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*** OMT Spurs vs West London Defence League

Think criticism of individuals is mostly a bit misplaced.

Our back three had to deal with a lot and mostly did really well.

Midfield two outnumbered and in a really tough spot most of the game.

Kane getting poor service and little space against top defensive players. Son likewise got very little of the service he thrives on.

The midfield four is a bit short on quality and creativity. We know this and that's why we signed Perisic and Spence. They're just not ready yet.

Tuchel is excellent tactically. Once we went behind it's always a massive uphill struggle. They shut our usual patterns down really well, and when we have to rely on individual excellence the front three can deliver, but that midfield four usually doesn't.

We mostly kept it tight at the back. Went a bit gung to when we had to and then had to ride our luck a bit. Such is life.

Well done on never giving up, we kept fighting, we have real spirit in this team. We clawed it back from a really difficult spot.

Very happy to see Conte changing it and changing it again. Probably already knew most of the lessons from this game, but we know it even better now. Work left to be done, as we all knew.
 

@Gazza

Re: Sess, I don't think it's an overreaction as much as a recognition that these fullbacks, Emerson and Sess, were identified as weaknesses last season. While they may have improved, we also specifically brought in Perisic as an upgrade on both Sess and Reguilon. And in today's game, a real pressure cooker against a good side, Sess was utterly invisible up against a makeshift right-back, while Perisic stepped in, was solid and provided an assist at the death.

We need players who show up against Chelsea, not just against Southampton.

Re: our shape and Richarlison, I don't mean he was bad, I mean he wandered all over - showed up on the left wing, right wing, down the middle. As for our shape, Conte mentioned that the second goal we conceded was because we weren't used to the four at the back - in fact, he declared we wouldn't have conceded it if we had three at the back. It's safe to say we have more work to do on that formation, I think.

Re: Romero, fully agreed. But there will be a time when he gets sent off regardless - he's not just mindlessly aggressive, he plays on the edge. But sometimes refs will see him on the wrong side of it - just the way it is.

Re: Davies and Dier, not against Southampton, but at the end of last season, for sure. And plenty of times last year - the fact is that in our best sides under Poch, they were both subs, only brought on when something was up with Toby/Jan/Wanyama/Dembele in Dier's case, and Rose in Davies' case.

We can't rely on them long-term if we want to challenge - we need a better distributor than Dier, and a better LCB than Davies.

Finally, re:Chelsea, I think their technical level is just better than us. The way they played quick, one-touch passes, touches around the corner, instinctive balls into spaces they knew their team-mates would be in...those are exactly what we need to get out of teams pressing us,and sadly, very few of our team have it. I don't even think Kane and Son can do those all that well. Kulusevski can, Bentancur can, Romero can - and it shows what we're trying to build towards that all those three are among our latest signings, as is Bissouma (another press-resistant player). But the rest lack technique compared to Chelsea, and it *always* shows in the ease with which they escape our press while imposing their own.
 
FatBloke said:
Spot on about Perisic. In hindsight, we could have done with his experience from the start. That said, starting Sess after his performance against Southampton was the right call.
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Agreed, mate. He had to be given his shot after Southampton. He was - he didn't deliver. Perisic was brought on, and did. It ended well for us, and now Perisic will start going forward until he either has a poor game or gets injured, at which point Sess will step back in for another shot at it.

FatBloke said:
I've got to disagree about Davies and Dier. Them playing it out wasn't much of a problem -- all the interceptions seemed to be on our right side as Chelsea overloaded it. I do think they suffered when we switched to a back 4 though, like with Chelsea's second goal, but that was largely due to the midfielders (Sonny?) not tracking back. It was a calculated risk from Conte and it didn't come off -- I'm really glad to see him return to a back 3 minutes later.
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It wasn't a problem in isolation, because I agree, they targeted our right side, not our left. However, both of them were given more space and time to play their passes relative to Romero and Royal on our right - why is that? I'd argue it's because neither is particularly dangerous with their passing, while Dier occasionally gives it away despite having no pressure on him at all. That isn't a positive, imo.

Plus, it's on the switch to the back four that I expect more from them. They've played that system for most of their careers - whether Son is doing his job or not, the fact that Dier got pulled to the ball on the right and left Davies alone against James, and the fact that Davies lost James to begin with, is poor. And it's part of a pattern - for all of Dier's vaunted organizational abilities, I don't actually see him doing all that organization in crunch moments, sadly - like that one.

FatBloke said:
Overall, poor first half, with Kante, Loftus-Cheek and Cucurella playing really well and our players seemingly nervous. However, we pulled it back in the second. Got lucky with both goals IMHO but, well, it's not like Chelsea have never had any luck against us. There was real character on display, and hopefully both players and management have learned from it.
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Absolutely agreed.
 
