Striker options

[glacierSpurs]

and so Berba went to PAOK... there goes...

 

[southlondonyiddo]

Njie has played off a main striker Lacazette. To my knowledge he has never played up front in a lone 9 role that could compare to the requirements of Pochettino's system.

.......or the physicality of the premier league

 

[thebenjamin]

.......or the physicality of the premier league

And he's only played 1 proper season of first team football. It's the equivalent of signing Berahino 2 or 3 years ago.

 

[Larryjanta]

How does everyone feel about this if Kane gets injured.

............................Dier................................

...........Mason...................Bentaleb..........

..........................Eriksen...........................

...........Son...........................Chadli..........

Surely there are enough goals in that front three *if* Kane was injured?

Would imagine that our first choice front 5 will be Mason, Son, Eriksen, Chadli, Kane (whether thats 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1) - the Europa League 5 could be Bentaleb, Dembele, Lamela, Alli, N'Jie (again they could play 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1)

That still leaves Townsend, Pritchard and Carroll as options as well.

We;ll be fine (even if we don't have a proper CF to rotate with Kane)

 

[thekneaf]

Let's just see, if Poch has to alter his system then he'll need to. Injuries can always necessitate this and if he is not versatile enough to do it, then he's not a good manager. Managers the world over, in every field, are employed to work with what they have. Resourcing is not always perfect, but results are expect no matter what.

I believe we have the players at our disposal to get us to Christmas, even with injuries. We may need to be inventive, but Christ, at that level we should be capable. I mean Liverpool played Sterling up front last year. Arsenal play Walcott up there who is no better than Son, United are a Rooney injury away from relying on a 19 year old.

 

[voxy28]

How does everyone feel about this if Kane gets injured.

............................Dier................................

...........Mason...................Bentaleb..........

..........................Eriksen...........................

...........Son...........................Chadli..........

Surely there are enough goals in that front three *if* Kane was injured?

Would imagine that our first choice front 5 will be Mason, Son, Eriksen, Chadli, Kane (whether thats 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1) - the Europa League 5 could be Bentaleb, Dembele, Lamela, Alli, N'Jie (again they could play 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1)

That still leaves Townsend, Pritchard and Carroll as options as well.

We;ll be fine (even if we don't have a proper CF to rotate with Kane)

Most important is whether Poch uses these formations.... Last I seen... Nope

 

[thebenjamin]

How does everyone feel about this if Kane gets injured.

............................Dier................................

...........Mason...................Bentaleb..........

..........................Eriksen...........................

...........Son...........................Chadli..........

Surely there are enough goals in that front three *if* Kane was injured?

Would imagine that our first choice front 5 will be Mason, Son, Eriksen, Chadli, Kane (whether thats 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1) - the Europa League 5 could be Bentaleb, Dembele, Lamela, Alli, N'Jie (again they could play 4,3,3 or 4,4,2 diamond or 4,2,3,1)

That still leaves Townsend, Pritchard and Carroll as options as well.

We;ll be fine (even if we don't have a proper CF to rotate with Kane)

It would be the same as every time Kane isn't on the field. A team with no focal point, no one able to hold the ball up, and the team will be unable to keep possession and therefore will get penned in their own half.

It will be exactly like Stoke when Kane went off.

There are probably coaches out there who can make something of a system like that, but Mauricio Pochettino isn't one of them unless he's going to change overnight how he's set teams up his entire coaching career - which is always having a physically strong number 9 lone forward to work the channels and give the team a platform for everyone else to play off.

Having seen Chadli try and do that role a good 5 or 6 times now it's abundantly clear he cannot. He gets bullied, can't play with his back to goal and despite his size wins nothing in the air. So we'd better hope HMS can. He has played that role in Korea, but not really in European football as he is clearly a player best coming from deep so we'd be negating most of his threat by playing him there. And the reports that he isn't that fond of physical confrontation on the field don't bode well for a career as a lone forward in England.

