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Toby Alderweireld

I was at the game so didn't read or contribute much to the OMT

They had no real attacks of note until the last ten when they went route one.

If there were people panicking on the OMT I'd put that down to the normal pessimistic nature of spurs fans personally

Yeah did put us under pressure but their only chance was the corner and that was it
 
metalgear said:
yeah we must have. just go through the last 20 minutes of the game in the game thread. people were wishing for 1 -1 !
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Well there is you first mistake if you are making judgements on how we played by the match thread. I suggest you get out more and actually go to a game to get a real view of what happens on a match day.
 
Bedfordspurs said:
You want your defenders to be boring and predictable
You want your creative and attackers to be almost the opposite

We Tick all the boxes at the moment with our defence
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Agree with the sentiment. But i thought our defence looked poor against Watford.
parklane1 said:
Well there is you first mistake if you are making judgements on how we played by the match thread. I suggest you get out more and actually go to a game to get a real view of what happens on a match day.
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wrong assumption. i watched the full game live on telly. was in the match thread all along the game.
 
metalgear said:
Agree with the sentiment. But i thought our defence looked poor against Watford.

wrong assumption. i watched the full game live on telly. was in the match thread all along the game.
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A very much in form Watford that started the game 3 points behind us with 4 wins in their last 5 including a 3-0 win against Liverpool a couple of weeks before playing us.
They had 9 total shots, 1 on target. One clear cut chance all game, other than that a corner and a couple of blocked shots that looked dangerous.

We managed this while our defence looked poor?

How many chances would you expect us to limit them to over 90 minutes in a game like this for us to look good?
 
in poch's system our defence isn't about preventing shots on goal. its about pressing and preventing them from getting control of the game in our half. for long spells late in the second half we were scrambling and could not clear our lines. we weren 't pressing, just reacting. we pretty much lost our structure and the gameplan. Full credit to the boys for effort, reslience and grit. But we weren't so well organized with 3 at the back, and did not have the usual response.
 
metalgear said:
in poch's system our defence isn't about preventing shots on goal. its about pressing and preventing them from getting control of the game in our half. for long spells late in the second half we were scrambling and could not clear our lines. we weren 't pressing, just reacting. we pretty much lost our structure and the gameplan. Full credit to the boys for effort, reslience and grit. But we weren't so well organized with 3 at the back, and did not have the usual response.
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Disagree. Part of the reason we press is obviously to prevent shots on goal...

We're not Barcelona under Pep, we're not looking to press and control the game for 90 minutes.

Several games this season we've absorbed pressure rather well and we've managed to sit back and defended well in that style. All part of the system as far as I can see.
Only issue this season when defending like this has been that we've struggled to launch enough counter attacks (imo). Too many games when we've had the lead we've failed to take full advantage by counter attacking the opponents into submission as they have to try to take control of the game. Against Watford that obviously wasn't the case as we countered in the winner.
 
braineclipse said:
Disagree. Part of the reason we press is obviously to prevent shots on goal...

We're not Barcelona under Pep, we're not looking to press and control the game for 90 minutes.

Several games this season we've absorbed pressure rather well and we've managed to sit back and defended well in that style. All part of the system as far as I can see.
Only issue this season when defending like this has been that we've struggled to launch enough counter attacks (imo). Too many games when we've had the lead we've failed to take full advantage by counter attacking the opponents into submission as they have to try to take control of the game. Against Watford that obviously wasn't the case as we countered in the winner.
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Do you think that hindsight might have influenced your evaluation of the game?
Did you really think we would get the winner at the end, especially the period after Watford went down to 10 men? Don't forget that Watford came centimetres away from scoring just before Son got the winner, with an audacious but risky back heel flick.
 
metalgear said:
Do you think that hindsight might have influenced your evaluation of the game?
Did you really think we would get the winner at the end, especially the period after Watford went down to 10 men? Don't forget that Watford came centimetres away from scoring just before Son got the winner, with an audacious but risky back heel flick.
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I remember my expectations of the game. I thought I would be happy with a fairly tight fought game that saw a performance from us that deserved a draw (we got that).

I remember some of my feelings during the game. Thought we failed to create enough chances after they went down to 10 men. Thought they fought back well through some set pieces and hard work to get the initiative back in the final 10 minutes, clearly an on form team working really hard. I thought we defended quite well. Particularly I thought we defended set pieces a lot better than we have in the last couple of weeks/months (been a worry for me so I think that's why I noticed). And I thought all along that we could easily get a winner from a counter attack if it just fell our way.

If our goal with our defending isn't to prevent shots as you claim (I still find that strange). What were your expectations defensively before the Watford game?
 
i thought we ought to have beaten watford, but would have been happy for a draw if we had put up a good fight.
we drew but we were struggling badly.
 
metalgear said:
i thought we ought to have beaten watford, but would have been happy for a draw if we had put up a good fight.
we drew but we were struggling badly.
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Away from home against a team 3 points behind us in great form we ought to win? Is that really a realistic expectation? You don't think your expectation might be influencing how you judge our defending?

What do you mean by struggling badly? We struggled badly, but without actually conceding many shots or chances. This doesn't make a ton of sense to me.
 
metalgear said:
The stats are misleading, go read the match thread to find out sentiments before our last minute goal. Especially after the red card.

Like Poch, I won't judge a coach too harshly in his first two years with the club; especially the first one. There's just too much to do.
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Yeah, pull the other one :D.
Poch is in his first two years atm and that hasn't stopped you talking horsebrick about him (whilst lavishing praise on coaches who are in similar positions and have done no better or performed similarly, Klopp as a case in point..)
 
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Raziel brought up the potential to become world class in the Dembele thread. I thought of and mentioned Alderweireld, got me thinking...

World class is a big term and perhaps a bit beyond Alderweireld. But he's doing really well and at 26 (27 in March) he's just about coming into that age where centre backs typically start reaching their consistent best.

How good do you guys think he will be in two years?
 
braineclipse said:
Raziel brought up the potential to become world class in the Dembele thread. I thought of and mentioned Alderweireld, got me thinking...

World class is a big term and perhaps a bit beyond Alderweireld. But he's doing really well and at 26 (27 in March) he's just about coming into that age where centre backs typically start reaching their consistent best.

How good do you guys think he will be in two years?
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At the risk of sounding daft... What more can he do???

His only poor error was against Stoke for the pen

He is head and shoulders above every defender in This league This season and this is an incredibly attacking league

He also has goals and assist to his name

The only thing holding his reputation back is he isn't glamorous and doesn't play centre back all the time for his country
 
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