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Manager Thomas Frank

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Are you Frank Out or In?

  • Total voters
    623
BJK said:
TLDR: Possible downsides of a heavily stretched 2-4-4 / 2-5-3 shape, illustrated through the Igor Thiago chance for Brentford



It's not that confusing I swear: We're once again in a 2-4-4, with Spence being outside of your screen somewhere in wide left watched by Brentford's Outtara. Brentford meanwhile match this with their 4-4-2 I assume; a mirror image of the former that would technically allow you to mark everybody outside the keeper. You can see the 6v6 here, and their back 4 must be man marking our front 4. Makes a lot of sense.



Spence and his matchup Outtara are also visible now. Keep an eye on Simons though: By dropping to midfield he turns our 2-4-4 into a 2-4-1-3 to possibly tip the aforementioned balance in our favour. Now one of the Brentford's two centre backs has to follow him all the way up there



Simons indeed creates a significant advantage for us, well done. How often do you see players in this league get this much space in the centre of the pitch?





Except a combination of a horrible first touch and a turn to the wrong way causes Richarlison to turn it over. Terrible hold-up play, can't sugarcoat it.





Gray could be blamed for being relatively slow with his reaction. But I'd still consider the ease with which Brentford went from a highly disadvantageous situation to a highly advantageous one in a matter of seconds the downside of having this much distance between the players. It makes these kind of defensive recoveries much more difficult.



I guess it's not terrible considering the additional man we have there in Romero; but If there had been another Brentford player there to even the numbers, this could have been much worse.





Thanks Vicario.

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If Frank abandoned this mini experiment with the back 2 and returned to a back 3 in possesion with Porro tucking in, it would be due to this. Someone like Ange would brush this off as occupational hazard, but I have a strong sense that Frank's extreme reluctance to play through the middle is caused by a strong concern about these sort of vulnerabilities.

But then, like he said, you also take [indirect] risks by refusing to take [more direct] risks. This extremely risk averse football, not going gung-ho, caused us to concede 17 in 10 league games before the most recent clean sheet against Brentford. Sometimes you defend way better by being on the front foot, as evidenced by this game.
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I like to think that there's a time and place for either tactic.

Certain teams, like Brentford for example, we need to play very much on the front foot. And then there are teams like City where we can do with a more conservative approach, at least for phases of the game.
 
WillWilliams said:
That guys a proper bozo isn’t he.

2024/25 MW15 = 11th.
Lost 4 out of last 5. 1 point from 15. (Worst form alongside soton and Ipswich)
7 points off 4th.
5 points of 6th.
After MW15 we were 10th for one week (MW16). Then we never got in the top half of the table again for the rest of the season.
Finding ourselves 16th or below from MW33.

We were about to go into Free fall.
Winning just 5 more league games between December and May. 3 of those wins v teams who would be relegated.

Versus today.

2025/26 MW15 = 10th
Lost 2 out of last 5. 5 points from 15.
4 points off 4th.
3 points off 5th
2 points of 6th.

About to play 17th placed team in the league.

Could cement our Top 8 Credentials going into the Xmas period. Beat Liverpool MW17 and Top 5 remains doable.

Let’s see if we can win more than 5 league games between now and May!! My money says we will.


Chalk and cheese Mr Cowlin.
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Teams like Palace, Sunderland and Everton will eventually fall off just like Bournemouth. It will be a 7 team fight for the top 4.
Pool looks lost and I know we can be better than Brighton. That leaves the Chavs and Villa. I think we will make it atleast top 5 at the end of the season.
 
Rooster the 2nd said:
Teams like Palace, Sunderland and Everton will eventually fall off just like Bournemouth. It will be a 7 team fight for the top 4.
Pool looks lost and I know we can be better than Brighton. That leaves the Chavs and Villa. I think we will make it atleast top 5 at the end of the season.
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At the moment we have used 20 players in the league.
The 17-20th least used players below.

Muani, Tel, Gray, Solanke. (Kulu & Dragusin still to come back as well)

You hope all 6 of those players could contribute something decent the second part of the season.
We shouldn’t be running on empty anyway.
 
WillWilliams said:
At the moment we have used 20 players in the league.
The 17-20th least used players below.

Muani, Tel, Gray, Solanke. (Kulu & Dragusin still to come back as well)

You hope all 6 of those players could contribute something decent the second part of the season.
We shouldn’t be running on empty anyway.
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And the first three of these have already proven that they can contribute a bit in bit roles under Frank. So we need to keep them rotated in the team and then start inserting Solanke, Kulu and Radu as they get fit.

