Good morning.
It was a combination of things. After the intensity and focus of Thursday’s performance invoked the Tottingham malaise of not quite being at the races for their next game. QPR pressed and pressed. The first half and indeed good spells of the second were miserable.
A key issue we have is that the physical absences of Modric and Rafa have been filled but the overall creative footballing IQ of the group has dropped.
Now this is in part to players still finding their way. But right now we aren’t as mentally dangerous as we were. Or at least we weren’t yesterday. Now, fortunately we have a manager with a tactical brain of immense human dimensions, but the plan that I and many others thought was good turned out to be …less than good.
Bale at left back didn’t work. Not only was his heart not in it, but it left us beyond uninspired up front. And of the entire 90 minutes Bale’s charge alongside Jan Vertongen and the subsequent goal was not only the only highlight of the afternoon but what is really damning is that it is was a one off. Bale eventually moved up to play as an inverted winger and it was here when playing from deep he and Vertonghen showed the benefit of players with pace having space to in which to exploit it.
Admittedly this isn’t a classic example to make the point I appreciate, as it was a break. But Bale in a position that is too forward negates his pace as he has nothing approaching the space in which to fly and really cause havoc. I think his worry is that he was turning into a one trick pony who every time he got the ball he went haring up the wing.
If his season continues like this the only positive that will come out of it will be that January’s back pages won’t be carrying any ‘Barca Set To Swoop’ tales.When I wrote that Ego Has Landed piece it wasn’t well received. Weeks later fans at games were singing ‘He plays on the left’.
Bale is drifting into the realm of the mediocre and he needs to find a compromise that works for Tottenham somewhere between his Ronaldo ‘vision’ and being an outstanding footballer in the Lilywhite. Right now, he’s being indulged. So there, I told you so.
The boss switched to a 442 or as near as dammit in the second half and this made the onslaught from QPR ‘less worse’.
The league table says we won and took all 3 points but the table doesn’t say how fragile we were and how much possession QPR who aren’t the world’s greatest were allowed. Manchester United up next in the premiership and we won’t buck the losing habit of a lifetime playing like that. It was confused and unconvincing out there yesterday and a really talented outfit would have kicked our heads in.
He kept us in the game. He stopped them from winning.
If he wasn’t a footballer he’d open up a gym called ‘Love Muscles’ that would shut down within a year. Or start a fight in a Chick King demanding to order a pizza. Thick as paint.
Yes he gave the ball away, yes he was off his game. Playing with Kyle would leave most people sucking their thumb in the fetal position, with a facial tick. So he did quite well to stay on the pitch.
I’m a fan. Very, very happy to see him out there. More please.
Forget the big boys coming in for Bale. Jan’s the man who will be getting all the press attention come the new year and it will be genuine. Eridivisie player of the year and looking good enough to walk into any top flight European first eleven.
It’s early doors but we urgently need to find this guy a specific role. Right now we have a talented bloke who seems to spend most of his time doing a good impression of a dog chasing cars. This was QPR and he wasn’t quite up to the task.
Beast-like. Given that fact that he was doing the job of at least three people it’s little surprise he looked knackered come the end. He was outstanding.
Suffering from being frequently hemmed in, but he didn’t help himself. He needs to move. make space and have in his head, ‘what would I do if I got the ball know?’ Too frequently the ball came to him and he seemed to start weighing up his options from scratch.
Lennon flattered to deceive. Lots of huff and puff but bantam weight on achievement. Needs to find the confidence to start taking shots on goal, especially when cutting in, he also needs to do this and make his passes at least a yard sooner. You can hear every fan in the world shouting ‘hit it!’ then there’s a 2 second delay and he does it.
Sort it out.
A bit nothingy.
He scored. Elsewhere he contributed zip.
The good news was that he changed the system and by the skin of our teeth we took the points. I’m really worried that players like Walker and Bale are saying, ‘yeah boss, 100% boss’ and then going out there and doing whatever the hell they feel like. When Benny returns he needs to shuffle the back four and bench Kyle.
You were booing again weren’t you? Those that boo their own should be evicted by a squad of heavy mob stewards. If the price of admission is weighing so heavy then refund these arrogant dogs.
Nor do I want to hear that ‘others were doing it and they just sort of joined in.’ Funny, that’s what a lot of people said about National Socialism in the 1940’s. Booing at half time and clapping at full time. If I was playing I’d tell you to stick your full time cheers up your bottoms. You’re not fans, you’re idiots. How do you go in the Home stands when you sound like the blokes in the Away end?
Bit harsh on Kyle. Yes he had a mare yesterday but overall I think he’s a decent player.
I think Defoe is looking a lot sharper than he has for a long time. He just didn’t seem to be getting enough support from midfield. There was just too much of a gap for him to play his best game. He was far more comfortable after the switch to 442.
