Tottenham Vs Bayer Leverkusen: Match Thread

[Archibald&Crooks]

Does it bother you that 2 people agreed that you would'nt be bothered?

Yes. So much so that I couldn't sleep at all last night. Thank you for caring, you're a wonderful human being.

 

[UbeAstard]

All week I was looking forward to going to the game. after a minute or two when lloris, our captain, misplaced a couple of passes, I knew this was going to be a terrible night. It just set the tone for the rest of the game.

I don't know why at the start of games when it is obvious we'll (like we did with Man Citeh) be put under pressure at the back by passing between defender keeper and deep midfielder. Surely it makes sense to have wide men on the move when we're under pressure at this stage and vary tactics by long playing sometimes rather than be predictable. In the later stages Dyer was doing this but we have recently been caught out and almost concede due to the predictable risks we are taking.

 

[dagraham]

If people don't get what Lamela brings to the team, his absence last night illustrated it. He is the pacemaker for the press, which explains why we often lose dominance when he is taken off or improve when he comes on.

Whilst I agree with that, there have been plenty of limp team performances where he has started, so it's too simplistic to put it all on his absence.

And I disagree with your assertion above that we don't lack guile and technique. We have some obviously, but not nearly enough. As you said, we are more of a machine like team, where our success has been based on grinding our opponents down rather than slicing through their defence.

The problem of course with this is when the machine breaks down or opponents find a way to crack the code then things can start to fall apart quite quickly. Of course, all successful teams have to have a work ethic and show desire and aggression, but this isn't enough on it's own. Just as talent and footballing ability alone is not enough. We constantly hear from Poch how we need to show more aggression and more desire and whilst I don't disagree, I don't think just running around like nutters is going to solve the problem.

We are in danger of becoming far too reliant on Kane, which is something that I think us Spurs fans felt was a thing of the past. You can blame poor form and the loss of our top scorer, but our attacking play is very poor and one dimensional. We seem to need infinite time on the ball and take several touches before working out what we want to do and any time a team presses us we shit ourselves and don't have the footballing ability to play through it.

 

[spursfan77]

I'd like to blame the grass for our passes going astray, but it looked more like some of our players had been smoking some.

I'm not using it as an excuse for our players not being able to pass the ball but more that it seems to produce a slow game. England games look equally tedious.

 

[degoose]

People complaining about the atmosphere etc the team gave the crowd absolutely nothing to get excited about last night , nothing at all . Some fans did try to get the chants going but it was difficult, and as we know the German crowds are organised and consistent throughout the 90mins, they drowned out any chants from small sections of the spurs vocal support .

Highlight of my night was the pan nation steel band. Awesome .

Yep agreed. The atmosphere was not there because of the awful football played.

That performance last night was on par with the 1 nil loss we had to Wigan a few years ago when Rodallega nabbed a goal. The football was dull,had a complete lack of zip and there was no intelligent passing. It gave the crowd nothing to cheer and then Bayer nabbed a goal and just time wasted constantly. It's bloody hard to get a good atmosphere going when the play was dull, the other team waste time and the ref gives us nothing.

 

[ernie78]

Yep agreed. The atmosphere was not there because of the awful football played.

That performance last night was on par with the 1 nil loss we had to Wigan a few years ago when Rodallega nabbed a goal. The football was dull,had a complete lack of zip and there was no intelligent passing. It gave the crowd nothing to cheer and then Bayer nabbed a goal and just time wasted constantly. It's bloody hard to get a good atmosphere going when the play was dull, the other team waste time and the ref gives us nothing.

Yep. When your goal keeper has more touches than your forwards then there's little to cheer about

 

[UbeAstard]

I wonder if sissoko has problems with his eyesight. 3 or 4 times tonight a ball was coming through the air right to him, and he completely misread it and headed fresh air. To keep completely missing the ball can't be normal.

Maybe he's copying Eriksen, jump and make it look as if your going to head the ball but you have no intention.

 

[dagraham]

I only saw the last ten minutes of the first half, we looked really good. what happened in the other 80 minutes?

Wouldn't go that far. We were ok, but yes that was our best and only period where we looked like we might be able to win the football match. Even in that period though we had several comic moments in defence, one of which presented the best chance of the match so far to Leverkuesan.

One moment during that brief period before half time has stuck out for me. I think it came from their corner and we had a break where Ali found some space an got on the half turn, with Jansenn up there too. We then had about three of four other Spurs players just jogging about in the centre circle. Not ONE of them bothered to even attempt to get into the box or support the attack. It's like everyone was hiding and no one wanted to take any responsibility.

Walker was poor in defence on plenty of occasions, but I at least give him the credit of trying to stand up and make things happen with a few runs at their defence. The rest of them just looked a mixture of frightened and knackered in equal measure.

 

[Monkey boy]

For what its worth I weirdly still think that we'll qualify. Perhaps going out to Monaco knowing that only a win will be good enough is just the motivation we need?

 

[WalkerboyUK]

My brother flew in from Atlanta for that shit-fest..... HAHAHAHAHA!!!


Actually, he flew in for a wedding this weekend, and managed to combine with the game last night, but still.....

 

[Sweetsman]

I'm not using it as an excuse for our players not being able to pass the ball but more that it seems to produce a slow game. England games look equally tedious.

