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*** OMT Tottenham Hotspur v Manchester United ***

Our squad is better than Saudi Sportswashing Machine’s, overall. Look at the difference in the two clubs, thanks to a competent coach who has completely bought into the club.

And players who have bought in, you need both and we've not had that since peak poch.
 
some post match thoughts:

  1. 3-4-3 doesn't work. Our 2 man midfield got absolutely dominated in the first half (as it has all season against the best teams) and played no part in gettinig us back in the game. Kane dropping deep, consistently, to support the midfield (and being our best midfielder) meant we missed him up front. But here's the real problem, the team literally CANNOT play any other formation apart from 3-4-3. they have been conditioned to it so long, to such drab play, we literally cannot do anythign else apart from playing 3-4-3. We don't have the players to really adjust to something, mainly due to injuries but even then, they have been coached out of it for so long.
  2. Spence - Said this earlier in the thread, but christ, can he be £45M worse than what we spent on Porro? Awful decision and call by us. Conte vanity project, silly of Levy to spend that much on a manager who was clearly not intending to stay. We now have 3 RWBs (Spence, Porro Emerson) and 2 LWBs (Sessengnon and Perisic). Really lopsided.
  3. Lack of coaching - like my initial point, this team has lacked a good 'coach' for years now. the fix will take several years

1. Agreed, don't see any model where the answer is we have 2 midfielders, it means starting every game at a disadvantage. I also am not a fan of the 3 upfront unless all three are in form (so we would need to be much more ruthless in dropping/rotating players), being 2 in midfield and carrying a front player out of form is a disaster. Yes, 3+ years of system/automation training via Jose & Conte has killed these players.
2. Said it as well, we should have kept Spence & Doherty (who could play both sides) and spent the Porro money on a CB. That said, if Levy didn't spend it, Conte would have bitched and we know exactly what the fan response would have been.
3. I don't agree, look at what Howe & Emery have done, in the time they have done, and we have a better side, it should be no more than half a season before you see a change.
 
So, I dropped my ear pods in the ground yesterday. I suspect it was when I picked up something for a drunk guy behind me who was calling levy a C word constantly and he stumbled with his belongings… we’re now best friends, or as my mate said “you pick ‘em”

anyhow… I didn’t realise until I was half way down the high road towards Seven Sisters

I was like feck… I use them all the time. Pod casts when walking my dog are one of of my few pleasures

so we walked back against the foot traffic on the high road to go back into the ground

“sorry sir you can’t go up there”
I think you will find I can mate…
“I will get a manager to stop you”
You can get Eric Dier mate if you want… he wouldn’t be able to stop me
I mange don’t get to the back of the south stand entrance and luckily using all my wit and charm they let me back in. My mate had to wait at the bottom of the stairs outside the ground
i bound up to my seat and …. No pods (feck)
Strangely a few stewards see me and come over. Couple of big guys join them too. All local lads. I explain the predicament and I also show them that they are tracked to my phone and they are moving whilst the stewards are walking…
I said, politely, I don’t care who has them as long as they are returned. Hell I’ll even pay a reward. I’ll turn my back and you can just pass them around until they end up in my hand
“You accusing us of having them then bruv”
Well yeah. Because they are in one of you many high viz pockets
But no one had them, apparently !!!
Two of the stewards, let’s call them pirate 1 and pirate 2 decided they were gonna track down the thief as it must be a fan in the downstairs bar area (I hadn’t been there all game but hey the signal may be wrong)
So we why to the bar but as I said to them… who is gonna ask and accuse another fan of having them
In the mean time they have stopped moving and appear to be in one of the concessions downstairs

I was like well they ain’t coming back so I’ll mark them lost and hope someone is honest. Banged a few tweets out and we got him at 1.30 after missing the trains

emailed the club but kept the tracker on them

this morning I found out they were in someone’s house very local to the ground
Then 10 minutes later in a coffee shop
Eventually ending up in a local “medical establishment”. I waited an hour and called them. Yep still there. The girl I spoke to said she would ask as she had an idea who it may be as they worked at the ground

