The Mauricio Pochettino thread

[Colston]

You can clearly see he wants to rotate the squad but everytime he tries to he ends up having to play the players he wanted to rest because our options aren't good enough. We could've had two decent backup players for the price of one Shitoko.

 

[tdk101]

This offense regressed this season, as compared to last year.

A stretch of 10 games earlier in the season where we scored nothing but penalties, which knocked us out of CL and put us 6th in PL. Worked hard to get back up to 2nd. Now we are going thru another barren stretch of goals to put the team in danger of getting knocked out of Europa league and top 4 in the league.

Offensively, this team is incredibly slow without wingbacks contributing. It's becoming really tiresome to watch centerbacks and midfielders forever recycling the ball within own half.

What has changed since last season? I guess two things: Wanyama as DMF and not having Lamela available. Nothing can be done about Lamela, but I wish Poch put Dier in MF in place of Wanyama in some games ( like against Gent) when we are expected to dominate. Wanyama is a monster defensively but he also slows down the game along with Dembele. Having both seems redundant against an opponent who are mainly expected to retreat and play quick counter.

 

[cliff jones]

It's pretty obvious what's going wrong. Too many players have lost form at the same time and confidence is low.

But, Poch is responsible for a lot of this by persisting with square pegs in round holes. No Jan, no Dan, so back to 4231 which has seen us become very poor in wide areas. Whether Alli, Son, Eriksen, whoever, they don't do a good job defensively leading to Davies and Walker being over run.

I think the game that spooked him was actually Wycombe, in that he was so disappointed as we all were with Wimmers performance, and the naivety of CCV, that he just doesn't have another centre back he can trust to revert to the 3 at the back which really suits us.

We also have to understand that the Premier League while exciting isn't as good as some think. There's no real difference in level between us and Lerkusen or even Gents reserves. Our players don't know how to commit little niggly fouls that disrupt the opposition, but don't attract cards. They were brilliant at it tonight, or the ref was totally useless, but looking across all the European games this season and recently we just can't seem to get up to speed in this regard. Lack of temperament and intelligence.

 

[THFCSPURS19]

A month ago we were dismantling West Brom having just beat Chelsea, now we're playing fucking shit. Don't get how it's happened.

 

[eViL]

A month ago we were dismantling West Brom having just beat Chelsea, now we're playing fucking shit. Don't get how it's happened.

We went back to 2 CBs while everyone else stuck to what worked.

 

[Hercules]

We went back to 2 CBs while everyone else stuck to what worked.

And injuries in very key areas with no quality, like for like to bring in.

 

[tiger666]

We went back to 2 CBs while everyone else stuck to what worked.

You know we played a back 3 second half right?

 

[spursfan77]

And injuries in very key areas with no quality, like for like to bring in.

True but not to have a like for like replacement for Rose (obviously not at his level), if we were to continue with 343, when it was possible to try and sign one in January was very poor planning.

It's not like Danny hasn't had a few injuries in his time under Poch.

 

[shelfmonkey]

We went back to 2 CBs while everyone else stuck to what worked.

I wonder if Poch is developing a Wengeresque stubborn streak where he's determined to make 4-2-3-1 work when it's so fecking obvious that the players we have are much better suited and much more comfortable in a 3-5-2/3-4-3?!!!!

 

[Romulus]

we changed our formation after destroying west brom.

since then we have been utterly awful against everybody we faced

Sunderland away
Wycombe wanderers home
Middlesbrough home
Liverpool away
Gent away

apart from the goals against league 2 Wycombe, including the 94th minute winner. we have scored 1 goal on this run. poch is deluded if he's running with 'the Liverpool game knocked our confidence'.

 

[Krafty]

Squad has been exposed. When everyone is fit and on decent form, the lack of proper wingers, lack of width high up the pitch, lack of pace on the counter, lack of proper playmaker in midfield can be glossed over. When we have to change and adapt, the foundation of our play is not strong enough to cope with it.

The big money signings should have helped with this, but Sissoko has been a joke, Janssen has really struggled, while some of the previous established players have been missing due to injury or struggled with poor form

 

[JUSTINSIGNAL]

This offense regressed this season, as compared to last year.

