Match Day Thread Tottenham Hotspur v Gent

Exactly. And things like this are reasons why I have no time for Pochettino.

 

Blimey, don't let it effect you.
Happy birthday treacle.

 

You can **** right off the both of you . And can we please make a new rule that the only member of this forum who is allowed to have a birthday is @remembercolinlee ? The rest of us can just advance a year in age on a pre-determined mutually agreed date sometime in the middle of July when there won't be any football to worry about.

 

Happy birthday whipper snapper

 

Happy Birthday People

Watchout Birthday Police about.

 

I'm not of that opinion Spurcat, but I just find it incredibly frustrating. On one hand, we've had a great formation this season which has seen us play some lovely stuff, but on the other, the plan B is for Poch to suddenly morph into AVB and literally produce the "square pegs in round holes" boring football we saw 4 years ago.

 

Happy Birthday, both. Hope you've had a good day. Try to ignore the last 2 hours or so!

 

Well,we weren't good enough for the CL.Now we're not good enough for the EL. if we continue to play like this we won't be good enough for anything.

 

Kane has hurt his knee and is unlikely to feature on Sunday. Some reports saying he could be out for a couple of weeks.

 

p.s.Nappy birthday to fellow sufferers. A nice steak and a very nice beverage will bring you around for our next one!!!!!?

 

No sweat ... we got Janssen

 

Happy birthday Spurlock, nice to share a birthday with a fellow fan. Wish I could say I was 41 today!
Many thanks for birthday wishes from other posters, much appreciated.
Lets hope our team can redeem themselves on Sunday... COYS

 

Since we demolished Chelsea and beat up West Brom in a devastating performance, we've been terrible. Lost to Liverpool and Gent, been beaten up by Wycombe and Citeh, failed to score against a wretched Sunderland and just about limped to a win against a very limited 'Boro.

It seems this team can't help but rest on the laurels of good wins and past performances. If they can't overcome it, it will be their downfall. Winning isn't about giving press interviews about how close we are to being winners . It's about concentrating on performing every time you cross the white line, over and over again. Time to shut the **** up and get down to some hard work.

 

It's worth noting that the West Brom game is where Verts got injured, and our form seems to have dropped almost immediately afterwards.

Up until the West Brom game we had a defence that was not just impressive at dealing with the opposition but also starting off attacking moves, yet since Verts hobbled off the defence has certainly lacked cohesion - not just defending, with Dier and Davies are guilty of one costly lapse per match while Wimmer's looked a shadow of the player he was last season - but the back line doesn't seem as proactive at starting attacking moves, with knock-on effects further up the pitch.

 

To be fair, I'd have been disappointed if Pochettino didn't try to change something after Liverpool it would've been poor.

For me the issue is that it was handled so badly. Alli and Sissoko were the wide forwards in the first half but instead of staying up, they were tracking back and playing a lot of the game with their back to goal. That meant Kane was all alone, meanwhile we didn't have the pace or guile, to break beyond Gent pressing us. It needs to be emphasized that Gent were pressing us, not Barcelona or Real Madrid. Second half we actually seemed to be doing better with Sissoko switching flanks and players pushing up and imposing themselves on the game but after the goal we just flipped straight back to the first half where we were playing aimlessly and with no cohesion.

I don't see how we have the squad to compete in 3 competitions at the moment so for me this game, out of all of them, was the no-brainer for us to rest a lot of players in. For a start, we still have the replay at home but also, we don't leave London for a game until April(unless we get win on Sunday and get drawn away) so the next run of games is the perfect chance to play the first team and try to get up a head of steam again. I could've coped if we'd played the first team and won convincingly to save ourselves a bit of energy on the return leg but anything less would've been bad. Losing and now having Kane with a knock is an absolute disaster.

We need to get back to playing 343 and get ourselves looking solid and threatening again. We really couldn't have asked for a better run in but that's going to be a pointless advantage if we keep playing so badly.

 

Thanks for the Birthday wishes, people.

