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***OMT: Mighty Spurs vs ManMour***

Pirate55 said:
It is a mentality thing. We played by pressing and being relentless in our pursuit of the ball. We gave them no time on the ball at all. In games where we are favourites, we too often stroke the ball about imperiously but with no incision, aggression or tempo. Yesterday, we were fast, aggressive, incisive and showed we wanted it more right from the start. That is how we play when the team considers itelf "underdogs". How many of the posters on here gave us little chance before the game? Most would have settled for a draw. That is what I mean by an underdog mentality. It is when we approach games in this manner that we are at our best.
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You really believe that this approach is called "underdog mentality"?
I call it something a little more like having more of your first eleven fit, including a very special player, and approaching the game with the knowledge that you are better than the other side and you are going to show them as much.
When teams pack their half and stifle us, it gets tough because they bung up the gaps and slow us down. Man Utd, last night, played into our hands by playing Pogba (again!) as a holding midfielder when he does not have the discipline or team sensibility to be one! We had spaces to move into once we swarmed, and that was a massive thing.
Dortmund and Madrid were European style performances of patience and nous. The manager, and side, learnt from last season's campaign.


p.s. I hate to break it to you, we are favorites in the majority of matches we play these days and we win a lot more of those than not.
 
I've only seen one paper, Sky sports and radio 4 this morning and there's not been any reference to any further incidents in the match like Kane moving too early, Dele kicking Sanchez and Jan "trying to kill" Herrera. Have I missed anything new?
 
What really stood out from that video above is how none of his team mates stuck up for him.

Think the wages have unsettled the ship massively.
 
thfcsteff said:
You really believe that this approach is called "underdog mentality"?
I call it something a little more like having more of your first eleven fit, including a very special player, and approaching the game with the knowledge that you are better than the other side and you are going to show them as much.
When teams pack their half and stifle us, it gets tough because they bung up the gaps and slow us down. Man Utd, last night, played into our hands by playing Pogba (again!) as a holding midfielder when he does not have the discipline or team sensibility to be one! We had spaces to move into once we swarmed, and that was a massive thing.
Dortmund and Madrid were European style performances of patience and nous. The manager, and side, learnt from last season's campaign.


p.s. I hate to break it to you, we are favorites in the majority of matches we play these days and we win a lot more of those than not.
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Yes I do believe it's a mentality thing. Take Arsenal away as an example. The media had been going on all week about a "shift in balance of power in North London." This inspired the Goons to play like dervishes - just like we did against United, This happened when we were given little chance - even by our own fans ( see comments earlier in this thread if you don't believe me). The players reacted with a stirring performance. Same as against Madrid and Dortmund, and Pool at home.

However, when we go into games like Newport, Wimbledon, Swansea, Southampton, Bournemouth, Brighton, Palace (and others I could cite) as clear favourites, sometimes that intensity is sadly missing - particularly from the start of games. If you can't see the difference in approach then you are watching different games to me.
 
They really do think we are a dirty side though. I've heard it from them for the last 3-4 years, mainly since the "Battle of the Bridge", which admittedly was a bad night.
 
Cochise said:
They really do think we are a dirty side though. I've heard it from them for the last 3-4 years, mainly since the "Battle of the Bridge", which admittedly was a bad night.
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Lots of supporters of others say the same while we see ourselves as soft touches
 
It is great to get this win over ManU. It is always enjoyable beating ManU who have affected us the most in the PL era. This is the first time since the 1960s and only the third time in our history that we have beaten ManU for 3 consecutive matches in the league at home. We played well and should have won by more goals if we had been more clinical in front of goal. The only disappointment is the team, especially Kane, failing to score in the second half despite having many chances. We could have won 4-0 or 5-0 if we had made use of all the chances we created.

Credit to Eriksen for scoring the crucial first goal and Trippier for forcing the own goal. It was the perfect timing to score within 11 seconds after the match started. Well done to Eriksen for being at the right time and place to score that goal. But it seemed the goal affected us more than ManU as they put us under pressure for about 15 minutes after that. Fortunately for us, the second goal killed them off. Kane played well to help the team but disappointing that he failed to score. Remember, Kane has only scored 1 goal against ManU before this and he was not clinical enough in this match as well. Kane had 2 or 3 chances which he should have scored from. Alli played well but like Kane he also wasted a few chances to score. Son was not at his best in this match as he also wasted a chance to score. In fact, was very annoyed with Son for opting to shoot from a difficult angle instead of passing to an unmarked Kane in the first half. Lamela didn't have much time to make an impact but still had 1 chance to score which he couldn't make use of late in the match.

Our midfield did well to control the match. ManU were poor for most of the match but Dier and Dembele did their part to help us. Was worried when Dembele got the yellow card early in the match for a needless tackle. Fortunately, Dembele was very careful with his tackles after that. Similiarly, thought Dier played well and didn't make too many of his usual mistakes.

Well done to our defence for keeping the clean sheet. It is great to see us keeping the clean sheet against ManU despite Alderweireld not playing in defence. Our defence were not really comfortable when ManU attacked in the first half but improved in the second half. Lloris, Vertonghen and Sanchez did their part well to keep our goal safe.

So, we are now unbeaten in 6 league matches against ManU at home, winning our last 3 matches. We are proving to the world that ManU have always been a one-man team when Ferguson was their manager. Remember, we can't stop losing to them when ManU were managed by Ferguson. Since he retired, we have been unbeaten against them at home for the last 6 years ! Full credit to AVB for starting our unbeaten run and Pochettino for winning the last 3 matches ! We do need to improve our away record against them though. Let's hope we will be boosted by this win to go on a long winning run to help our top 4 race. With us only 5 points behind 2nd place now, we should be aiming for the 2nd place in the league for the remaining of the season.
 
Pirate55 said:
Yes I do believe it's a mentality thing. Take Arsenal away as an example. The media had been going on all week about a "shift in balance of power in North London." This inspired the Goons to play like dervishes - just like we did against United, This happened when we were given little chance - even by our own fans ( see comments earlier in this thread if you don't believe me). The players reacted with a stirring performance. Same as against Madrid and Dortmund, and Pool at home.

However, when we go into games like Newport, Wimbledon, Swansea, Southampton, Bournemouth, Brighton, Palace (and others I could cite) as clear favourites, sometimes that intensity is sadly missing - particularly from the start of games. If you can't see the difference in approach then you are watching different games to me.
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I would argue this is more a deliberate tempo thing. A lot of the time I’d imagine Poch doesn’t want us going hell for leather against teams like Wimbledon or Newport - I actually think we play a patient game deliberately against those sides to preserve our condition for times when we want to peak.

And most of the time it works. We manage our conditioning to peak at the right times and it’s why we can be so relentless in certain games. I was stunned at how in control we looked against United, not because we were sitting back protecting our lead but because we kept on going at them again and again. But we can’t do that in every game, we have to choose. There are some games we do it before Christmas but a lot of the time it is after.

And it doesn’t always work - it is not a guanenteed win. For instance I thought we tried to play a real high tempo against West Ham at home and we were unlucky to only draw. But it does increase our chances of winning when we can run teams into the ground due to superior fitness.

I actually don’t think our players ever view themselves as underdogs - maybe they did in the Jol or Harry years but I think you can tell from the comms that come out of the club through to the looks on the players faces that they believe they will win every game and are royally fudged off when they don’t. And they ultimately believe in their ability to take the game to any opposition.
 
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