Woolwich Wanderers V Tottenham Hotspur Football Club

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That's another Walker trait that annoys me, he should be fined ever time he stops play to have a look around to spot a pass...he should keep the ball moving, just pass to the closest man and get on with it, if a better pass isn't immediately available it's not going to appear after you've given their defense more time to get set.

Agreed, but he wasn't the only one guilty of it. Chadli has got to settle quickly, his decision making and awareness was poor at times. I recall one incident where he could have played Soldado in but tried to take it on himself.
Mousa was another one, very frustrating. Don't try and run through the crowd every time, look for the pass for fucks sake!

Again all forgiven at this stage as we need time, but is something for AVB to work on.
 
Seemed to go poor as soon the goal went in after that was just small groups singing.
 
I agree with previous posts. Yes, of course we're all massively disappointed with the result but there is still a hell of a long way to go and it's far too early in the season to make the massive sweeping statements and engage in meltdowns I've seen from some Spurs fans (not necessarily anyone on this forum).
After the game yesterday a friend of mine complained that we've signed 'all the wrong players':avbfacepalm:

Yes, the defending for the goal was painful to watch and yes, throughout the game we showed as much urgency and drive as a snorlax with a hangover...but if we should have learned anything from the past few seasons it's that it isn't over till 38 games have been played
 
It will be a tight top 6 this season. Every club are gonna have their fuck up's during the season.

We need to move on from Bale, the transfer window and start grafting away. A positive attitude would help from the fans aswell! :freundgoal:
 
Fuck off Carragher blaming Jan for the goal.

Felt like Dawson kept dropping when everyone else was pushed out to play the offside. And Rose didn't close him down, either. Jan was in the ideal place but let down by players on both sides of him.

Im not having any of this 'wait for the players to gel' bollocks.
We created fuck all, that doesnt come with gelling, it comes with having creative players in your team.
And when we do get Eriksen in, the pressure on that boy is going to be IMMENSE, and he'll be hounded out big time if he doesnt create things instantly.

Quite often, a player will attempt a pass to someone, especially when the ball is moving quickly...and they're not there. The reason is that the move they worked on in training has fallen apart, often because the runner has to work around the defence. I feel like Eriksen should be phased in, as Lloris was, but there was no reason that Holtby shouldn't have come on at half time for Moussa yesterday.

Watch the Woolwich fans give us crap when they were playing 6 at the back. I don't know about you but I wouldn't be happy if we did that.

Playing at home, 3rd game of the season, Wenger gives up the attacking philosophy he's championed his entire career. For a Spurs team that hasn't yet gelled. They played with a roadblock in front of the penalty area. Our sin is not playing the creative, skilled footballers (Holtby or Siggy) who could've picked the lock and taken those players out of the game.

At least Wenger proved he's not inflexible. Though if the tables were turned and we'd won 1-0 with negative football, you KNOW that he'd be bitching about us playing anti-football or some such shite.

on a positive note whens the last time we out possessioned them cunts with Eriksen, Holtby and Lamela coming into the fold we'll surely start to carve teams open more, just be patient lads

Agreed, 100%. The return fixture will be where we get our satisfaction.

Im not doubting Capoue will be a decent/class player, just that Sandro needs to be starting ahead of him. He will now of course, but he should of today aswell.

Capoue started well with some great tackles and holding possession. But he got that syndrome that you see with kids when they're like, "Oh, fuck, I'm doing really well! I was born to play for Sp-oh shit I've lost the ball. Oh shit, that wasn't such a good pass. OH FUCK GET OFF ME YOU FAT CUNT! ARRRGHHH!"

Seriously. Just got the first day jitters after beginning to overthink it. Then an articulated tank made of jelly fell onto his leg.

Its clear to me that Soldado cant play as a lone striker. Not in this set up anyway.

Both Ade and Defoe are more effective with these players around them.

Until we find the players to utilise Soldado, I would start with Ade, or play Defoe with Soldado, and drop Dembele.

Yes people! 442!!

Better to play with two strikers than (effectively) none

What does anyone have to do to make the 4-4-2 talk stop?

