They paid out on Kane first goal?!
Yep Paddy did
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Yep Paddy did
JJ was saying on MOTD that maybe if the fans were there they would be moaning and groaning if we were playing at home with 20% poss.All without the fans there.
Is that saying something?
Only thing I would mention. Yes we had some good performances from individuals who haven't been great this season e.g. Sanchez and Davies.
But until they string 5-10 of them together, then I will say that they've turned a corner.
It's too easy to say that they are the future after 1 or 2 good performances. We have been here before. They play shit against Palace and the same old comments come back.
But yes there was a good team performance today, but I'm still not overly convinced by Aurier, Sanchez, Sissoko, Winks and Davies.
We can easily upgrade on those and have a great squad to challenge for PL title, top 4, domestic cups and EL.
But until they string 5-10 of them together, then I will say that they've turned a corner.
It's too easy to say that they are the future after 1 or 2 good performances. We have been here before. They play shit against Palace and the same old comments come back.
But yes there was a good team performance today, but I'm still not overly convinced by Aurier, Sanchez, Sissoko, Winks and Davies.
We can easily upgrade on those and have a great squad to challenge for PL title, top 4, domestic cups and EL.
It's a trade off, a classic compromise. We did it under Graham and won something. Not a long-term vision for the club to play park the bus football but we are desperate for a trophy, I think a lot of fans will tolerate it for a season or two if it brings result, but it's a very valid point over the longer term.
The analogy I make is that winning with defensive football is like climbing K2 with oxygen, whereas winning playing attacking football is like climbing K2 with no oxygen. It's harder - hence the famous Nicholson quote about aiming high and even then failing has an echo of glory.
Great counter attacking football today which is exactly what Mourinho is wanting from the team. Some very good individual performances. That save from Lloris and goal from Kane were immense. Starting to get back to their best which we all know is world class.
I’m content with Europa for a season but I will say if we win at Crystal Palace, it will be a strong finish to the season and going into the next one. If Mourinho can get the players he needs, could be cause for optimism.
COYS!!
I’m content with Europa for a season but I will say if we win at Crystal Palace, it will be a strong finish to the season and going into the next one. If Mourinho can get the players he needs, could be cause for optimism.
COYS!!
Jolly good.
What I wanted to emphasise was your last part: if you've got Iheanacho and Grey taking shots from 20 yards, you're probably fine and you can get away with it (as you say). But today's strategy doesn't work if you're giving (a player like) Kane those shots. I agree with you that it's not sustainable to allow that volume of shots, no matter how speculative they would typically be, against elite teams and strikers. I can't think of a specific chance that I'd choose above all others but it's hard to imagine Kane not scoring at least one of their opportunities.
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Well technically speaking he was the first Tottenham player to score with the initial one being an own goal.
It's not. But it could also be a calculated risk as part of a one-off strategy tailored to Leicester (on the assumption that they don't have players known for scoring low-xG long shots and would be ridiculously vulnerable to the counter). It's very uncommon for Spurs to concede so much possession against anyone, which leads me to think that it could've been a Jose tactical masterclass. (Or at least I hope so because playing with sub-30% possession is not sustainable)
But it wasn't a one-off...Newcastle had like 55% against us, and they struggle for 40% most games. We also only had 35-40% against United and Arse as well.
Now I know circumstances in these games somewhat dictated how things panned out, but still. It's pretty staggering to see us below 45% possession in the majority of our games now.
would the fans take to it if we have more games like Bournemouth next season, and sit down for 90 mins watching it. 24 shots from an away team against us for certain is worrying.
Fair enough, mate. But 29% against Leicester, a team with counterattacking DNA and a slow rag-tag defensive line, still seems like an anomaly even amongst those irregularly low numbers. 45% against any team is, I have to assume, somewhat par for the course with Jose.
It wouldn’t have been that low if we weren’t 3-0 up at half time.
Given our situation, giving up on possession is a potential masterstroke. If you have a clinically striker (we do), can break at speed (with Moura and Son, we can), and most importantly have a rock solid defence and goalkeeper, then perhaps it is exactly how we need to play for the time being.
I think the tactic of having at most 40 percent possession is here to stay under Mourinho. Possession based football is heavily attritional; it's like letting a boxer wear himself out with punches, then doing a Tyson peekaboo and putting him to the floor.
I think the tactic of having at most 40 percent possession is here to stay under Mourinho. Possession based football is heavily attritional; it's like letting a boxer wear himself out with punches, then doing a Tyson peekaboo and putting him to the floor.
That's not really true this year, they're 4th highest in possession this season...
I agree with you 100 % dembele almost always passed it done the middle to the feet of erikssen Kane or dele
Like a Mohammed Ali rope a dope.
But maybe Josè has to play that way at the mo because of a lack of good central midfielders. Solid at the back, good up front but shite in the middle. It may change if he/we can get hold of central midfielders next season who can actually hold the ball and pass the fucker!
Is it though....?
We can't pretend the game hasn't changed on multiple levels since Bill Nick's heyday...
Typically, approximately half the division (or often more) to a large degree take a pragmatic bus-parking approach against the upper tier teams (of which we are one)... Somehow you need to find a way to tease these teams out. How many times have we spent 90 minutes chipping away at 2 banks of four waiting for a moment of individual magic that never came?
It's not like the notion of 'giving up possession' is to be taken literally; when winning the ball we'll still attempt to create opportunities.... We're not going to consciously give the ball back and it's not like Jose's teams don't hand plenty of lesser teams a hiding over the course of a season.
Meanwhile, whilst we have genuine quality in our ranks, having a well practiced counter-attacking game up our sleeves can only bode well for when we face so-called better quality teams....
Just riffing really, but let's see what this team evolves into following a transfer window....
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Dembele was rarely played as our deepest lying midfielder though.... He kept possession and broke lines with his dribbling.... Besides he too (ironically) spent half his Spurs career being criticised for not making progressive passes or scoring goals.
One could argue they were taken out of their comfort zone... Brenton had nothing to reply with.
Meanwhile we've always had a rapid counter-attack in our locker even at our most pressing and proactive under Poch.