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*Official Match Thread* Tottenham Hotspur vs Norwich

To actually execute tactics, you need the proper tools. AVB has not been given those tools, with the heart of the creativity, guile, and vision ripped out of his team. Even if all of the players are technically adept at passing, even if they're all great dribblers (and they're not), that doesn't mean they have vision, a sense of where and when to pass, anything approaching Modric's passing range and quickness of transition. To break down a team, it takes more than individual skill, it takes more than even movement - it takes things like rapid ball circulation and the ability to spot and execute key passes quickly. Look at United - even their mediocre players are typically able to one-touch pass with speed, so they inevitably win games even with the weakest United team on paper in a long time (how many years have I been hearing this???) and some very strange formations.

I am not going to judge AVB particularly harshly until he is allowed to bring in HIS players. For now, I'd like to see Carroll given a chance, because it's not like we can do much worse. :lol: Even though we see plenty of the ball, we are sorely lacking in the desire and the ability to do something with it.
 
Spot on! I think a lot of the FM tacticians on this forum would be quite shocked if they were a fly on the wall in training or tactical team talks. Most stuff given to players is very basic and the players do the rest.

As a rule I think coaches are over rated. Teams SOMETIMES even win in spite of them. Look at England in the 1990 World Cup. Robson gave them his instructions and the team went out and completely ignored them Played Wright as a sweeper if I remember correctly. The media did not know and lauded Robson as a tactical genius, when nothing could have been further from the truth.
 
As a rule I think coaches are over rated. Teams SOMETIMES even win in spite of them. Look at England in the 1990 World Cup. Robson gave them his instructions and the team went out and completely ignored them Played Wright as a sweeper if I remember correctly. The media did not know and lauded Robson as a tactical genius, when nothing could have been further from the truth.

If anything, it was typical England. We only really played well in the semi final and were unlucky admittedly, but the rest of the games were same old England. Didn't we draw with Ireland?
 
That's 3 match of the days I can't watch tonight. Seriously prefer to go 1-0 down and equalise than let in another late fuxking goal. It was so obvious we should have gone for 2-0. Why the fudge take off Defoe u thick **** avb
 
That's 3 match of the days I can't watch tonight. Seriously prefer to go 1-0 down and equalise than let in another late fuxking goal. It was so obvious we should have gone for 2-0. Why the fudge take off Defoe u thick **** avb

I am a pessimist, but I just knew we would concede late again today. We look very dodgy at the back! And more worryingly, we don't look like scoring much like the start of 08/09.
 
I agree he should not have started today and should not start now we have Dembele and Sandro. Alongside Dembele if Sandro's hurt? Fine.
As for your second point high lit above, let's just agree that I have no clue then mate. Like Redknapp didn't, like AVB doesn't and like Hodgson doesn't. Clueless the lot of us. Guilty as charged.
Your third point? Again, and to make this very clear, you are correct, it is a silly comment. Irrelevant? No. YOU started that particular line of silliness by calling out his lack of England youth caps. Accept your part in what I agree is tedious sub-thread within our exchanges.

again you sho yur ignorance. the fact he has no international youth caps is entirely the point....i reckon there are no players in or around any of our competitors with a playerwho has no youth caps...find me another...he wasnt quality as a youth ...so where has he come from? and why is he deemed giodd enough by anyone...he has no pedigree....no talent to command a place in front of us....how is he deemed good enough? because heisnt.......he will end up at a lower side within a few years so i ask again why do you deem him good enough now? is he as good as even chelsea, man yoos cieth's arsenal 6th choice defensive midfieler?? i sufgest not...s why is he stinking out our first team?
 
I am a pessimist, but I just knew we would concede late again today. We look very dodgy at the back! And more worryingly, we don't look like scoring much like the start of 08/09.

Mate I'm a massive pessimist and I'm first to say this but even the happiest most optimistic taco in the world could see they were going to equalise. We are awful and so mentally weak
 
Gallas is a disgrace..i reckon we only kept him to get Lloris....did anyone else notice ho fuct he was at 70minutes.....its frightening watching him one on one....its getting really silly now.
 