Which is a task that I guess that Frank is learning on the fly given that having so many games a season is new for him as well.
 
PointToPatrik said:
And the first three of these have already proven that they can contribute a bit in bit roles under Frank. So we need to keep them rotated in the team and then start inserting Solanke, Kulu and Radu as they get fit.

Which is a task that I guess that Frank is learning on the fly given that having so many games a season is new for him as well.
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I think he has to give the youngsters some faith.

They have all got talent. They all need that self belief and the confidence that they have a manager who backs them.

Like you say. We can see the flashes of potential. Fingers crossed they all kick on in a Spurs shirt.
 
TLDR: The first goal, and how Simons in particular broke Brentford's 4-4-2 with his smart movement



2-4-4 versus 4-4-2, should be familiar by now. Except Simons once again turns our 2-4-4 to a 2-5-3 by dropping back and causes confusion on Brentford's part, which will be more obvious soon.



Bentancur and Gray are marked by Brentford's two central midfielders of their 4-4-2, but so is Simons somehow. Could only be a central defender doing the marking in his case then.



Brentford's number 4 [Van Den Berg] is indeed their centre back, stepping way out of his comfort zone to mark Simons. He has to. He however overplays Simons, who reads the situation beautifully to start running behind him. Kudus, barely visible on the screen, will also play a nonnegligible albeit probably coincidental role in this soon. Porro watches the situation carefully for a passing opportunity to develop.



Kudus drags his man, Brentford's left back, away from his position to open up that side of the pitch for Simons who already has the head start on Van den Berg. Brentford's backline is missing not one but two defenders now due to Kudus' movement.







Porro delivers a bullet to Simons, and the rest is child's play. An instance of quite direct football leading to a nice goal.

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I think both the sequence that led to Igor Thiago chance for Brentford and this one highlight how Simons ran this game: By making himself, through his constant and smart movement, the odd man in midfield and/or inside the final third in this battle of two mirror image formations of 2-4-4 and 4-4-2 . Why Brentford didn't switch to a 4-1-4-1 to address the situation is anybody's guess, but credit to Simons and the team in general for taking full advantage.

Even though this sequence was about weak defending on Brentford's part more than anything, it could still have long term implications considering how often teams use the 4-4-2 shape in defending.
 
Weird how Frank was so non committal in the press conference about replacing Solanke with tel for the last few CL games.
Who knows when solanke will be available again, and whenever he is he will be way off match fitness

Just seems like a strange random punishment for Tel. Must've called him cunt in training or something
 
Kaz Hirai said:
Weird how Frank was so non committal in the press conference about replacing Solanke with tel for the last few CL games.
Who knows when solanke will be available again, and whenever he is he will be way off match fitness

Just seems like a strange random punishment for Tel. Must've called him cunt in training or something
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My guess is they are considering loaning him out to create a squad place and don’t want him cup tied. He’s the least used non home grown member of the squad in the premier league.
On paper he’s our most disposable player if we are looking to make a signing in January.

Plus him and Kulu can’t both be added to the CL squad without taking out two players.
Adding Kulu already means someone has to lose their place.
 
Have we turned the corner, has he turned the corner? Sometimes you need a little chaos and less control especially in the home games we should be taking the game to the ops and winning, keep it up.
 
Shadydan said:
Have we turned the corner, has he turned the corner? Sometimes you need a little chaos and less control especially in the home games we should be taking the game to the ops and winning, keep it up.
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Too early to say, there's still a lot to clean up. But Frank has set the squad up pretty well over the past few matches. The biggest issue today was poor finishing, which is down to the player level.

Notts Forest will be a nice test because they'll park the bus from the onset and challenge us to break them down. If we can get a good result there, then it will start to look like we're making progress.
 
I'm pleasantly surprised by this sudden and highly visible change of direction in the last two games, and therefore the following should only be taken as a modest attempt at constructive criticism.

That back 2 in possession, with Spence playing as an inverted fullback/wingback and VDV covering for him as a wide centre back, definitely needs a Palhinha/Bentancur/Gray as a half back sitting right in front of it at all times.

The guy shouldn't even start pressing like a usual defensive midfielder as soon as we turn it over, but instead keep his position as part of the backline to allow fullbacks the time to recover before stepping up. Otherwise you'd probably end up with a cheap imitation of Angeball, with all its madness.

Slavia could've easily had a goal or two today, as some of the scrambles after getting beaten in the initial high press reminded the worst days of last season. EPL teams wouldn't be nearly as forgiving.
 
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