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***OMT - Tottenham Hotspur v Arsenal***

Arsenal were the better side, lets not kid ourselves here. They did something Ive never seen themselves vs us and that was press hard. I wasnt concerned when I first saw it, because most teams these days press against us as thats the only chance you get against us is not giving room - however, save for the top teams after a while we can wear them down and begin to find spaces. This never materialised against Arsenal, and as much as credit must go to them for their hard work we were sloppy with the ball by our own standards and that wasnt just because of Arsenal. Added to that Kane and Dele were clearly not 100%, just have to accept this was just Arsenal's day. They are still a top team and we was always going to lose to them in the PL at some point, it doesn't happen often so Im as about comfortable as I could be about losing this game to our rivals....
 
Arsenal were the better side, lets not kid ourselves here. They did something Ive never seen themselves vs us and that was press hard. I wasnt concerned when I first saw it, because most teams these days press against us as thats the only chance you get against us is not giving room - however, save for the top teams after a while we can wear them down and begin to find spaces. This never materialised against Arsenal, and as much as credit must go to them for their hard work we were sloppy with the ball by our own standards and that wasnt just because of Arsenal. Added to that Kane and Dele were clearly not 400%, just have to accept this was just Arsenal's day. They are still a top team and we was always going to lose to them in the PL at some point, it doesn't happen often so Im as about comfortable as I could be about losing this game to our rivals....
We also have the answer to that kind of pressing - playing on the counter.

That plan was working until the ref/lino contrived to give them a goal.
 
We also have the answer to that kind of pressing - playing on the counter.

That plan was working until the ref/lino contrived to give them a goal.
We normally do have the answer to that pressing though,thats what Im saying - Our passing wasnt as slick as it normally is.

Sorry but I dont see what plan was working, look at the match thread and most were commenting before the goal how they could see one coming. They won a free kick they shouldnt of, that doesnt excuse conceding a goal from that and then letting another one in subsequently and not scoring ourselves. If we cant come back once we have a critical decision goagainst us then we really arent all that....
 
We also have the answer to that kind of pressing - playing on the counter.

That plan was working until the ref/lino contrived to give them a goal.

And there's me getting ready to blame Sissoko.

The ref was just guessing with the majority of his decisions. They literally have not a clue what is really happening in most games. 'If a player screams it must be a foul' referring.
 
We normally do have the answer to that pressing though,thats what Im saying - Our passing wasnt as slick as it normally is.

Sorry but I dont see what plan was working, look at the match thread and most were commenting before the goal how they could see one coming. They won a free kick they shouldnt of, that doesnt excuse conceding a goal from that and then letting another one in subsequently and not scoring ourselves. If we cant come back once we have a critical decision goagainst us then we really arent all that....

I dont think we were overrun or anything close to that and I agree with @scaramanga (and that never easy for me;)) re we where coping. But totally agree with the coming back from one down bit.
But it was a strange game. I personally was sick and tired of all the media hype which always follows "the game of the weekend". I was almost feeling 'well at least thats out of the way by the end. This is not the way I roll. I love my football and especially a Spurs game, but this weekend I thought I would scream if another Sky/BT/media pundit eulogised over Pochettino/Spurs.
 
I dont think we were overrun or anything close to that and I agree with @scaramanga (and that never easy for me;)) re we where coping. But totally agree with the coming back from one down bit.
But it was a strange game. I personally was sick and tired of all the media hype which always follows "the game of the weekend". I was almost feeling 'well at least thats out of the way by the end. This is not the way I roll. I love my football and especially a Spurs game, but this weekend I thought I would scream if another Sky/BT/media pundit eulogised over Pochettino/Spurs.
I wouldnt say we were overrun, but it did look like they were going to score, or certainly the more likely team to. We just didnt look as sharp, they came out of the traps quick and we never really got into our stride despite creating the odd decent chance did we?
 
I wouldnt say we were overrun, but it did look like they were going to score, or certainly the more likely team to. We just didnt look as sharp, they came out of the traps quick and we never really got into our stride despite creating the odd decent chance did we?

I have not seen an Arsenal team so focused for a long long time. I think losing was not an option on Saturday the club would have had serious unrest again!. The fans were baying for blood, anybodys!
 
Hasn't someone forgotten an avatar change punishment? Or are you still searching for something sufficiently horrific?
 
I felt it was a pretty self indulgent and lazy performance from us for whatever reason. I think at times some of our players believe the hype and get caught up in the nonsense like the ott sky sports countdown to kick off with 3 days to go and all that nonsense. The power shift conversations don't help either and then the players end up playing the occasion rather than the game. We have got to learn to switch off from all the surrounding noise and just match them for work rate whenever we play and then our better team spirit and individuals will generally show through for the most part.

