 35 minutes of first team football.



They stop doing it, I'll stop mentioning it.



This substitution just disproves your point about "Poch being better placed". It was utterly banal. Sissoko isn't a CM. He's shit there, he control's the ball further than some players can kick it, we have a player with enormous potential who is a CM, who giving that 35 minutes to would have been enormous, and benefitted not just him but us as a squad, we might have found out we actually have a viable alternative going forward, or at least seen the seed of that.

Again, the Kane sub just wasted a tactical sub. We could have both Nkoudou and Onomah on, rested Dembele and one of All or Eriksen and got 35 minutes of meaningful football into two squad players, who we just might need to call on in the run up if we get a glut of injuries or suspensions like we did last year. But no. We get Kane, Sissoko and then Omomah for 3 minutes for Son ? Even that decision was odd. Why take off the player with least miles on the clock this season who is on a hatrick and leave on Alli and Eriksen (not a big deal just another slightly odd decision).



I don't know what the idiot media were on about regarding Janssen's misses. The first one was a lovely spin and shot that was excellently saved, the second one I was right above and at the time I thought "how did he miss that" but when you see it on TV you realise what happened, the ball takes about three ricochets and slices through three people and bounces up at him. And he couldn't reach the next cross from Trippier it was too fast and ahead of him.

Kane's not getting on Trippier's cross was the other way round, at first it looked like he couldn't get there, but when you actually watched it on telly later you can't understand why he didn't get to it, it was gettable and all he had to do was put his head on it and it was a certain goal, it looks like he just doesn't fancy getting clattered by Gomes maybe. That's fine, we all know Kane will score goals, I'm not questioning his ability or commitment most weeks, just there's a kind of distorted reality thing going on where Janssen and Kane are concerned, Kane can be clumsy (and was a couple of times Saturday) and can miss sitters, and make poor choices and his performances back end and early this season weren't up to scratch always. But Janssen has played well at times, performed a very similar team function to Kane and done it very comparably and competently, but just because he hasn't had much luck in front of goal - and for the most part that's what it is, either he's played early in the season when we haven't created chances for him, or things like Saturday where the keeper makes good saves or it just won't roll - people are calling him shit and saying we need a better back up.

Those are good responses and a number of your points are taken.

But it remains true that we don't know enough about Kane's match fitness to say whether or not he needed those minutes. I will trust the coach on that one. I think for the most part it is clear that Poch's man management skills are among his strengths and that is witnessed by nearly all the players signing new contracts which I am sure a number of them would not have done if they had not felt that they wanted to continue to improve under his management. I'm sure he will have handled the Kane substitution in a way that didn't upset Janssen either by pre warning him or explaining after the game. That is different from saying he is always right.

Clearly I don't think Poch is always right or I wouldn't criticize his under use of Nkoudou. I would say the same thing about Wimmer. Couldn't he do with minutes on the pitch too ? It is however another mark mark of those man management skills that these under utilized players are not openly complaining about it. He appears to keep the bit part players happy so that when they step in they perform, with Trippier being a case in point. Likewise Winks. Dier has had to deal with being omitted sometimes. As has Son. I think it is widely perceived that this is a very together squad with them all pulling for each other. And that of course is largely down to Pochettino. Yes, he makes odd substitutions sometimes but I can live with that and I don't think we would have the same togetherness if, say, Mourinho or even Guardilola or ( heaven forbid ) Wenger was in charge. It is to a large extent the team spirit which is keeping us ahead of most of our rivals who have more financial muscle than we do.

 

[Bulletspur]

I know it's a thing to hate on Sissoko and he has often not been good enough but in NO WAY was he a "3" today. I think we have to be fair in our opinions and he has had some good games for us this season and it should be recognised. The trouble is those good days have not been frequent enough and he has the potential to give much more.

I was thinking the same thing and do agree. It seems as if @yankspurs had made up his mind about Sissoko's performance before he had even kicked a ball in this match

 

[Shadydan]

I re-watched the match today and looked at Sissoko's performance and he literally did nothing wrong, yet some people couldn't wait to criticise him, talking utter bollocks about things he was alleged to have done in the match in which he didn't actually do which means that some of our fans are dickheads, you know who you are

 

[yankspurs]

I was thinking the same thing and do agree. It seems as if @yankspurs had made up his mind about Sissoko's performance before he had even kicked a ball in this match

No. He was wasteful snd lost the ball quite a bit. He wasnt dog shit like he's been recently but he was still pretty poor, IMO. He simply has to do ALOT better whether coming on as a sub or starting to continue warranting a place in the 18.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

Those are good responses and a number of your points are taken.

But it remains true that we don't know enough about Kane's match fitness to say whether or not he needed those minutes. I will trust the coach on that one. I think for the most part it is clear that Poch's man management skills are among his strengths and that is witnessed by nearly all the players signing new contracts which I am sure a number of them would not have done if they had not felt that they wanted to continue to improve under his management. I'm sure he will have handled the Kane substitution in a way that didn't upset Janssen either by pre warning him or explaining after the game. That is different from saying he is always right.

Clearly I don't think Poch is always right or I wouldn't criticize his under use of Nkoudou. I would say the same thing about Wimmer. Couldn't he do with minutes on the pitch too ? It is however another mark mark of those man management skills that these under utilized players are not openly complaining about it. He appears to keep the bit part players happy so that when they step in they perform, with Trippier being a case in point. Likewise Winks. Dier has had to deal with being omitted sometimes. As has Son. I think it is widely perceived that this is a very together squad with them all pulling for each other. And that of course is largely down to Pochettino. Yes, he makes odd substitutions sometimes but I can live with that and I don't think we would have the same togetherness if, say, Mourinho or even Guardilola or ( heaven forbid ) Wenger was in charge. It is to a large extent the team spirit which is keeping us ahead of most of our rivals who have more financial muscle than we do.

There are many things I love about Pochettino and have lauded those things, I have said I think he's the best coach we've had in my 50 years (43 of them as a Spurs fan). And his errors or deficiencies don't make those positives any less virtuous, but that doesn't mean we don't call them either. As a coach, and as an instiller of mentality he's great. Tactically he's been vastly improved this season, has varied format and has reacted and changed things better in game. But some of his tactical choices are still baffling - Away from home we've been pretty meh (up until the last couple of weeks we'd won less points away than Palace I think), at Liverpool and City were atrocious - two of the toughest tests tactically. His in game subs have been less peculiar this year but he still makes some really strange choices at times, Saturday was as bad as it gets for me, a completely wasted opportunity to use those subs wisely.

Dier hasn't had to cope with being benched very much at all, it's almost been the reverse at times, he's been played when better options were available - such as Wimmer when Vertonghen was out or played in CM when we really needed more Vim.

 

[slartibartfast]

Weird. Was looking for this thread as I wanted to mention I thought Sissoko had quite a good game. Not amazing but better. Seems others agree as you were talking about him

 

[JimmyG2]

Weird. Was looking for this thread as I wanted to mention I thought Sissoko had quite a good game. Not amazing but better. Seems others agree as you were talking about him

Partly because he isn't trying to run through walls,
defensive or otherwise any more
Releasing the ball more quickly
and keeping it simple.
I said the same about Wanyama earlier in the season.
It's the Eriksen effect
Watch and learn boys.