Article by Chris MecoyHello again Spurs fans, it's been a while.
Right, I've always been an advocate of that old adage "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all", so, since the Newcastle game, I haven't said anything. However, I've had a few days to get the disgust out of my system, and I now feel that I may have been a tad hasty regarding my ill-feeling towards the team's most recent performance. Don't get me wrong, I still have nothing nice to say about the first half display, but I'm gonna break the habit of a lifetime, and actually talk about it.
In a word, it was rubbish, bloody rubbish, awful, kak, an offence to the eyes of every Tottenham fan. Okay, that was more than one word, but I think you get the gist of what I'm saying. It's so frustrating to see our beloved Lilywhites, full of skill, ability, and sheer talent, performing like they were playing their first ever match at Hackney Marshes. A disjointed, out-of-sync display that, in my opinion, warranted us being FAR more than 1-0 down at Half Time.
Some people may argue that 'Sweeper-keeper' Hugo Lloris would have stopped Remy's goal had he been playing, but the fact is that Brad Friedel is a different type of goalkeeper, and our defence should have responded better knowing that.
There, I said what you were all no doubt were thinking, but as a man who truly insists on writing positive articles rather than focusing on the negatives of any given subject, that's exactly what I'm gonna do right now.
A BIT BORING?
As a group, we Spurs fans have been screaming out for some more attractive football, and up to the interval against Newcastle, our pleas had apparently fallen upon deaf ears. Then the boys came out for the second half.
A MASSIVE IMPROVEMENT
Yes, we all know that despite our efforts, the result against the Geordies wasn't what we hoped, but can any of you honestly say that our performance after the break was not a HUGE improvement? With Sandro coming on to replace the poor Dembele (don't worry, Mousa fans, I'm not slating him. I think he's a great player, but he wasn't at the races on Sunday), as well as a welcome return to League football for Younes Kaboul as a substitute for the unfortunate Vlad Chiriches, we did look a different prospect.
Countless shots and much better passing and movement throughout, it was just the heroics of Tim Krul (hence the title of this article, do you like what I did there?), and the cross bar that prevented it from being a massacre. This vastly improved performance did coincide with, arguably, Christian Eriksen and Paulinho's worst performances thus far in a Spurs shirt, so there are actually one or two plusses to come out of this horror.
CAN WE PUSH ON?
I honestly believe that the general belief among non-plastic Spurs fans after the match was that we weren't good enough first half, but that if not for the goalkeeping performance of the season, we would have run out comfortable winners.
So that begs the question.
Did AVB notice, as we all did, the better performance after the break? Surely he did. So if he, and the team, can push on from that, maybe we can get ourselves out of this recent blip, and start our climb back up the table.
Add to that the fact that of the seven clubs I feel can mount a title challenge this year, only two picked up maximum points last weekend, so we haven't lost any real ground. If our blip this season still only leaves us 5 points off the Premier League summit, then maybe we can count our blessings and go into the two Manchester games after the International break confident that it WILL come right soon. HOPEFULLY!!
Thanks for reading, Spurs fans, and as usual, please leave any comments below.
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COME ON YOU SPURS!!
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Come on it isnt so bad for Spurs this season.
ReplyDeleteYou are 3 points better of than last season at this point
Your defence looks better and more compact
You are only 5 points away from 1st spot, last year it was 10 points.
If you still want to get rid of AVB, you can always trade him for Pardew :-D
Nah you're alright mate :-)
ReplyDeleteYou're absolutely right though, we just need to chill out and be patient
Actually, I don't think we were that bad in the first half. Sluggish, yes, and the goal was pathetic especially from Paulinho's point of view. But we weren't terrible at all, I've seen soooo much worse over the years (I've seen us 0-2, 0-3 down to teams much worse than this Toon side). I just wish AVB would vary things a bit, switch the wings, stop asking JD to bale us out, show a bit more imagination. Kane/Lamela should have come on. The new players will settle in fine - given time. In the highlights Eriksen did very well, but if you watched the whole game he'll know he could have done better, but again, he's new. He should have scored of course. Corners - there was only one or two good ones. Why not play short corners? We really should be scoring more goals with our talent... let's involve Soldado more, use Lennon on the right to feed him. Try Townsend/Lamela on the left (sorry Sigg, your goals are brilliant but you need to achieve more across the whole game). Our defence is superb - and we look forward to Danny Rose's return and his future development, a real prospect now. Keen to see how Kane develops too, he looks far more like making it now. Sandro must be the first name (other than Lloris) on the teamsheet every week.
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