90291Spur said:
Yet the criticisms will pile up - I know we are all entitled to our opinions. But this was a poor team performance that somehow yielded a point and two equalizers. THught the ref was one of our better contributors today, letting that foul on Havertz go and no minding Romero trying to scalp Cucurella.
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In hindsight with video replays It wasn’t actually a foul on Havertz. Agree in general though, we got the run of the green from the ref, Romero was lucky with the hair pull, got away on a technicality I think. Also, for me, it’s offside on Richarlson for the first.
 
DubaiSpur said:
@Gazza

Re: Sess, I don't think it's an overreaction as much as a recognition that these fullbacks, Emerson and Sess, were identified as weaknesses last season. While they may have improved, we also specifically brought in Perisic as an upgrade on both Sess and Reguilon. And in today's game, a real pressure cooker against a good side, Sess was utterly invisible up against a makeshift right-back, while Perisic stepped in, was solid and provided an assist at the death.

We need players who show up against Chelsea, not just against Southampton.

Re: our shape and Richarlison, I don't mean he was bad, I mean he wandered all over - showed up on the left wing, right wing, down the middle. As for our shape, Conte mentioned that the second goal we conceded was because we weren't used to the four at the back - in fact, he declared we wouldn't have conceded it if we had three at the back. It's safe to say we have more work to do on that formation, I think.

Re: Romero, fully agreed. But there will be a time when he gets sent off regardless - he's not just mindlessly aggressive, he plays on the edge. But sometimes refs will see him on the wrong side of it - just the way it is.

Re: Davies and Dier, not against Southampton, but at the end of last season, for sure. And plenty of times last year - the fact is that in our best sides under Poch, they were both subs, only brought on when something was up with Toby/Jan/Wanyama/Dembele in Dier's case, and Rose in Davies' case.

We can't rely on them long-term if we want to challenge - we need a better distributor than Dier, and a better LCB than Davies.

Finally, re:Chelsea, I think their technical level is just better than us. The way they played quick, one-touch passes, touches around the corner, instinctive balls into spaces they knew their team-mates would be in...those are exactly what we need to get out of teams pressing us,and sadly, very few of our team have it. I don't even think Kane and Son can do those all that well. Kulusevski can, Bentancur can, Romero can - and it shows what we're trying to build towards that all those three are among our latest signings, as is Bissouma (another press-resistant player). But the rest lack technique compared to Chelsea, and it *always* shows in the ease with which they escape our press while imposing their own.
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An excellent post. Both in regards to today's game and where we are as a team.

My expectations for the season were neither raised or lowered by what I saw today. We will be in a mighty scrap for the top 4 as usual. Talk of Chelsea's demise has sadly been shown up as the wishful thinking it always was.

Still, 4pts represents a good start with a really tough match out the way early. Onwards and upwards.
 
DubaiSpur said:
Agreed, mate. He had to be given his shot after Southampton. He was - he didn't deliver. Perisic was brought on, and did. It ended well for us, and now Perisic will start going forward until he either has a poor game or gets injured, at which point Sess will step back in for another shot at it.



It wasn't a problem in isolation, because I agree, they targeted our right side, not our left. However, both of them were given more space and time to play their passes relative to Romero and Royal on our right - why is that? I'd argue it's because neither is particularly dangerous with their passing, while Dier occasionally gives it away despite having no pressure on him at all. That isn't a positive, imo.

Plus, it's on the switch to the back four that I expect more from them. They've played that system for most of their careers - whether Son is doing his job or not, the fact that Dier got pulled to the ball on the right and left Davies alone against James, and the fact that Davies lost James to begin with, is poor. And it's part of a pattern - for all of Dier's vaunted organizational abilities, I don't actually see him doing all that organization in crunch moments, sadly - like that one.



Absolutely agreed.
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Surely Davies should have been organising and shouting at Son to get back for their second goal then Davies could have stayed near to James.
 
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Best thing: how we hustled a draw at the end. Unsettled them, unsettled Tucel who probably made too many subs, and fought until we got the reward. Chelsea were triggered by the end and lost their cool.

Most frustrating thing: 1) that we didn't make more of the first 8 mins. We created openings, we were getting on the ball and had them rattled. But we lacked precision. Both sides were edgy, we needed to be calm and impose ourselves. After this opening 10mins, it was them who imposed their game, we'd missed our opportunity to dictate. 2) Second frustration was how chelsea closed Bentancur out the game. Lets be honest, Chelsea pressed extremely well, but thankfully their finishing was terrible.

Re. Bentancur not getting in the game - some of that is on his teammates and maybe on Conte too. We needed to pass faster and create some angles to play the ball through the middle. It was too simple for Chelsea to get Mount between the CB in possession and Bentancur. Bentancur didn't do enough to move into space and demand the ball, the rest of the defense didn't help - they needed to find an intermediate pass to create another angle to get the ball to him.

