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****** Tottenham Hotspur vs Stoke City OMT *******

Well its a point i guess. Didnt really create much throughout the game. I thought AVB might have changed things a bit earlier than he did as we weren't really causing Stoke many problems at all.

I get the feeling that if one of our players had caught one of theirs with an elbow like Nzonzi did they would have been off. I still dont know how that wasn't a red.

Points a point. Need a few wins over Christmas to put us in a strong position going in to the 2nd half of the season.
 
No, when we went direct at the end Stoke looked comfortable to head the ball out.


I wish we had the mentality of United. When they need a goal late on they don't just hoof and hope, they wait patiently, build and attack and then strike. Usually score as well.

Actually I thought their defence looked panicked for the first time in injury time. And at one point kicked it anywhere-and it went out for our corner. Also I think you will find that Man Utd are quite happy to go direct when needed -although they do have van Persie which helps.
 
Let's not be too hard on the team after this. They worked hard. Stoke weren't just negative, they were super negative for the entire game. They do it when they go away to somewhere like Villa but the problem with facing a team of our stature is that they will show even less ambition. They had absolutely zero desire to score a goal today.

Our attacking play wasn't outstanding, but we were stopped by a fantastic Begovic save. Ade should have scored his header, and if Sandro showed more composure we could have been in there too. When a team defends with that level of men behind the ball, there are never going to be too many clear cut chances. We had to take one of them when they came.

Also thought Siggy on for Defoe would have been a good sub, but the crowd would have not have liked it, turned the atmosphere bad and therefore it was probably more trouble than it was worth.

I don't disagree but unfortunately we do struggle to get the first goal in home games. we have to improve in that respect, no question.
 
That is part of the league. They use what resources they have to stop teams like us from scoring (which keeps them up very easily every season) and we should use our resources to build a squad that consistently breaks these teams down. We have failed to do that.

I dread to think about what our home record against these mugs is since they've come up. Cannot be particularly good.
 
Defoe needs dropping. Has been brick for the past few games.

haha

I think Ade has been worse. Utter fudgein brick and HE should be dropped. In fact Defoes effectiveness has been radically reduced by Ade's re-introduction back into the line up. I was an advocate of the 4411 but I thought Ade would perform.
 
We battered them but missed a bit of luck to get the breakthrough.
We completely dominated them. Bale made 18 fudging crosses in one game!

Some people have a very strange definition of battering. Bale made 18 crosses for example, most of them safely floating over or in the air to Defoe in the box by himself surrounded by 4 huge men.

Their keeper made one good save (one that I would still expect most 1st choice keepers in the league to make) and other than that. Not too much else.
 
haha

I think Ade has been worse. Utter fudgein brick and HE should be dropped. In fact Defoes effectiveness has been radically reduced by Ade's re-introduction back into the line up. I was an advocate of the 4411 but I thought Ade would perform.

At least ade offers something else to the team. Defoe's touch is utterly abysmal, and he never looks to get his team mates involved.
 
I think we need to release the ball earlier, Bale and Ade and defoe for that matter hold onto it for too long. Again no tempo until the last ten minutes. Had a bad feeling from the start seeing our players strolling around.
 
Once again, Stoke 1 - Football 0. But we don't make it easier on ourselves with our poor movement. We lack someone not to initiate the attacks, but to properly distribute them. I'll wager that 20 times a match, I see Spurs players doing the arms out thing because of the lack of options. Not to beat an old horse again, but we really miss someone with Modric's vision and ability to create space. Without his goals/assists, I'll have an uneducated guess that he "assisted the assist" in over 75% of our goals. We even look harmless on counter attacks, which made our opponents brick themselves just last season.

But all things considered, it's no shame playing a 0-0 draw to Stoke. It's what they're all about.
 
I don't disagree but unfortunately we do struggle to get the first goal in home games. we have to improve in that respect, no question.

I think we are improving on that score...I also think the patience we show in the first half is somewhat deliberate. 80% of teams will come to frustrate us. Therefore if we give them too many openings first half our task is a lot harder to win the game if we concede, having to score 2 goals instead of 1. Today I thought it was noticeable that Caulker tried to join in with more attacks in the second half than the first, and there was a period in the second half where we did look really threatening.

But I do agree, we do need to improve on breaking the Stoke's down. That will come with signings and improving the quality of the squad. I just think the reality is no matter how well prepared the team is, there is always a chance they will fail to score against a team that has zero ambition. Sometimes there is nothing you can do.
 
We battered them but missed a bit of luck to get the breakthrough.
We completely dominated them. Bale made 18 fudging crosses in one game!

You're on another planet if you believe what you just typed.

We created didly squat except a few headers. The team we apparently battered had a chance from Shotton and one from Jones that we didn't come close to creating. They tactically outsmarted us and it's getting fudging annoying.
 
Too many negatives today. Bale, Lennon not at their sharpest, Adebayor not interested, Walker too fudging indecisive, Sandro frankly not Prem quality going forward (despite the excellent cross that led to Siggy's header.)

Cannot understand why AVB didn't throw Townsend into the mix late on. A tricky, unpredictable winger like him could have been just what was needed to open them up.
 
I would rather Sandro did not even bother to get forward as he tends to just clog space, get in the way or misplace a pass. He should stick to what he essentially is, a playbreaker.
 
I think we are improving on that score...I also think the patience we show in the first half is somewhat deliberate. 80% of teams will come to frustrate us. Therefore if we give them too many openings first half our task is a lot harder to win the game if we concede, having to score 2 goals instead of 1. Today I thought it was noticeable that Caulker tried to join in with more attacks in the second half than the first, and there was a period in the second half where we did look really threatening.

But I do agree, we do need to improve on breaking the Stoke's down. That will come with signings and improving the quality of the squad. I just think the reality is no matter how well prepared the team is, there is always a chance they will fail to score against a team that has zero ambition. Sometimes there is nothing you can do.

Again I don't disagree. It just seems that to get the first goal we rely on a flash of brilliance or a **** up ie Defoe v West Ham, Sandro v Fulham, Vert v Swansea. None of those opening goals came through a team move resulting in a great move and a finish. Hopefully it will come with time. I still feel the lack of a ball playing mid is a real Achilles heel.
 
AVB is tactically clueless. I have said it since day 1. Every point we have is despite AVB, and not because of him.
 
Another clueless attacking display. Yes we had the ball a lot, because Stoke didnt want it. But as always, its just individuals trying to do something out of nothing.

We sometimes had these moments under Harry, often inbetween brilliant dominating wins. Harry got slated for these rare moments. Every home game has been the same under AVB, with no sign of improvement (even with players back from injury). When his new manager pass runs out, this place is going to go mad.
 
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