Sandro and Vertongen were immense and I think Dembele is a great acquisition, but we just didn’t seem to click.
Lets be realistic QPR shouldn’t have been much of a challenge, Meeting the big boys will be a worry on this form.
Avb may be have a ‘tactical brain’ but something aint right with the way he comes across.
please expand on your statement.
comes across what?
From my perspective watching the game, Sandro was 90% terrible yesterday, a headless chicken and a liability. Flying in and missing tackles, giving the ball away repeatedly. Giving away really stupid fouls where there was no need.
I’m a fan, but just disagree with you there, yesterday was not a good day for him.
Also, Vert aside – who was dimensionally immense indeed – Lennon was far and away our best and most consistently useful player over the 90 minutes.
Can’t really judge Bale too accurately as he was LB first half but still managed to contribute directly to both goals (as he usually does if you actually think about it) when he moved further up. Similar moving Dempsey centrally was also a large reason why we were so starkly better in the 2nd half (in that we edged it, rather than being completely outdone by QPR in the first half).
LLL Sandro was 90% terrible??????????????????
The man was fantastic!
no sorry..
FANTASTIC!!!!
Well I must have had a bad view. His ball retention was woeful. Really bad.
He puts himself everyhere and does everything. Thats because he takes maximumn rfesponsibility and whatever he does he does 1000%.
Other player and just looking and he is going.
He wasnt worse than any other player with his retention of the ball….why single one of our best out?
Quite simply because from my perspective he turned the ball over more than any other player and therefore contributed a lot to our lack of control. I may be wrong, are there stats?
Generally speaking, as I said, I’m a big fan. But yesterday was the worst I’ve seen him play. Everyone can have a bad game.
Our best players yesterday were Vertonghen, Lennon, Friedal, Dembele – in that order. I think Sandro was just behind Sig and Walker in our worst performers on the day.
Sandro has two distinct parts to his game:
1. Defensive interception
2. passing the ball and choosing a pass to turn defence into attack
He did the first one as well as he always does, but sadly the passing boots were left in the changerooms.
I watched the game live and then again this morning Perth WA time and its amazing how different I perceived it the second time around, without the angst that had me cussing and swearing at the tv the night before during that first half.
Verts was immense both times I watched it. Thats the name going on the back of the shirt this season… it was going to be Levy but Verts has shown his class above the rest.
Kyle didn’t have the best day out but made a few good tackles and did his bit.
The rest I totally agree with.
Soggy Siggy unfortunately, though he didn’t do an aweful lot wrong, made some decent passes but 90% of the time was running around everywhere (possibly in the name of pressure) with very little influence. I’d like to see him play behind Ade as I think the hold up play will get him into the game a bit better to make those killer passes and 18 yard pile drivers.
Wouldn’t dare critisize Sandro. Had he not been available yesterday we would have lost the game. He is immense and will only get better. He has also stopped the silly tackles which got him booked last season. I absolutely love his style as it turns defence into attack 90% of the time.
Sandro made 40 passes and completed 34 of them. That’s an 85% the 3rd most passes in the team (behind Dembele and Vert).
He has been (IMO) irreplacable this season. Parker better get used to the idea of playing less games this season.
Well, honestly I can’t argue with the stats but watching from the subjective perspective in the stands, he seemed to be in a bit of a mess. Perhaps his passes were going to people who were heavily marked. Incidentally, that was a key feature yesterday, quite a number of times we passed to someone with a player literally on their back rather than look to the free man or the space.
I agree, Sandro is indispensable, though I think anyone can have a duff game, and thought he had one yesterday. Can’t change that opinion unless I rewatch the game!
It’s not often I agree with you LLL, but we’re of the same accord regarding Sandro yesterday. I thought it was the poorest performance I’ve seen him put in for us for a long time.
A lot of the sub-par performances yesterday can be put down to the after-effects of the Lazio game. Chelsea, City and United all played below their best following a midweek run out, with only Arsenal and Liverpool (who fielded a youth team in midweek) played anything like we know they can.
Maybe it’s possible to play your first team game in game out if you’re Porto, but the same is definitely not the case over here. Hopefully our GBG has learned this already and won’t be making the same mistake again.
LLL you make a fair point about Sandro…compared to other games he would probably admit to himself that he had a poor one…but compared to the rest he still put in a really good, full hearted which I love the guy for, decent shift and I agree with others can only fear what would of happened without him. Normally he is pretty confident of turning around and looking for a forward pass but not yesterday…I couldn’t help noiticing, through my fingers as I can’t bear to watch any SPURS game in injury time, that when the final whistle blew he instantly jumped up onto the back of GALLAS in celebration…he is the badge just love the fella.
