Terrible performance

[Bus-Conductor]

I meant to post this in the other thread.

 

[Spurs_Bear]

Unfortunately, due to the international break Kranjcar's had virtually no opportunity to train with the team, whilst if dos Santos was as jet-lagged as Palacios appeared to be he wouldn't have been much cop either. Bentley? He hasn't exactly been a roaring success that side, has he? We could have gone with Bentley on the right and Lennon on the left, I suppose, but maybe Keane was felt to be the least worst option in the circumstances. Then, of course, Modric only notionally plays on the left, and what we missed in addition to his creativity was his support for the CMs—when you have Huddlestone's deficiencies being exposed because of a sub-par Palacios you've got problems.

And we compounded those with some sloppy passing, giving the ball away to about the last side you want to do that to.

I think that's a very worthwhile point and a better one to look at than the knee jerk "Harry fucked up", "Where was Gio", "Keane is shit" ones that we have read.

If your core midfield (in our case Hudd and Wilson) are not at the races in any game, you are always going to struggle.

I'm not going to comment too much on the actual game as I thought we got done by a very good side, and I don't see the point of too much character assassination of the same players that have won us the first 4 games of the season.

Bring on Chelsea.

 

[Hoowl]

The only person IMO that needs to take blame for yesterday is Harry. We tried Keane on the left before and it didn't work. I think he was under pressure from Crouch and thats why he started. Harry said before if the team is going well he won't change it so why start with Crouch? Nicko should have started on the left and thats the only change that was needed because Keane on the left made it harder for Palacios. Harry said that the players kept looking for Crouch when they had the ball, I think that was our downfall but FFS Harry you said you brought in Crouch to give us something different, well thats it! what do you expect the players to do when they know thats why Crouch was bought? I'm a big fan of Harry but if he is looking for blame he needs to look at himself, lets just hope we can learn from yesterday and Harry completely kills the idea of Keane on the left.
Also to be fair the internationals did not help, the players looked very lethargic and our passing game was no where to be found

As much as I agree we shouldn't play Keane on the left, the one time I remember us trying it was against Manchester City at home last year and we won that game.

 

[phil]

As much as I agree we shouldn't play Keane on the left, the one time I remember us trying it was against Manchester City at home last year and we won that game.

And when we beat Chelsea 2-1 in 2006. Keane was moved to the left when we went 1-0 down and was MOM, crossing for Lennon's winner.

I was not surprised at Saturday's line-up (I think I was alone in predicting the team correctly in the relevant thread) but it is not the team I would have selected. Harry did have a problem however. Kranjcar did not look match fit when he came on and Gio (like Wilson) did not have an ideal preparation having played at altitude in a game that finished at 4am Thursday and then having an 18 hour flight to London, not arriving until lunchtime on Thursday.

We lost the game in midfield because Wilson unsurprisingly had a poor game, Lennon was in Evra's pocket and Keane/Huddlestone were never really interested in the physical battle.

I think that we have a real problem against Chelsea. We need to be more combative in midfield for that game but I cannot see what options we have. If he hadn't been loaned out, I would play O'Hara.

 

[Bus-Conductor]

And when we beat Chelsea 2-1 in 2006. Keane was moved to the left when we went 1-0 down and was MOM, crossing for Lennon's winner.

I was not surprised at Saturday's line-up (I think I was alone in predicting the team correctly in the relevant thread) but it is not the team I would have selected. Harry did have a problem however. Kranjcar did not look match fit when he came on and Gio (like Wilson) did not have an ideal preparation having played at altitude in a game that finished at 4am Thursday and then having an 18 hour flight to London, not arriving until lunchtime on Thursday.

We lost the game in midfield because Wilson unsurprisingly had a poor game, Lennon was in Evra's pocket and Keane/Huddlestone were never really interested in the physical battle.

I think that we have a real problem against Chelsea. We need to be more combative in midfield for that game but I cannot see what options we have. If he hadn't been loaned out, I would play O'Hara.

Keane was not MOTM against Chelsea in 2006. And if it was possible to search back that far I would paste you my post from the ratings post that game. We came under immense pressure that day and couldn't retain the ball. We won in spite of Jol's terrible tactics not because of.

I do not blame Keane for being played at LM, I blame the manager that is stupid enough to do this.