We need better passing and movement from the CBs and CMs. Not sure it's fair to point the finger at the WBs as some seem to be. We didn't really get the ball into them (apart from the very start and end). Chelsea smothered us. Second half we showed more belief and passed the ball faster. Then we dug in and fought for a point! Onwards and fuk you Tucal!
 
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seaside spur said:
Surely Davies should have been organising and shouting at Son to get back for their second goal then Davies would have stayed near to James.
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Yep, but that is less on Davies, more on Son, who has form for this sort of thing. Remember Lloris yelling at him to track back? Before that, pretty sure Jan was yelling at Son to track back too at times.

Sonny just isn't a defensively aware player. I wouldn't say he's lazy since he does track back when he notices things are going wrong - but he's not generally aware of danger developing in a defensive sense, and is super focused on offering an option on the break.

His quality means that we have to build around that, but it was, is, and probably will continue to be an issue that will hit us when he plays on the left in front of a four. In the future, it might be better to have him continue in a free-floating 10 role and move Richarlison to the left when we go down that route - the latter is more defensively sound.
 
DubaiSpur said:
Yep, but that is less on Davies, more on Son, who has form for this sort of thing. Remember Lloris yelling at him to track back? Before that, pretty sure Jan was yelling at Son to track back too at times.

Sonny just isn't a defensively aware player. I wouldn't say he's lazy since he does track back when he notices things are going wrong - but he's not generally aware of danger developing in a defensive sense, and is super focused on offering an option on the break.

His quality means that we have to build around that, but it was, is, and probably will continue to be an issue that will hit us when he plays on the left in front of a four. In the future, it might be better to have him continue in a free-floating 10 role and move Richarlison to the left when we go down that route - the latter is more defensively sound.
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Yeah Son is awful defensively.
I actually think he absolves responsibility rather than get beat / outmuscled and blamed.
Whatever the reason , it's a problem , especially in that formation.
Ultimately it's Sons fault , I know that but the senior players can take on the responsibility of screaming at him to get back.
Alternatively, someone else needs to go there , such as Richarlison,as you suggested.
Also , is there any point having all eleven of our own players in our box defending corners ?
Surely Son would be better left upfield , dragging a couple of the opposition players beck with him, or at the very least he can stay on the edge of the box.
Chelsea had at least two players outside the box on their first goal , I'm not sure if they had any others on the halfway line but at least two outside the box so why did we have eleven players inside the box?
Son is absolutely no use at all in the penalty area on set pieces as we've seen today and on other occasions.
 
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Jordinho said:
Tuchel thinks Anthony Taylor shouldn't be allowed to ref Chelsea again. Getting pretty much every decision go your way for at least the first half isn't good enough I guess.
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fun fact they have never lost a game when Taylor has been the official
 
Rewatched the game on the train and then at home
Koulibaly… not very good. Looks lost
Our whole team was poor and didn’t do well with the ball
Kante is class and the best in his role I’ve ever seen
Their fans are less racist than they used to be but their ground is awful.. still third world
My godson has now
Seen us play every top side and never seen us lose. His record for an 8 year old is unreal especially as we’re talking city away, Chelsea away, pool away, arsenal at home and villa and Norwich away too
 
Spoonman said:
An excellent post. Both in regards to today's game and where we are as a team.

My expectations for the season were neither raised or lowered by what I saw today. We will be in a mighty scrap for the top 4 as usual. Talk of Chelsea's demise has sadly been shown up as the wishful thinking it always was.

Still, 4pts represents a good start with a really tough match out the way early. Onwards and upwards.
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Don’t forget that’s as good a Chelsea can play
That’s their peak game with this squad… even their fans said it when we left
 
DubaiSpur said:
Yep, but that is less on Davies, more on Son, who has form for this sort of thing. Remember Lloris yelling at him to track back? Before that, pretty sure Jan was yelling at Son to track back too at times.

Sonny just isn't a defensively aware player. I wouldn't say he's lazy since he does track back when he notices things are going wrong - but he's not generally aware of danger developing in a defensive sense, and is super focused on offering an option on the break.

His quality means that we have to build around that, but it was, is, and probably will continue to be an issue that will hit us when he plays on the left in front of a four. In the future, it might be better to have him continue in a free-floating 10 role and move Richarlison to the left when we go down that route - the latter is more defensively sound.
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I don't really have an issue with son for the goals, he's not defence minded, but i do take issue with his reaction to the second one where turns round and starts shouting at others.
We all fudge up, it's how you deal with it and to me that isn't the right reaction.
 
Same old story we draw that game after being in control and we're soft touch Tottenham, and it was a never say die performance from whoever we played. When boot is on other foot we didnt deserve it.
As poorly as we played did Lloris have much to do? Instead of saying how brilliant his team played Tuchel might ask why they didnt score more goals and put the game to bed.
 
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