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Manager Antonio Conte

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Saw a quote that Conte was joking that he may have to play due to our injuries.

But he’s not giving much time to Skipp, Gil, Spence, or Sarr. Must make them feel great. Maybe they should have gotten more minutes here and there before they are forced into 90s.
 
TheSpurEst said:
Well, now some time has passed from the game, some emotions cooled off.
It is bit of oversimplification from both sides really. Which is fine, cause I too am on the fence, so I can see both sides.

First of all - I do no not give a shit about possession. And there are more than 1 way to win a game. I think it is fine that if you play pragmatically and plan on counter-attacks, there are some games where you borderline fall apart. ManU game was one of them.

2nd of all - I do not give a fuck about shots that opposing team has. It is pointless metrics that comes from the way Conte has set up the team. Opposition players have room outside of the box and so many shots taken are just very-very speculative. xG against gives much better picture cause it also considers the quality of the chance.

3rd point - I actually think we were set up well yesterday from the start. We started the game well and in first 20 minutes passing patterns worked, we created some quite okay chances. Also managed to win ball back from them number of times. But what happened since like 22 minute mark - I just don't get it. ManU put some pressure on our box and we just crumbled. It did not help at all that Son might as well have stayed home. Literally - him not being on the field would have changed nothing. Another issue I noticed was that both our fullbacks lacked directness. There were moments where one could sprint with the ball, but they chose safer option. Why? I have no idea.

So that much to defend / support Conte.
Of course I saw some major problems as well.

4th point - how and why dafuq did he wait until 80 minute mark with any substitutions ?!?!? Sure, we did not have Kulu and Richie available. And we did not have some magic weapon to bring on. But heck - we could not control passes. Surely ~60-65th minute mark trying more rested Skippy for Benta could have changed something. I am not much of a fan of Moura, but Son was just shocking in every possible way, no chance that Moura would have been worse for last 30 minutes. And Perisic started just few days earlier as well - why not give Sess last 20 minutes? Would have those changes dramatically altered the game - possibly and even likely not. But YOU HAVE TO TRY. Not to just accept beating.

5th point - against top teams that put pressure on us - PEH and Benta cannot operate if they don't have room around them. All fine and dandy that we can manage to beat lower-half teams consistently with them. But games against opposition like Chelsea and ManU prove time and time again that there is real need for someone with better ball control. Someone who can win AND retain possession. Otherwise we are like flag in strong winds - flapping around from one side to another, but don't control much. We did not have much better options to pick from, but it is also down to Conte. I never felt like he even wanted to get better ball-playing CM in the summer window. He is fine with workhorses and playing them 2x a week for 90 minutes. Which is weird to be honest.

So I do not think we should panic, but some worry is justified. I tend to agree with those who say that results have flattered us to some extent. Meaning results have been better than underlying performances. Kane and his moments of brilliance have carried us. But he has got us so many points on his own. I think we'd be below 10th place without his goals. If threat only comes from one player, he can be also taken out of the game eventually. So Conte has to come up with something. FAST. Pointing fingers ain't gonna help.
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Very good points.

Point 1 - completely agree. Possession stat is pointless.

Point 2 - same thing. They can shoot 30 shots from outside the box, I’ll take that all day. They were barely creating chances against us.

Point 3 - Son is usually a great outlet but he was missing. It also seemed like we tried playing through the middle more (probably because of the 352 instead of a 343) and our midfielders cannot pass through a press. For the fullbacks, Perisic was supposed to be the attacking fullback we added. Outside of some crosses, he’s just as bad at Doherty at giving the ball away and killing possession. I would rather see Sess get more minutes as he is actually improving.

Point 4- My biggest gripe all season with Conte. You have 5 subs this season, FUCKING USE THEM. I don’t care if you think the bench players are average at best. It’s worth a punt compared to how the starters have looked.

Point 5- Conte has always struggled against top teams. You need to play aggressive and control the game (not the ball, the game). We rarely setup to do that in big games, we setup to defend and hope for a mistake which does not come against the good sides.

I’m not panicking about top four or a domestic trophy yet. But Conte needs to fucking change. Stop playing the same XI and expect different results.
 
bonaspur23 said:
Saw a quote that Conte was joking that he may have to play due to our injuries.

But he’s not giving much time to Skipp, Gil, Spence, or Sarr. Must make them feel great. Maybe they should have gotten more minutes here and there before they are forced into 90s.
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TBF..... That only really applies to Gil & Spence.

Skipp himself had injuries to set him back and we don't have an injury 'crisis' at CM right now anyway.

Sarr was never likely to play much.
 
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bonaspur23 said:
It’s nuts he’s complaining about literally 2 injuries in our entire squad. Richarlison and Kulusevski. Who else is even injured?
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I've quickly learned to gloss over some of the shit he comes out with in pressers. (He could just be putting the verbal thumb-screws on Levy over the Jan window already; in which case meh... Whatever gets the desired outcome.).... A lot of the minutia and guessing games surrounding his comments aren't that important. Ultimately it's a very black & white situ.... If he doesn't feel backed; he'll be off and he's yet to make any such claim so far.

More pressingly....

He could easily play Lucas or Perisic as a winger if he really wanted to revert back to 343.