I was genuinely stunned

long story short… they are being posted to me today by all accounts

the manager of the place the persons works at tang me and talked me through what they were doing, including checking their staffs integrity

the person with them apparently took a bag to work at THFC and someone else put them in their bag. As I said to the guy I was speaking too, that’s gone form someone finding something they could and should hand in (as an employee) to someone intentionally hiding something

be interesting when they arrive, but credit to the place where they are for responding on something they could easily have ignored

the club, when I said where the pods were and where the person lived said call the police as it can’t be a spurs employee. I have called the police and it takes 2 days for anyone to contact you for a non emergency. THFC IMO have pretty quickly said it’s not us. It clearly is but as long as I get them back I’m fine
 
Thoughts on the game
Porro can’t defend… not new
Dier can’t defend 1 on 1 … not new
The system doesn’t create chances unless it crosses
Richarlison has a real issue standing up but he does work bloody hard
When we play with why pace and zip… we look decent
Fraser is much better than current Hugo. His kicks out uniteds back line under pressure
The ref should have sent Lindelof off for a Ceuta second yellow and bottled it
De Gea is still a vampire keeper
Son is scared of doing in the area
Both teams had more than enough chances to win that game
It felt almost like a win the end
We did back off after equalising to full conte mode. That won’t change this design at least
 
In my opinion, we haven’t had a coach since Poch. Mourinho and Conte might both be great managers, but they’re not great coaches, and neither of them suited us — it might have been clear to some before they were appointed but for the rest of us we’ve learnt that now. Nuno, who knows…that was was an aberration.

We clearly need a coach, in the style of Eddie Howe. You say that our squad belongs mid-table, so we’re does Saudi Sportswashing Machine’s belong? You’d probably take 3 or 4 of their players, and that’s on the back of this season. He’s done an incredible job with players like Joelinton, Nick Pope, Dan Burn, Joe Willock, Sean Longstaff etc etc. There’s absolutely no reason why some of our fringe players couldn’t do a job like them with the right coaching.

Of course, Eddie Howe probably won’t sustain it and Saudi Sportswashing Machine will fire him at some point, as the pressure of Saudi Arabia will be on them. But it doesn’t change what he’s done this season.

We need a coach that will commit to improving players, to focussing on a system that gets the best of out them, to promoting youth and rotating players. Get that, and we absolutely can be a top 4 team with more or less a similar squad.

It all depends on what you expect from a coach, I suppose. Conte's very good at drilling players into his system, see Lukaku's and Perisic's comments during his Inter days, for instance. He never managed to replicate that here, though, for some reason. As for Howe, I agree that nothing will ever take what he did this season away, but from the same perspective, you could say Ranieri is one of the greatest managers in Premier League history. I'd disagree with that. Doing it for one season is great; doing on a regular basis is a different matter. Chelsea and Liverpool are having terrible seasons, which means 4th spot was up for grabs - a lot of people said as much to dismiss Conte's 'achievements' this season.

That's what made Pochettino's time at Spurs so special: it wasn't a one-season wonder or a matter of circumstances. He had us punching above our weight for a relatively long time. Sometimes, you just find the right group of players that buy into your project and your words. You could have Howe at West Ham or Everton and they'd have just the same miserable season they're having now.

As for our players, they might be great on paper but that hasn't been translating on the pitch for a long, long time. It's always the system: 3-4-3 doesn't work, Mourinho's defensive 4-2-3-1 doesn't work, Espirito Santo's didn't work either, Pochettino's infamous 'diamond' formation didn't work... at some point, you have to stop making excuses and say, 'ok, maybe some of these players aren't as good as I thought'. That, more than anything else, brings back memories from the 90s. 'How could be we fighting relegation with Klinsmann, Ginola, Sheringham, Barmby, Anderton?'
 
