*** SPURS v AALBORG *** Official Match Thread

[SpurSince57]

That's ifs and maybes, though. We could have beaten Arsenal, United and Liverpool this season. It's a knife-edge.

We should have destroyed Vale and Southend in the CC last season. Then again, if results had gone according to form, we should have been facing United rather than Southend. And looking at tonight's UEFA results, Bolton scraped a home draw against Salonika after their second-string held Bayern away, Bayern could only draw away against Braga, Getafe lost at home against Hapoel (after recently beating Barca!). What does that tell you?

 

[Juande_Ramos]

I do not think there is a Jol v Ramos debate. The debate is whether in replacing the manager the Board correctly identified the problem. As SS57 has said, Ramos is facing the same problems as Jol.

Under either manager we were only going turn things around by transfer activity. The difference is that wheras Jol perhaps just needed the missing peices in the jigsaw, under Ramos we are likely to be looking at a more fundamental restructuring. Ramos himself said in the pre-match interview that in order to play the football he wants to play he needs the right players. The question is will the Board let him sign them?

From what I have seen of Spurs these last few games a CB capable of organising the defense, and a holding midfielder should be the first priorities. If the board decided to pay Ramos £7 million per year I reckon they are going to trust his judgement to sign the players needed.

 

[joey55]

From what I have seen of Spurs these last few games a CB capable of organising the defense, and a holding midfielder should be the first priorities. If the board decided to pay Ramos £7 million per year I reckon they are going to trust his judgement to sign the players needed.

The thing is virtually everyone knew we needed an expereinced CB and DM in the summer, but we never got them. Ramos will no doubt suggest we need them, but wether he'll get them is another thing. Ramos has already commented on the fact out transfer policy isn't as straight forward as at other clubs.

This is what he said:

"Normally it is the coach who asks for specific players for a specific position. But you have to adapt to the philosophy of the club and the economic situation."

THis suggests to me it isn't quite as straight forward as Ramos saying he wants a specific type of player for a specific position. New signings will have to fit into the club philosophy on transfer dealings, which many of us believe has been the fundemantal problem over the last 18 months and not the coach.

 

[SpurSince57]

Players cost sometimes means very little but how much money the buyers have. There some Brazilian or Argentinian teams that are way better than Spurs and didn't cost a fraction of the money to assemble.

This Aaborg team looked to me like a very decent outfit, well organised and technically good. On their first half perfomance I'd say that they would be fighting for a UEFA Cup spot in the Premiership easily.

I don't know how much English football you get to see, but last season Southend and Port Vale gave us far more grief in the Carling Cup than any of the more illustrious sides we met in UEFA did (Sevilla excepted, obviously!). Southend put United out of the Carling in the previous round.

You could say that Aalborg would be fighting for a UEFA Cup spot in the Premiership on their first-half performance, but the reality is that they would probably be mid-table in the Championship. Copenhagen beat United last season, and United have struggled against Lille. This kind of thing really shouldn't happen, but it does. Having engineered a draw against a second-string Bolton side at the Allianz, Bayern could only draw against Braga tonight. Getafe beat Barca a couple of weeks ago, but managed to lose to Hapoel tonight.

:shrug:

 

[DC_Boy]

Glory glory hallejuah indeed - a night to proudly rank along those great Lane nights of 60 70 80s

Oh and as I pointed out time and again on this forum before the game - Lee is not a good right back - I can understand JR making the mistake - he's quite new - but I noticed a lot of Spurs fans on here and other forums suggesting he should play there - surely some of them must have seen before he just doesn't do it there for us

anyway big praise to JR he got it right again - just like he keeps calling it correctly by playing steed on the left and Lennon on the right - something Jol had problems with (and something that though I'm no tactical expert I've pointed out time and again on the Ramos tactics threads - so a good night for DC too

big praise too for Bent and Bale - these two of the summer signings I like very much indeed

 

[Marty]

We played 20 minutes of good football and won 3-2
The first 45 were terrible, the last 25 were ok, we should probably have added at least one more, but we were nothing special.

Aalborg played very well I thought. I'm not sure e.g. Hapoel could've come to The Lane and played like they did in the first half, no matter how shit we were. Credit to them.

 

[Juande_Ramos]

I don't know how much English football you get to see, but last season Southend and Port Vale gave us far more grief in the Carling Cup than any of the more illustrious sides we met in UEFA did (Sevilla excepted, obviously!). Southend put United out of the Carling in the previous round.

You could say that Aalborg would be fighting for a UEFA Cup spot in the Premiership on their first-half performance, but the reality is that they would probably be mid-table in the Championship. Copenhagen beat United last season, and United have struggled against Lille. This kind of thing really shouldn't happen, but it does. Having engineered a draw against a second-string Bolton side at the Allianz, Bayern could only draw against Braga tonight. Getafe beat Barca a couple of weeks ago, but managed to lose to Hapoel tonight.

:shrug:

That's why I said "on their first half perfomance". Having said that I don't think Championship sides can pass the ball half as well as this team did, and they looked organised and fit.

 

[SpurSince57]

Quite a few Premier League sides can't pass the ball as well as they do!

Although we're always doing it, it is very difficult, not to say dangerous, to compare different leagues, and the CL and the UEFA Cup have both thrown up major surprises already. No-one expected Rosenborg to hold Chelsea at the Bridge, let alone beat Valencia home and away; no-one expected Liverpool to lose to Besiktas (whom we beat pretty easily last year) or to Marseilles, who have been generally dreadful in Ligue 1.