Today reminded me of Hoddle's last few months in charge. Do the players know what to do? Is the manager getting the best out of them?

I'd say no to both these questions atm.
 
Today reminded me of Hoddle's last few months in charge. Do the players know what to do? Is the manager getting the best out of them?

I'd say no to both these questions atm.

fair enough i sort f felt taht too but he has the excuse of so fe games. hoddle- it breaks iur hearts but lost the pliot big time..but there is one mre differnce..watch his bbcinterview..unlike hoddle and that bell end end redknapp who was so keen for the england job he admitted nothing, , he admitted we were bad...and that is a start. at least.
 
Was at a party for one of my little sons mates today so could only follow via live score. I'm worried to be honest. Was at the WBA game last week and thought we offered very little. Disappointed Ade didn't start today too.
 
Last week, I was pleased with the performance but disappointed with the result. This week, I was pleased with the result, but disappointed with the performance. The rationale behind this is that Norwich deserved something out of the game.

Our first half performance was probably one of the worst I'd seen for 4 years, but we got a point out of a game we lost last year. If I were a teacher, I single out Freidal and Vertonghen for special praise, along with Dembele for an excellent finish. As for the rest, the classic phrase "must try harder" springs to mind?

I understand that some people have been quick to criticise AVB and Levy, but the truth of the matter is that Modric and VdV wanted to go, so whoever was at the helm would have had the unenviable task of replacing two irreplaceable players. For those who have said that HR and Berbatov would have made a difference, I am afraid that you have very short memories. One would have dropped us as quick as a starving lady of the night would have dropped her knickers, had England came calling and who referred to us as "them", whilst the other went on strike!

As for AVB and Levy, I think they have done the right thing and I am positive that we will see the benefits in the long run. Remember SAF was one game away from the sack, whilst the "other north London" club has kept the faith with AW.

Come on you lot, get behind the team FFS, its embarrassing when fans boo their own team!!
 
Re: Bad substitution two weeks in a row

The subs the last two weeks have bemused me too. But what has me completely worried is:

a) last season we tried (didn't always succeed but we tried) to play a possession game, an attractive fluid game. This season we are rigid, tactically inept, dull, defensive minded and too often long ball because we run out of ideas. Now I am fully aware that VDV, Modric and Parker were the three main players in that passing game and all are missing, but I do really hope that it's just a case of the players getting used to the system because we truly are playing a turgid brand of football right now.

b) the last two weeks we've started 4-5-1 and looked average. We switch to 4-4-2 and go 1-0 up. Then, despite us being at home, we switch back to 4-5-1 to play out the 1-0 win and end up drawing 1-1. That frustrates the fudge out of me.

c) AVB seems to think Livermore is a better option than Sandro. I find that very strange!

d) Friedel has been our MOTM the last two matches.....at home.....to average sides. That is VERY worrying! And he'll probably be dropped for the next league game too which would send out an awful signal to the players IMHO. But how can you sign Lloris and then have him on the bench? That would send out a bad signal to anyone wanting to join the club.

e) we don't have a single midfielder who can put their foot on the ball or who is comfortable receiving a pass under pressure. Last season Modric/VDV/Parker were all very good at receiving the ball under pressure, this season we only have Bale who can receive it under pressure and still produce a pass or keep possession.

AVB has a lot of work to do, but we still have the players at the club to make top six. My final thoughts are that I warned people last season that the previous three years have been a mini golden era. People were so focused on the negatives and misguidedly believing that we could (even should!) have done better that they utterly failed to appreciate what was being achieved. Two 4th places in three seasons is an AMAZING achievement for a club of our limited stature. Even if Redknapp had stayed it was highly unlikely that we'd have matched the last three seasons, this season because those last three seasons we were punching above our weight. It simply wasn't sustainable regardless of who is in charge.

Agreed on all counts.

