Merry xmas everyone

Totally agree. A legend in the making.:grin:

This is good news. It should be great to watch this lad develop over the next few years. Great things are expected of him and I feel that he will live up to the expectation. The guy is the size of freakin' HOUSE, though, so let's hope he doesn't literally outgrow his holding midfieder position.
COYS!!!!!!

I admit it is great news that the club and Tom want to commit to each other but at the end of the day what is a contract worth? it seems it means absolutely nothing when it comes to a player wanting to leave.

disagree mate - Carrick was sold because he was into the final 2 years of his contract and the club refuses to let another player do a sol. With a 5 year contract we don't need to worry until late 2009.

By the way isn't 2011 the same year for most of the new contracts - lennon, dawson, king?

that said if we don't fulfill our potential, we could see lennon, dawson, king and the hud all leave !!!
Hmmmm.........

I think Hudd had his worst game in a spurs shirt today....

Gave the ball away way too much and put us in unneccessary pressure - not as shocking as Ghaly though.

This is all part of the learning/development process, just needs to keep it simple!!

if that is the case though, and as long as we dont get relegated, we will make an absolute mint!!!!!!!!

Great news! I was hoping for 6 or 7 years but at least its done. Need to give lennon a 10 year contract too...and dawson etc etc etc

yeah, i agree he made mistakes, but i thought he did alot right. he won a fair few tackles and positioned himself well in parts....and some of his passing was brilliant. the chipped through ball for berbatov was quality and another drilled cross that was meant for defoe at the far post was from a visionary at best. Granted a villa player intercepted, but he has the vision AND the power to do this. Its one thing being able to pass very well over distance, but its a whole let better if you can do this but even quicker, which is what i think Hudd will provide as he develops. Im glad he plays for us and none of the other top 5!!!

Great news for the New Year and shows the clubs ambition to secure our future greats.

There is definitely a sub-set of fans who only see individual mistakes or bits of individual skill, but never seem to see the role a player fulfils in the team. Huddlestone was a major part of our attacking play today. His creativity started a very high proportion of our attacks, especially in the second half. He also patrolled his defensive position very well, much better than in some earlier matches, until after the Barry goal, when his naivety and susceptibility to pressure started to tell and our defence was much more exposed.

Huddlestone gave the ball away perhaps 4-5 times in 90 minutes. Most of the constant change in possession in midfield today was down to players winning the ball, not other players losing it. It's related to what I was posting about after the Newcastle match: sometimes when we don't do well, it's because another team plays well, not because we have cocked up. Villa played very well in midfield and defence today. They lacked quality up front and that's why we won the match.

The last thing we need Huddlestone to do is to set himself a rule to "keep it simple". It would neuter his creativity. He needs to develop his positioning and anticipation until they are at the same level as his passing. As Jol said, significantly, a couple of weeks ago, when the press were first noticing Huddlestone, "on the ball, he is already one of the best midfielders in the league". His point being that, off the ball, he is nothing like that good. Huddlestone tries audacious passes and they often work well. His judgment of when to play short, unambitious passes is pretty good for 19, but he's 6 years younger than Carrick and it shows sometimes. He needs to know when to "keep it simple" and when to try something daring and he's made dramatic progress in that area over the past 2-3 months. It ain't broke, so it don't need fixing. Just let the boy develop, he played just fine today.

As well as audacious passes he was also pretty strong in the tackle today to. Give him time and he will be IMMENSE.

I didn't mention Carrick. My thinking is that if (more likely when) a 'bigger' club comes calling for Big Tom then his head may be turned and his nice long contract counts for diddly because when all is said and done you can't keep players at the club who want to be elsewhere. Sorry to be so pesimistic but the day may come.

fantastic news

Yes, throught we might lose him to Chelsea or Barcalona, the best passer of the ball in the premiership, and not bad at tackling as well

Good news!! Well worth nailing down on a long term, at least we can command a big fee (prob 18m) when they come knocking.

I expect he has hit the 20,000-30,000 a week bracket now, what a christmas bonus!!

Re: davidmatz

I just thought that having watched him for the all the home games he's played already, today was the one that I'll give him the lowest marks for.

I agree he did fine/good but the way he's played until today - I and probably others have got the prior 5+ games as a standard benchmark for him (stupid I know - as of those 5+ games he was pretty much MOTM in most of them). I suppose it's that which makes the mistakes/misplaced passes today more glaringly obvious.

I think I used the "keep it simple" quote as I can't help comparing him to Carrick, as a replacement or better talent. The term I think I should of used is be "smarter" with the ball.

Hudd will pick up this and other tips/tricks from his team mates - Zokora and Berbatov are best at holding up the ball to run down the clock. Hudd just bulldozes through players when he has the ball, so it'll take a couple of players to get it off him when he's holding it up. For the first time today, his dummy with the ball as he turns and creates a bit of space for himself was snuffed out and he was caught out.

Hudd will be a key player in the team..... his set-pieces alone is a vast improvement on what we had last season. He's too exciting a player compare to some of the DM's we've had in recent years.

A Spurs fan getting too excited over the skills of a young British powerhouse of a player...... don't get that too often!! Also, can't help but to add my two-pence worth on how to improve him as a player as well!! :wink:

But Carrick is nevertheless a good contrast. And, in a different way, a good example.

The point of a long contract is that it makes it very expensive for another club to poach a player, because the value of the transfer depends on the value of the services being lost by the selling club; and that value is a combination of the quality of the player, the need of the buying club and the length of service remaining on the contract.

That limits the number of clubs who can afford to bid and also reduces the attractiveness of the player to those who can afford him.

The other point of the long contract is that it signifies that Huddlestone and the people who advise him are not interested in keeping their transfer options open. Otherwise, they would have negotiated to keep the contract to 2 or 3 years. It sounds as if their mindset is that Huddlestone has had his big break, which is to play regularly at 19/20 for a club in the top 6-7 of the Premiership and in the UEFA Cup. and that "good business" for them is to cement his relationship with his employer (and to improve his wages dramatically, I expect), rather than to enable him to "play the field" in 1-2 years' time.

Those extra 2 years are important. By the time Huddlestone's contract is running out, Spurs may be the place to play: assuming we hang onto everyone, Defoe will be 25, Robinson, King and Dawson will be at their peaks, Lennon will be the star winger of the England squad and either Jenas or Zokora will be Hudd's midfield partner of choice.

A lot of hard work has gone into assembling this squad and no less hard work has gone into securing the key players on long-ish contracts and making sure that they know that their quality will not go unrewarded.