They played well and deserve credit but we allowed them to go untroubled and then couldn't actually apply any real pressure. Kane looked unfit, Alli looked out of sorts as did Eriksen. In fact, Sanchez, Sissoko and Davies were the only players who emerged with any real credit for me. Having said all that, its one game and it doesn't define our season. We will still go on and despite our handicap of being homeless to all intents and purposes, have a good season and probably finish above them before taking ourselves back home whereas they will lose their only marketable assets for free next summer and will be unable to adequately replace them in terms of star quality and in Alexis Sanchez's case, actual output.

We get another chance in 12 weeks time and a win in that will see this game very quickly forgotten as an aberration rather than the norm.
 
I felt it was a pretty self indulgent and lazy performance from us for whatever reason. I think at times some of our players believe the hype and get caught up in the nonsense like the ott sky sports countdown to kick off with 3 days to go and all that nonsense. The power shift conversations don't help either and then the players end up playing the occasion rather than the game. We have got to learn to switch off from all the surrounding noise and just match them for work rate whenever we play and then our better team spirit and individuals will generally show through for the most part.

They played well and deserve credit but we allowed them to go untroubled and then couldn't actually apply any real pressure. Kane looked unfit, Alli looked out of sorts as did Eriksen. In fact, Sanchez, Sissoko and Davies were the only players who emerged with any real credit for me. Having said all that, its one game and it doesn't define our season. We will still go on and despite our handicap of being homeless to all intents and purposes, have a good season and probably finish above them before taking ourselves back home whereas they will lose their only marketable assets for free next summer and will be unable to adequately replace them in terms of star quality and in Alexis Sanchez's case, actual output.

We get another chance in 12 weeks time and a win in that will see this game very quickly forgotten as an aberration rather than the norm.

^^^^^^THIS^^^^^^

what I’ve been attempting to say. But not as well!
 
We also have the answer to that kind of pressing - playing on the counter.

That plan was working until the ref/lino contrived to give them a goal.
I agree with you here. I felt that we had seen off their initial 25 minute manic burst and were growing into the game at the point when they scored via an offside header from a free kick that never was.

I am also puzzled as to how Xaka's blatent foul on Sissoko stopping a good counter attacking opportunity for us wasn't deemed worthy of a yellow card? His next one (or more likely the blatent tugging back of Winks later on) would then have resulted in a red card.
 
We normally do have the answer to that pressing though,thats what Im saying - Our passing wasnt as slick as it normally is.

Sorry but I dont see what plan was working, look at the match thread and most were commenting before the goal how they could see one coming. They won a free kick they shouldnt of, that doesnt excuse conceding a goal from that and then letting another one in subsequently and not scoring ourselves. If we cant come back once we have a critical decision goagainst us then we really arent all that....
To be fair the match threads are always doom and gloom.

My take on it was that Arsenal were playing the game on the front foot and the action areas were mainly in our half, but the opportunities that we had were as good as theirs.
 
I have not seen an Arsenal team so focused for a long long time. I think losing was not an option on Saturday the club would have had serious unrest again!. The fans were baying for blood, anybodys!
Same as Liverpool were against us up at Anfield last season. They'd had an appalling run of results and the media were coming for them with such venom there was always only going to be one outcome, them playing out of their skins against us.

What's also going on here is that up to a point we are the upstarts, the outsider gatecrashing their party. We get similar fomenting by the media prior to fixtures at Stamford Bridge and to an extent Old Trafford. All the top six clubs are all desperate to put us back in our box and the media have a field day winding everyone up about it so it really does make it doubly hard for us to get a result on their patch.

It's a problem though not one we cannot overcome, but for us to stand a chance it does need for us to be in good form and not struggling with too many injuries as was the case against the Arse.
 
Did you watch Carragher and Bellamy (!) on Sky Monday Night Football; they showed a few instances where Spurs were TOO keen to press... Dembele and Vertonghen would go and press too far, so a simple pass and suddenly it was 3vs3.

And over 90 minutes, if you have Ozil, Lacazette and Sanchez playing well versus our Sanchez, Dier and Vertonghen in a 3 vs 3 it is very hard to keep them out all game... eventually they will score or get a deflection or dive or tight referee/linesman call.

They criticised Dembele for not remaining in place in front of that back 3, he allowed a gap to appear and we faced 3 vs 3 too often, as Dembele is really not a "pure" DM, he likes to go chasing a bit.
 
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