The players coming on weren't wrong, it was the initial team selection and the decisions on who was replaced that were downright awful today. Defoe on his own up front was never going to be a good idea against West Brom and it was shockingly bad, but AVB at least had the vague reasoning behind it that Adebayor was short of match practice and fitness. No such excuse today. We spent 56 minutes hoofing high balls up to Defoe who never won any of them of course and of course, created very little, we looked miles better once he came on. Not starting Dembele was almost as stupid, the guy is fit and in form and was buzzing and raring to go. Instead we started with two holding midfielders at home to a team that will in all likeliness be battling relegation this season. Of course we created fudge all. I was also surprised to see Gallas too, I really thought Caulker would be given a chance but Gallas was very poor today.

Once Adebayor and Dembele were on the pitch we scored a goal and had a couple of other chances. But by not starting them we effectively wasted the entire first half which is a ludicrous thing to do. AVB did bring on the right players but he also brought off the wrong ones. Sandro wasn't having a particularly good game, but neither was Livermore, and they are both holding midfielders, they perform the same role, and Sandro is clearly better. So what the fudge was AVB thinking in choosing him to go off instead? For the second week running? The next decision to take off Sigurdsson was also a poor one, as he is now there to carry out the creative role that Van Der Vaart used to do behind the striker. Surely anybody can see that we will see the best of him with the ball at his feet playing off Adebayor, not chasing non-existent knock downs from Defoe or coming deep to get the ball from one of the holding midfielders. Instead, we took him off for Adebayor. That meant that we had no passing midfielders left on the pitch, and there was a horrible moment where we got a corner and nobody even stepped up to take it because clearly nobody left on the pitch had been practising them. Finally, right near the end of the game, when we were in the lead and finally on the front foot, AVB took off Defoe, a striker, who was working hard and was now finally in a formation that he might actually be able to do something useful in. And he took him off for Huddlestone, a defensive midfielder, to go on the back foot and allow Norwich to come at us, and of course, they scored.

I can accept a manager making a mistake here and there, or if the team drops points because a good player or a player we were forced to play through injuries has a bad game. But I cannot accept a manager not spotting basic basic things like the fact that hoofing high balls up to Defoe on his own up front is not going to achieve anything, even after he's already watched it go horribly wrong a week earlier. People used to say Harry was a bad tactician, but there's no way he would have had a team play Norwich at home with two holding midfielders hoofing high balls up to a midget striker when there were other players on the bench. What the fudge was AVB doing today?

Yeah yeah, give him time you say. I'm not writing off the possibility of him turning things around but I've been very unimpressed by what I've seen so far from AVB. If we'd won our opening three games in style then everyone would be jizzing themselves about how he's the next messiah, so it's only right that after dropping four points directly because of poor decisions he's made that I'd be very disappointed in him. 8 points from his last 9 games in English football, 17 from his last 15. That's practically relegation form over almost half a season. Please Andre, sort yourself out. I can't bear to consider the consequences of us having hired another brick manager who fudges things up for us.
 
Was at a party for one of my little sons mates today so could only follow via live score. I'm worried to be honest. Was at the WBA game last week and thought we offered very little. Disappointed Ade didn't start today too.

We were even worse today. At least we had good spells in the WBA game.
 
Re: Bad substitution two weeks in a row

I'll probably get slated for this, but our team was crying out for Scott parker today. We desperately needed someone puting a foot in today, someone who works their socks off and shows passion. Not saying he'd fit in avb's tactics, but his leadership qualities were sorely missed today.
 
Why didn't Adebayor start? Mate who went told me that part of the problem was a lack of height and that Defoe was playing his selfish attitude game where all he wanted to do was shoot? Sounded like Adebayor could have been a better pick, bringing others in to play.
 
Re: Bad substitution two weeks in a row

The Sandro one was strange, but may be a knock of some kind. The other one was Ade on for Siggy. Not because bringing Ade on was a bad move but because it led to a shift to a 442 and a period of confusion. Ade for Defoe I could have understood. Others may disagree.
 
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