Poch says the lads lack confidence after the weekend game. Shouldn't that mean you have a point to prove and would come out all guns blazing? Instead we seem to just wither away, happened last season too. I worry about the mentality of the squad and indeed the mentality of the Club when it comes to the finer points of getting to the next level. We have dithered too much in the recent past and its nipping at our arse cheeks at every given opportunity. Seems like Kane is playing like a man who knows he has got no real competition. You called it, i called it, lets get Dembele in, we dither he becomes a hit, we knew he had massive potential. I reckon he would have joined. Yeah I know Kane was starved of service but the urgency, determination and decision making seems quite lapse in him lately and indeed the team as a whole. Walker is useless without Rose and as Roo keeps on suggesting, Cockerel George should be the LWB. Conte done it with Moses. What does Poch do during the week? Less thought than us it seems when it comes to being savvy.

Still well in the tie , its only half time but Wembley is not our Home. If it was the Lane I'd be well optimistic. With it being Wembley and the gusto shown by the opposition last night, I suspect they will be well up for their visit to Wembley. Need to start winning there or these petals are going to suffer next season.

 

What's happened to Wimmer? Last season he slotted in to replace vertonghen and we didn't even notice that Jan was injured. - we all know there's clearly a player in there, as it's been proven already. How can Poch "lose trust" in someone? No one just loses their ability to play football or turns **** overnight. His job as a manager right now should be to put his arm round Kev's shoulder and give him some games and the opportunity to step up and build his confidence, showing he's still got a role. - what must this be doing to Wimmer? Not only is he not getting a game, but he's watching Dier play like a shower of **** in a back 4.

We have got to try playing Wimmer as a left sided CB, or on the left as part of a back 3. Then Davies along side him at left back or as a wing back depending on formation. Or GKN as part of that somewhere, with balance, again, depending on formation.
The current experiment isn't working. We're not solving the rose absentee issue, or discovering possible solutions if this situation was to arise in the future. Not to mention we're also holding Walker back as a result.

I know it may seem like I bang on about GKN, like I've seen some sort of hero player in him. - But I can assure you, I haven't.
It's really more of a protest as I just wanna see us set up from the start of the game with a balanced side, regardless of formation. Whether that's a full back and a fast winger in the "front 3", supporting one another, or whether it's a back 3 and wingbacks. - which again, provide a balanced formation and attributes that compliment one another. I'm fed up with seeing the likes of GKN come on for 15-20mins when we're playing **** or we're lost on the pitch. Give him a chance. Others aren't performing, and some could do with a rest!

As YV has said, we were playing gent and they've completely outpressed us and it was embarrassing . - why? Because we were unbalanced and there was little team cohesion on the pitch. Pressing is a team strategy, not just 1 player who moves towards the player on the ball. It's about working as a unit which stops penetrative passes, prevents play through the lines, and ultimately negates the oppositions attacking strategy, hopefully sending them backwards. We were all over the place last night, with one player expecting another player to be somewhere they weren't. So they just played triangles around us and kept possession. A total shambles.

We can only use the players we have available, but this experimental stuff has to stop, it's not working. I thought I'd seen everything, but when sissoko went out to become a LWB... when there's 2 or 3 other left footed players who could be playing over him....

- not to mention it's Sissoko!! - (For you Spurf)

 

Sunday's game will tell us all we need to know about Wimmer and Janssen's future at the club. Jan is rumoured to be close enough to make a return but if we throw him straight back into the mix unnecessarily early, it is curtains for Kev.

At the other end of the pitch, we've run into a similar rut as the one earlier this season when we couldn't score from open play for love nor money. More worrying is the sad reality that we don't even look like scoring either. Janssen cannot do anything worse than Kane at the moment. There were times last night when the latter's play was so unnecessarily physical or unintelligent that I had to double check we hadn't brought on the Dutchman!

If they don't start against Fulham, they'll be gone in the summer.

 

It's just a blip.

We'll never be good enough to win every match!

We are in better shape in all competitions than this time last year.

Keep faith