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Really good following from the lads. Went a touch quiet midway through the first half. But superb noise for the last half-hour, another a good day-out.
Villa Park ia becoming a decent ground for us these days
Apparently a guy through a flare, it landed in the gangway and whilst the fans were choking on some smoke, another Spurs fan threw it away obviously to get rid of it and it accidently hit the linesman. Not sure how true this is, but guy on twitter has said that.
No, was about a few blocks to our left. A few around seemed to think it was Villa fans, but seeing the clip on Sky just a few minutes ago and it certainly looks like it comes from our of our sections.
Wonder if a Villa fan had thrown it into the Spurs end?
Certainly possible. I hear they have made 2 arrests. Will be interesting to see who they were
Just back, and my GHod there are some ****s in life..... 2 guys behind us spent the whole game either shouting TRAVEL WITH IT...... or TOWNSEND YOU FUVKING ****... DO SOME THING....
Not sure what some people expect... Oh and they did sound northern.
I remember us being quite effectively stopped by hard working, well organized defensive teams when we played Bale left and Lennon right both under AVB and Redknapp.
You must have been close to us. We were in Row P Lower Stand, and that sounds like the same bloke that was about 2 rows behind me.
Everytime Townsend got the ball in the 2nd half he was shouting 'Townsend do something' Has to be the same bloke, I was amazed. To quote Alan Partidge...'Some people'
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Really good following from the lads. Went a touch quiet midway through the first half. But superb noise for the last half-hour, another a good day-out.
Villa Park ia becoming a decent ground for us these days
I never questioned putting Vertonghen at LB. With Rose out, this is the only option (have decided I'd rather we changed formation than use Naughton there again, he's not a LB). What I questioned was using Sigurdsson and Vertonghen on the same flank when neither of them give us natural width. Against a team like Villa, who have lots of fast players that will get back quickly when we get the ball, press us and make it difficult to find space, you need to be able to stretch the pitch. To create gaps in the defence. It is a common tactic used against teams that have poor wide players to defend narrow, because you either force the ball out wide to poor players who can't do much with it or don't give the good players in the middle any space. Our good players in the middle are good. But we don't have Messi, Iniesta, Fabregas etc who can pass their way through tiny gaps regularly. As it was, Villa doubled up on Townsend in the first half and he was less effective, only when they started committing men forward after a lucky goal and the introduction of Benteke did we start getting more space. If you have two wingers, you can't double up on both without leaving lots of space for the players in the middle.
You might have thought we lost to West Ham because of defensive errors, and whilst that's true, we weren't winning by the time they were made because we played right into their hands using these kinds of tactics.
As for clean sheets - yes, the defensive side of our game has been good. But clean sheets don't win you matches, they just stop you losing them. It's key for us to work out how to start battering teams, as it's going to be tight at the top this year and currently, if the season were to end now, we'd miss out on CL football on goal difference. We have scored the same number of goals as newly promoted Cardiff and a West Ham team managed by Sam Allardyce. We've scored less than Villa and Saudi Sportswashing Machine. City and Arsenal have scored more than double what we've scored. This needs to improve, and playing two wingers (or at least two strikers) in these types of game, is how.
This was a crucial win. This not only put us back into the title race but also shows we have the mental strength to recover from setbacks. After being humiliated by West Ham, the media could have put pressure on us if we had not win this game. Fortunately, we managed to get the all important goals to win. We were not outstanding but did just enough to overcome Villa. But we still need to learn to be more clinical in front of goal. We could have get a more comfortable win if we had make use of chances in the second half.
I still have some doubts on Townsend but you have give credit to him for his part in this win. It was a crucial time to score our first goal even if Townsend did not mean it. He was clearly crossing the ball but the goalie got distracted by Holtby and Soldado. Townsend played brilliantly but still needs to improve his finishing. He could have scored a hattrick if he was more clinical with his shooting. Frankly was very disappointed Soldado didn't touch the ball for the first goal. Soldado badly needed a goal to boost his confidence. Really happy Soldado managed to find the goal in the second. And it was a well-taken goal by him. The way he pretended as if he was going to round the goalie but instead shot into the goal was world class ! Hope it will boost Soldado's confidence to score more goals like these.
It was a big gamble by AVB to drop Dembele and Eriksen and play Sandro with Paulinho in midfield. But the gamble really paid off. Sandro looked very assured in midfield even if not that commanding. I think Sandro needs more time to get back his real form. Paulinho continues to impress especially in attacks. It was brilliant the way he assisted the goal by Soldado. It was a inch perfect pass to Soldado. And Paulinho could have scored a goal or two as well. If Townsend's cross in the second half was a bit higher and slower, Paulinho could have headed into an open goal. Happy to see Lennon returning. He didn't have much impact but atleast we will have more options in attack. Was disappointed by Holtby and Sigurdsson. Thought they will trouble the Villa defence but they were hardly in the game. Holtby did create our second goal but other than that he was largely missing.
Credit to our defence for keeping another clean sheet, especially since we played Vertonghen out of position. Chiriches was a bit shaky at times but other than that looked promising. Maybe we can call upon Chiriches in defence whenever needed. Ofcourse Villa hardly looked like scoring but our defence didn't make many mistakes either. But we need to improve our defending during corners as we looked shaky at times. Fortunately for us, Benteke didn't make use of the chances he got.
It is really great to get back into winning ways to keep us on track in the title race. But wish we will be more ruthless in attack and score more goals. After scoring his first goal from open play in the league, hope Soldado will now go on a goal scoring run. We really need someone to be a consistently goal scorer.
You were not a million miles away from me, I was in row L seat 325.