We have essentially built a squad fundamentally unsuited to the way our coach sets teams up

 

[glacierSpurs]

I think since presumably Son and Njie do not seem to play well alone upfront (but we never know for sure!!), let's play them together upfront then! problem solved.. double pivot in 4-2-3-1 with Kane, or traditional 4-4-2 of Son and Njie, but without wingers, inverted maybe..

and we have enough AMs for sure for these set ups.. Lamela will have game time, so does Pritchard..

 

[THOWIG]

I reckon Son will play up front with Kane. Leaving N'Jie and Chadli as their back ups. Sounds good to me.

 

[not_tenth-again]

Chadli, Lamela, Son, Njie, Dembele..... has anyone mentioned Carroll yet? I'm sure I read he was leading goal scorer for the U16s at some stage or something like that.

There won't be enough straw to go around soon....

 

[nicdic]

Chadli, Lamela, Son, Njie, Dembele..... has anyone mentioned Carroll yet? I'm sure I read he was leading goal scorer for the U16s at some stage or something like that.

There won't be enough straw to go around soon....

Think you're thinking of Mason.

 

[thekneaf]

It would be the same as every time Kane isn't on the field. A team with no focal point, no one able to hold the ball up, and the team will be unable to keep possession and therefore will get penned in their own half.

It will be exactly like Stoke when Kane went off.

But we had no pace on the pitch in that game. I would actually love team to come at us with Son on the pitch. Same with Clinton. If they push us we can actually punish teams now.

During the Stoke game they knew that they could easily sit on us and not actually be damaged at the back.

 

[SydneySpur]

Whats Robbie Earnshaw up to these days?

 

[CosmicHotspur]

Time to give our younger strikers a playing opportunity. It worked for Kane and worth a try.

 

[dagraham]

How about close our eyes and hope for the best?

Seriously, I like how some think all we have to do is add up the potential goals that our WF's/Wingers/AM may score over the season and we're ok. If only setting up a football team was that easy.

 

[wozzahotspurs]

Chadli can just be converted now to playing in the central role. If its worked on in training and tried from the start in matches (Europa to start with), rather than just sticking him up there out of the blue in games where we are under the cosh and falling apart (see the Stoke game) then I think he can do alright. He's what, 6ft 3, he can head a ball, he can hold it up, shoot, two footed, he can run in behind, and we know he scores goals. Work on the training ground needs to be done.

We have Eriksen, Son, N'Jie, Lamela, Townsend, Dembele, Carroll and Pritchard, plus Alli and Onomah also, who can then compete for the attacking midfielder roles. Son and N'Jie could probably be tried out centrally also, these are what the cup/Europa games should also be used to find out what our options are.

If there's enough room in the squad then I think the bullet has to be bitten and Adebayor is named also, even if its just to fill in for Europa/Cup games until Xmas.

I'm more worried about our failure to sign a central midfielder, and how we seemingly prioritised that less, I think our potential options there are a lot more scarce.

Hasn't Onomah gone on loan to Glasgow Rangers?

 

[WiganSpur]

I'm surprised at the amount of people who don't think Chadli can do it. If we give him a chance there you know what I think he could surprise a few.

He's got all the attributes, we should at least give him a go like we've done with Dier in CM.

 

[thebenjamin]

I'm surprised at the amount of people who don't think Chadli can do it. If we give him a chance there you know what I think he could surprise a few.

He's got all the attributes, we should at least give him a go like we've done with Dier in CM.

He's played there in numerous spells for us. He's been uniquely shit each time. Just because he has the physique of a striker doesn't mean he can play there. He gets thrown off the ball by players half his size playing on the wing, let alone dealing with centre backs.

 

[HotspurFC1950]

Hasn't Onomah gone on loan to Glasgow Rangers?

No.

 

[HotspurFC1950]

The point is we wanted Berahino on top of what we have.