It's a dead system at the top level. If we aspire to play good football and attract good players and progress in European competition, we can't play 4-4-2. The middle of the park is way too light and any decent team playing 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-3-2 (or 3-5-2 or variants of 3-4-3) will simply walk straight through to goal.

For the love of God. Make. It. Stop.
 
Long post, apologies.

Some big positives from the game I thought.

We couldn't create more than a couple of serious chances, but then neither did they. In a way the game came down to two defensive errors and two chances. Giroud was able to take his, Soldado's shot when he got in behind was blocked.

The midfield battle was the main focus for me going in, getting a chance to see how our more muscular play in controlling the game would work against a very good passing midfield trio. It had showed its quality against Swansea and Palace, but this was a test against a top 6 club. After a settling in period early on we ended up controlling the ball and forcing Woolwich to switch to counter attacks.

We all know Wenger loves his principles, and so I think the midfield can take great credit that he was forced to throw on 6 defenders at the end and play as the away team for the whole second half. With even more match time I think our midfield will be very dominant this season.

Lamela showed a few flashes of great promise. Very quick to find space, even if he wasn't picked out. Don't forget Wenger had put two full backs on his side by the time he came on and he was able to escape double marking pretty easily. I don't think there are many full backs in the league who will cope with him for 90 minutes.

The changes are criticised, but I can see what AVB was trying to do. Delivery was not always good, but we were getting past the back line and getting balls into the box, particularly from Walker and Rose. Our big problem was getting support in the box. Soldado was often crowded out and the second ball was falling to the deepest Woolwich midfielders. Paulinho got in to the box once or twice, but not enough to be effective. Therefore it makes sense to put a second striker in there to create more space. Indeed late on, even with the defensive line thickened through changes, we got moments of free space in the box from deliveries. That final stramash a case in point. I'm sure he was concerned Holtby would have ended up just another body outside the box if he switched to 4-2-3-1 and opted for 4-4-2.

However despite the defeat I am greatly buoyed for the rest of the season. If Eriksen settles quickly and Lamela gets the pace and physicality of the English game we will do very well. With the kind of control we had yesterday we can stifle even great sides when needed, and against lesser sides our quality should be too much. I can certainly see us giving a few weaker sides a complete hiding this season, and can see us keeping a lot of clean sheets. Norwich and Tromso are next up and I think we can do some serious damage in those games.
 
What does anyone have to do to make the 4-4-2 talk stop?

Let me see, how about play three games in a row, where your record striker actually recieve's one single pass to run onto?
And that his only two touches in those three games is not from the penalty spot?

Yeah, 442 is outdated....lets play 4-3-2-0
 
Let me see, how about play three games in a row, where your record striker actually recieve's one single pass to run onto?
And that his only two touches in those three games is not from the penalty spot?

Yeah, 442 is outdated....lets play 4-3-2-0

I must say, I couldn't give a rats arse about what formation we play. I would just like to see us using some width, rather than letting them clog up the centre of the pitch.

I made the same argument two years ago, when we opted to play VDV as an Aaron Lennon replacement. It made our play predictable and didn't stretch the defense. We're seeing the same again now. Chadli and Townsend should have tried switching sides, to see if that brought some success.

Variation is the key!
 
I'm not too worried about that result, but I think it's going to take more than a month for the team to gel. My biggest concern is crossing and delivery to the final man. I've not seen much of Soldado so I'm not sure if he's going to get his head on the end of these crosses? Townsend was getting crosses in but seeminly connecting with thin air while on the left I couldn't see crosses coming from anywhere, I'm feeling that's where Lamela could be providing service as an inside forward but we opted to play him on the right so he was cutting inside and shooting from his left?

The thing is we had Woolwich pinned down inside there own penalty area while we maintained a massive amount of possession in the last 15mins and I'm not to sure I've seen a lot of that in derbys in recent years. We had something like 57% of whole match possession! Given that I would have thought to see more long shots coming into the box (I saw a few but were woefully off target). It seems 4-3-3 would work for us well in open attacking play with space (like in the dianmo tblisi game) but in EPL are teams going to start sitting back and putting men between us and the goal so that we rely on fouls and penaltys to score?
 
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