As for our players, they might be great on paper but that hasn't been translating on the pitch for a long, long time. It's always the system: 3-4-3 doesn't work, Mourinho's defensive 4-2-3-1 doesn't work, Espirito Santo's didn't work either, Pochettino's infamous 'diamond' formation didn't work... at some point, you have to stop making excuses and say, 'ok, maybe some of these players aren't as good as I thought'. That, more than anything else, brings back memories from the 90s. 'How could be we fighting relegation with Klinsmann, Ginola, Sheringham, Barmby, Anderton?'

I’m not sure you’re hearing me. I’m not blaming the system (though it definitely doesn’t help.) No system will work if you’re not being coached effectively. That’s why our players look so poor. That’s why many of our poor players under AVB/Sherwood suddenly looked so good under Pochettino.

Not sure where Ranieri’s name came from; one-off things like that happen. Coaches like Mourinho and Conte clearly work at other clubs, and I’d confidently say that Howe would be a disaster for Everton. Every club needs a manager that suits them, and we need a coach that buys into the whole project (I hate that word). That we haven’t found that in our last 3 appointments is on Levy and Paratici.
 
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I hope Mason moves on at the end of the season instead of continuing with us in any capacity, for his own development he needs to build his experience in a different environment.

Completely disagree. All we ever do is post players out because we think players are too young inexperienced and not ready. Yes it is a matter of judgement but In the case of Ryan he will have the passion for the club.
An up and coming manager has to start somewhere! its about time this club supports a Manager instead of sacking one every five minutes..
Ryan needs a chance! Billy Nick came up through the ranks..yes and I know it was a long time ago but who knows what Ryan Mason could bring if he does not have a chance. Liverpool will be a tough test and obviously I don't expect us to win with the players we have.

Anyway...Mason really looks like he wants the job as well.
Don't forget the alternative is another well known manager who flops with us ..at least that's how its gone so far.


Come on you Spurs.........
 
Completely disagree. All we ever do is post players out because we think players are too young inexperienced and not ready. Yes it is a matter of judgement but In the case of Ryan he will have the passion for the club.
An up and coming manager has to start somewhere! its about time this club supports a Manager instead of sacking one every five minutes..
Ryan needs a chance! Billy Nick came up through the ranks..yes and I know it was a long time ago but who knows what Ryan Mason could bring if he does not have a chance. Liverpool will be a tough test and obviously I don't expect us to win with the players we have.

Anyway...Mason really looks like he wants the job as well.
Don't forget the alternative is another well known manager who flops with us ..at least that's how its gone so far.


Come on you Spurs.........

To be honest, i dont think its fair on Mason to give him the job until he has had chance to refine his talents as a manager, as others have said, there is more to building a squad and team then being motivational for 6-7 games a season. If he were to takeover too early and it fails, then his chances of being able to get a new role is unlikely (he isnt a name like lampard or Gerrard, who despite their lack of ability seem to land on their feet), but look at those players who have jumped straight in (Paul Ince, Neville, That ex defender of ours who joined them other lot who we also dont talk about, Paul Scholes, Henry, Shearer...the list goes on), some intelligent players in that list but they were thrown in too early and never managed again.
 
To be honest, i dont think its fair on Mason to give him the job until he has had chance to refine his talents as a manager, as others have said, there is more to building a squad and team then being motivational for 6-7 games a season. If he were to takeover too early and it fails, then his chances of being able to get a new role is unlikely (he isnt a name like lampard or Gerrard, who despite their lack of ability seem to land on their feet), but look at those players who have jumped straight in (Paul Ince, Neville, That ex defender of ours who joined them other lot who we also dont talk about, Paul Scholes, Henry, Shearer...the list goes on), some intelligent players in that list but they were thrown in too early and never managed again.

I take your point and you may be right..but I'm not so sure. Mason must have learnt something since his time at the club.
Brian Clough had to quit playing but proved to be a success. I take your point though. I still think he should at least remain until the
end of the season.
If he was that poor we would have folded yesterday.
 
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