I thought the performance was ok, but we had 3 good chances close to goal and only Teemu managed to get a shot on target, though it was easy for Lloris. They were much more clinical with less good chances. The gulf between a top six side and us. At least ManUtd is at CR.
Brereton Diaz (Blackburn) anybody? 17 goals this season. Interesting to note that Toney of Brentford scored nearly 30 goals last season and now only 4 in EPL. Watched Byram play for U23 recently (on YouTube) seemed to be comfortable with ball and completed some stretch tackles without any signs of a problem. Could be if Aarons went that he could fill his position.
The bottom line is our players are not good enough. With the exception of Krul, Max, Brandon and Teemu, the others would not make the bench for other Premier teams. Smiffy has got one hell of a job to keep us in the Premier
Honeymoon is over for Smith. He now sees the task ahead of him - we are still playing nice football, creating good chances, yet conceding soft goals and not putting away chances to lose 3-0 against a team who frankly looked there for the taking. If we can’t translate performances into results, as was the issue Farke had, we will be relegated.
We missed Normann and Rashica today, but Spurs away was always going to be difficult. They have players who can turn half chances into goals and, except for Pukki and Normann, we don't. The fortunate thing is that other results suited us with Leeds and Brentford drawing and Palace losing. We did turn the previous 4 games into 8 points, showing that we can compete, but not necessarily with top 6 sides. Smith has improved our play and performances and I think there's more to come.
Really feel we missed Rashica to offer something different today, certainly Williams' best performance for us so far. We're only 3 (4 inc GD) from safety so there's shoots of optimism remaining, deffo need a clearout in Jan
Much as I expected from Dean Smith. He's ok but he can't work miracles. Definitely a sideways mve from Farke. But that's what we have. No point on moaning about him.
Smith can only do so much with the average squad he has inherited. It's a better squad than last time, but still nowhere near good enough.
I didn't think it was that bad a performance overall - actually better than the Newcastle game in many ways. But it reminded me of the Farke days in the Prem - lots of possession and some good technical skills but a total lack of goal threat. Nor did I think Idah was as bad as some people are saying. True, he may not have looked Prem class, but compared to Sargent, he is Gerd Müller. As for Sargent, surely we must write off the money.
I actually said something similar myself on here a couple of games ago. But that miss today made me finally lose all hope. Pukki slipped the ball to him as if he was saying, "Here you are, help yourself to a goal to boost your confidence," and Sargent still managed somehow to get his feet into a mess. Which was worse - the Brighton miss, the miss from two yards at Newcastle, or today's falling over his own feet? He is compiling his own private Miss of the Season competition.
Disagree on Sargent. I think he looks like Harry Kane when he was on loan with us. He’s just a shade too young, and needs time. Remember he came on and transformed our performance against Southampton
Some of Spurs interplay and quick passing game around our box was really impressive. We lost out to some quality moments from Spurs and failed to take advantage of our own opportunities. It felt like it was clicking for Spurs today. I've been sceptical about Gilmour starting in the anchor midfield role but he showed some good moments today I thought not least his strength for a smaller guy, muscling Dier off the ball in our box for example.