A stretch of 10 games earlier in the season where we scored nothing but penalties, which knocked us out of CL and put us 6th in PL. Worked hard to get back up to 2nd. Now we are going thru another barren stretch of goals to put the team in danger of getting knocked out of Europa league and top 4 in the league.

Offensively, this team is incredibly slow without wingbacks contributing. It's becoming really tiresome to watch centerbacks and midfielders forever recycling the ball within own half.

What has changed since last season? I guess two things: Wanyama as DMF and not having Lamela available. Nothing can be done about Lamela, but I wish Poch put Dier in MF in place of Wanyama in some games ( like against Gent) when we are expected to dominate. Wanyama is a monster defensively but he also slows down the game along with Dembele. Having both seems redundant against an opponent who are mainly expected to retreat and play quick counter.

lol you clearly didn't see how poorly Dier played in DMF against Villa in the FA Cup.

 

[TaoistMonkey]

in that he was so disappointed as we all were with Wimmers performance, and the naivety of CCV, that he just doesn't have another centre back he can trust to revert to the 3 at the back which really suits us.

I think he needs time with quality next to him. E.g the goal for Wycombes 3rd he knows what around him and instructs the other defender to mark the guy which he doesn't....

9:50

 

[rossdapep]

I think it's pretty clear he needs to get back to the 3-5-2/3-4-3, although that is quite difficult when you don't have the options of the bench to continue it when others are injured.

This summer Poch really needs to find 2 or 3 players who have the skill set to play in this system, which will allow rotation without the dip in performance.

If Kane has a knock and Rose and Verts return, he really should try Janssen in this formation. I'm not his biggest fan and I doubt he will make it but we may see something different when we are at our best.

 

[kaz Hirai]

His hands are tied, he obviously thinks wimmer is garbage now and Davis would just be useless on the wing .
No doubt he'll look to sign a couple squad players to better cover vertonghen and rose

I'd like him to risk trying gkn in that role against Fulham.

Ultimately though the squad depth is a bit shite really

Janssen and sissoko have added nothing, in fact they've made us worse .

When Harry Kane is shite we have nothing to replace, same goes for Alli and erisken, no one to push them.

Dier kinda meh as a CB really, he's mearly okayish however was developing into a really promising top cdm. Now he's been sent backward I feel to accommodate wanyama. Rather they both just competed for that spot

 

[Johnny J]

Wanyama aside, our summer business was atrocious, in terms of strengthening both the squad and the first team. Every time we get into the CL we fail to capitalise in terms of transfers.

 

[ajspurs]

Is Wimmer that bad that can't put him in to create a back 3 again? To me it's not just 3 CB's and wing backs being able to get forward but the attackers looked much better as well. Eriksen looked the best he had in a long while, back to his best and the true hub of the team, Alli was getting forward better and looking more of a goal threat and Kane was looking less isolated. Basically everyone in the team's performances seem to be enhanced a bit in that setup.

 

[shelfboy68]

I think it's pretty clear he needs to get back to the 3-5-2/3-4-3, although that is quite difficult when you don't have the options of the bench to continue it when others are injured.

This summer Poch really needs to find 2 or 3 players who have the skill set to play in this system, which will allow rotation without the dip in performance.

If Kane has a knock and Rose and Verts return, he really should try Janssen in this formation. I'm not his biggest fan and I doubt he will make it but we may see something different when we are at our best.

But not having the options whose fault is that that responsibility lays with himself and Mr chairman.

 

[Spurrific]

The trouble is, as soon as you criticise Poch for a second on here, his fan girls start coming out of the wood work ironically screaming #PochOut! at you, because you can't possible criticise a football manager without wanting them fired these days.

The guy has obvious flaws, he's definitely not the finished article, we are lucky to have him, don't get me wrong, but he's far from perfect. And the last few results are highlighting that.

I agree with the basic gist of your post but referring to people as "fan girls" comes across incredibly childish and devalues your opinion somewhat.

 

[tdk101]

lol you clearly didn't see how poorly Dier played in DMF against Villa in the FA Cup.

I see. So, one sub-par performance with a second string squad (who barely played together) decides it. While at it, let's just forget what he did entire season previously.