Finally let’s not disrespect QPR…they were bloody everywhere, 2 on 1 eachtime hunting down and being very physical about it, just damn glad none of our players got crocked yesterday as it looked like it was going to happen.
The QPR fans teased us singing that it “was a Library” and they were right, it was ! Piss poor real support on most occassions I’m afraid and you got the feeling that the boys were fairly nervous as well as lethargic out there.
We all need to really get behind them at this key stage in the Clubs development.
Good point about the crowd, was my first game of the season and the atmosphere was dire. What happened to the rowdy Lane of a few years back? Embarrassing really.
Indidpebsible is the word.So no need to pick hjim out when there were 6 other players out of sync
I disagree, I felt he did stand out as being one of the worst offenders, and moreover disagreed with Harold above that he was amongst our best on the day. This is a discussion type deal, this blog, isn’t it?
Picking out Sandro for negative comments is diabolical.Period.
Sandro had so much to do but is a monster – even when he’d run himself into the ground he kept going and put the tackles in. This is a guy Harry had little faith in who has started maybe 20 games? He should be the future of this team.
Ronnie Ronnie Ronnie.
If we are doing player ratings then it’s only right to appraise each player accurately, as you see it. Otherwise what is the point of all this jibber jabber?
@Mattspurs
He is the present of the team and I’m sure a mainstay for some time. That doesn’t mean he played well yesterday. That’s all.
LLL,LLL,LLL,LLL,LLL
Everythbing is perspective,please.
4 midfielders
Sigg,Dembele,Dempsey and Sandro
Only Sandro had a game.The other three were MIA (AWOL)
Ok so some passes went astray.So?
Ronnie Ronnie Ronnie Ronnie
RONNIE
Ronnie. We disagree in our assessment of Sandro’s performance yesterday. That’s all. We are both entitled to our opinions.
Personally thought Dembele was one of our better performers on a bad day. I thought Sandro was one of our worse. You thought he was fantastic. I can deal with that.
so let me fucking finish of the discussion by saying that Sandro was a 1000 times better than Dembele yesterday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have very high hopes for Caulker and I definitely see the logic in promoting a young player with great potential and pace above Dawson. That said, I think he was a bit shaky yesterday. Vert’s amazing tackle was a consequence of his shaky defending and Gallas had to drop deep in (correct) anticipation of him getting sucked under a high ball at one point. Caulker was good at offensive freekicks, but I’m not sure we should chuck him in against Man U. A few more cup games to ease him in might be worthwhile.
The first half was abject with us being beaten to every single loose ball. We were better second half. I think Sandro was doing two players’ work. I’d like to see Dembele move higher up the pitch where his dribbling might do more damage as his passing from deep seems to be the only thing he currently lacks. With Hudd next to Sandro we might improve our passing in home games where we need to dictate rather than play on the break.
At the moment we seem more suited to away games, lacking a great passer in midfield (Sig seems our best passer but yesterday it was the game that passed him by…) and Defoe unable to really hold the ball up. I’m looking forward to Ade’s return.
QPR are a decent team though, it must be said. A bit of a mish-mash, but some strong players, especially their two centre midfielders.
COYS
In the run-up to Vert’s wünder-tackle Gallas was badly out of position. Sure, not a great clearance from Caulker (under pressure), but if Billy is where he’s supposed to there wouldn’t have been a chance at all. Defending 101: stay between the man and goal. He didn’t.
A midfield of Thud, Sandro and Dembele could be pretty effective imo. Sandro wins the ball, Thud passes the ball, Dembele does the box to box and dribble thing.
I really hope AVB gives Thud his opportunity. He’s given Sig 5 starts in a row, and he hasn’t really delivered anything whatsoever.
Stone me, again we concur. I’d love to see a Huddlestone/Sandro partnership in the middle with Dembele playing a more advanced role just off Defoe (at least until Ade’s fit) with Bale and Lennon out wide.
I don’t understand the high regard that Demspey seems to be held in in these parts as he’s done nothing so far in a Spurs shirt to warrant it. In fact, if anything he looks like he could provide competition for Defoe in the ‘greedy’ stakes.
And to think that we paid £6m for him whilst Fulham only forked out £4m for Berbatov…
You guys put way too much faith in Adebatyhole.
I’m fully behind this AVB malarky, but one things that has given me the recurring heebiejeebies over the last few games has been the scenario where the opposing team have been attacking down the wing about to put a ball in and they have one guy in particular in the box in acres of space just waiting for a tap-in that our defence don’t seem too concerned about. Luckily on each occasion they’ve put in a shit ball or some other fluke has saved us, but against someone like Man U that kind of behaviour will get us a spanking. Anyone else noticed this, or is it just me having a little panic.
This is to do with individual players marking over trying to win by the offside rule.I go for marking 100% of the time