The ball did seem to not reach their intended target and it may be that the likes of Eriksen can't gauge the speed on it. If we do make it through, I suggest that the dummy Wembley pitch at Hotspur Way also has the same grass as Wembley.

 

[Sweetsman]

My brother flew in from Atlanta for that shit-fest..... HAHAHAHAHA!!!
Poor bloke

Actually, he flew in for a wedding this weekend, and managed to combine with the game last night, but still.....

 

[Sweetsman]

For what its worth I weirdly still think that we'll qualify. Perhaps going out to Monaco knowing that only a win will be good enough is just the motivation we need?

The next game is away, but Falcao is firing again. We will have to put out our strongest team to win there.

 

[Sweetsman]

Whilst I agree with that, there have been plenty of limp team performances where he has started, so it's too simplistic to put it all on his absence.

And I disagree with your assertion above that we don't lack guile and technique. We have some obviously, but not nearly enough. As you said, we are more of a machine like team, where our success has been based on grinding our opponents down rather than slicing through their defence.

The problem of course with this is when the machine breaks down or opponents find a way to crack the code then things can start to fall apart quite quickly. Of course, all successful teams have to have a work ethic and show desire and aggression, but this isn't enough on it's own. Just as talent and footballing ability alone is not enough. We constantly hear from Poch how we need to show more aggression and more desire and whilst I don't disagree, I don't think just running around like nutters is going to solve the problem.

We are in danger of becoming far too reliant on Kane, which is something that I think us Spurs fans felt was a thing of the past. You can blame poor form and the loss of our top scorer, but our attacking play is very poor and one dimensional. We seem to need infinite time on the ball and take several touches before working out what we want to do and any time a team presses us we shit ourselves and don't have the footballing ability to play through it.

At halftime, we saw the volley Bale scored with for Madrid. When you don't have that level of mature talent, it is the system that needs to compensate. I thought that Poch made a mistake when he brought on Janssen for Dembele when Winks may have been the more logical choice. Just because 4-1-4-1 worked one or two times, I think the team is used to 4-2-3-1 and we may play better with that.

 

[Sweetsman]

Whilst I agree with that, there have been plenty of limp team performances where he has started, so it's too simplistic to put it all on his absence.

And I disagree with your assertion above that we don't lack guile and technique. We have some obviously, but not nearly enough. As you said, we are more of a machine like team, where our success has been based on grinding our opponents down rather than slicing through their defence.

The problem of course with this is when the machine breaks down or opponents find a way to crack the code then things can start to fall apart quite quickly. Of course, all successful teams have to have a work ethic and show desire and aggression, but this isn't enough on it's own. Just as talent and footballing ability alone is not enough. We constantly hear from Poch how we need to show more aggression and more desire and whilst I don't disagree, I don't think just running around like nutters is going to solve the problem.

We are in danger of becoming far too reliant on Kane, which is something that I think us Spurs fans felt was a thing of the past. You can blame poor form and the loss of our top scorer, but our attacking play is very poor and one dimensional. We seem to need infinite time on the ball and take several touches before working out what we want to do and any time a team presses us we shit ourselves and don't have the footballing ability to play through it.

We need players to be making decisions on the pitch, but we aren't at that stage yet. We will need to see how we progress when Poch has more time between games to coach.

 

[DEFchenkOE]

At halftime, we saw the volley Bale scored with for Madrid. When you don't have that level of mature talent, it is the system that needs to compensate. I thought that Poch made a mistake when he brought on Janssen for Dembele when Winks may have been the more logical choice. Just because 4-1-4-1 worked one or two times, I think the team is used to 4-2-3-1 and we may play better with that.

To me this means that Poch puts players before his system , not saying that is necessarily a bad thing but if after half an hour and Dembele gets injured and you opt to bring on a striker and change system instead of another midfielder, it shows to me that he is a bit unsure of things.

 

[dagraham]

We need players to be making decisions on the pitch, but we aren't at that stage yet. We will need to see how we progress when Poch has more time between games to coach.

He's not going to get that time though is he until mid December? Something needs to be addressed now before the slump continues and stuffs up our season before it's even got going. We can't just rely on Kane coming back and banging the goals in straight away.

 

[Sweetsman]

To me this means that Poch puts players before his system , not saying that is necessarily a bad thing but if after half an hour and Dembele gets injured and you opt to bring on a striker and change system instead of another midfielder, it shows to me that he is a bit unsure of things.

I think that he is trying to integrate the new players and to find a system that works. This is so that our team doesn't fail in the final stretch of the season. He is also developing as a manager.

 

[sebo_sek]

How is he a clutz? He might not be scoring but that isn't due to him not being able to control a ball and shooting at the corner flag. He got sod all service last night, Kane wouldn't have had a sniff last night either.
And it's Janssen

Watch Dier's freekick again. Seriously he should have been all over that rebound and instead it got lost somwhere between his feet, and not for the first time either.
If you read my posts I've always supported him, but in light of our absolute goal drought, we have to look to strikers to be able to create something out of nothing - like Kane.
I know he is learning and I hope it happens for him sooner rather than later, but for now he is the fastest in the league, we have 60% possession per game and have not scored from open play in what 4 games? That is how bad it is!

 

[DiscoD1882]

I think we have just become too risk averse. We have got to start flooding the box when we are attacking. The only time we have more than one player in the box is when we have a corner or a and god know we are terrible at those. I would rather we lose trying to win. than draw trying not to lose.