I think a 3rd match in a week for Doh might not be the wisest idea; but otherwise he can easily mix it up for the NC game:

Emerson (or Spence! LOL) / [insert 3 of 5 CMs] / Sess
Son / Kane

or

Emerson (or Spence! LOL) / [insert 2 of 5 CMs] / Sess
Son / Kane + IP or LM or Gil​
 
I love Conte but his blind belief in our wingbacks is starting to get extremely frustrating. More often than not, I see opportunities for the ball to be played into Kane/Son only for the ball to go out wide to Emerson/Doc/Perisic who inevitably put in a weak cross or lose the ball. Something needs to change, and change fast otherwise we'll find ourselves in 6th place before the world cup.
 
Doc said:
Some people turning quickly. I'd have preferred a ten Hag / Potter type myself but Conte is worth running with now that we have him imo. We win lots of games and...yeah.

He's had his pants pulled down in games at Stamford Bridge, Old Trafford and the Emirates this season, and we were crap away to West Ham. Not good enough at all. Hopefully it improves.
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Ffs his not some kid out of 6th form. His supposed to be an elite manager so :/ who should be able to sort this out. His had enough games now to make sure we are defensively solid and good at attacking.
Note. His got spanked by Chavs about 5 times since joining us.
 
daveyboy88 said:
thats almost an impossible job though. you are not going to get average footballers beating elite footballers no matter who the manager is or what the system is. some of the shit weve had over the years is a joke! who was the last player to leave here for better things? bale? fucking joke! the rest have dropped levels for a fucking reason!! they got found out and taken to their actual level.

we dont have a squad of average players some are very good. but when 3-4 average ones creep into the 11 the standard comes crashing down. dier, davies, sanchez, emerson....all defenders who were not good enough before and now we play a system that requires the defence to be good.
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Brighton bear manure earlier in the season?
 
Gym&Chill said:
Football isnt that difficult. Pass and move. Keep possession. Press high up the pitch. Close down quickly.

People get caught up with these hipster managers and their “system”. Contes system essentially revolves around 2 wing backs playing out of their skin each week. Thats it. Thats the plan. And if he hasnt got the best of the best, guess what, he struggles.

Thats why I put way more respect on the craft of a guy like Sean Dyche, who for years kept Burney playing in the most competitive league in the world even when he didnt always get the best of the best or his own perfect set up.

Thats what Spurs need. A guy in for the long run that can work with the tools at his disposal whilst implementing a solid style. Need a guy with a bit of something about him that can cope without having golden toilets or unlimited funds.

Thats what Pochettino did. Even if the players werent the best, he had us playing effectively by having the players extremely conditioned, played a high line and closing down the ball very quickly and covered the most ground. Just these simple things alone allowed us to compete at the top for so long despite the lack of funds
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Fucking brilliant post apart from soar throat dyche😀
 
Maureen said:
Ffs his not some kid out of 6th form. His supposed to be an elite manager so :/ who should be able to sort this out. His had enough games now to make sure we are defensively solid and good at attacking.
Note. His got spanked by Chavs about 5 times since joining us.
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We're third in the PL and well positioned to qualify from our CL group. All of our games vs top 6 opposition have been away from home. It's not as if we're wading through a disastrous period here.
 
Brian Fantana said:
It’s bizarre isn’t it and has been for as long as I remember.

How much money have we spent on those players though? We didn’t improve the wingback positions sufficiently in the summer and failed to bring in a significant upgrade in defence. Plus we didn’t buy players who can unlock the door. It just wasn’t enough.
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Don’t think we were seriously looking at an unlock the door type of player. Mainly throughout the window we were after defend et s and WBs.
 
Doc said:
We're third in the PL and well positioned to qualify from our CL group. All of our games vs top 6 opposition have been away from home. It's not as if we're wading through a disastrous period here.
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True.

The problem for me is that I expected a year of Conte coaching (including 2 transfer windows, several players in and a famed pre-season) to give us a bit more fighting spirit in these away games this season. We showed it towards the end of last season. What's changed? Why the heads down?
 
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Nuts said:
True.

The problem for me is that I expected a year of Conte coaching (including 2 transfer windows, several players in and a famed pre-season) to give us a bit more fighting spirit in these away games this season. We showed it towards the end of last season. What's changed? Why the heads down?
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Don't disagree, just think the mood has gone too far in the other direction. Thought reaction to NLD was overblown, UTD game was as bad a performance as you'll see all year
 
Shadydan said:
Yeah so how many shots were from outside the area?

All well and good saying that we concede a fuck load of shots but how many were from dangerous areas?
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Rashford had clear cut chances inside the box. Everton had two gilt edge chances inside the.box. Remember if you don’t buy a ticket you have no chance of winning the raffle. Allow enough shots and one will fly in , deflect or handball, ricochet or anything might happen. Tell me how many games have we played where the oppo goalie has had hardly any saves to make? We have scored may be a pen or one goal but other than that nothing. Talking of deflections we only made it 2 b Everton with PEH deflected shot.
 
Airfixx said:
Maybe it's the players or maybe it's Conte... Or a bit of both... But:

- Too often when we do have the chance to break we're ponderous. By the time we get to the half-way line we slow up and give the oppo too much time to regroup.
- A lot of the time the oppo are pre-empting our passes and are within touching distance to intercept.... Yet way too often we're too far away from x or y oppo player to realistically engage them.
- Virtually EVERY throw-in we get goes backwards and thus immediately grants the opportunity to push out on us..... This has been going on for years now so fuck knows why; but it does my fuckin' head in!
- Ditto the non-existent movement on throw-ins.
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Very true re throw ins really pisses me off. V manure we had a thrown say around half way in their half it was thrown all the way back to our on defence. Why not get that sane distance throw to their pen box? Push enough players up to either win the ball or engage for 2nd ball.
 
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