Andre Villas-Boas - Head Coach

[Bedfordspurs]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Liverpool create a lot and actually put these poor teams to the sword when they play them.

Yep they beat the **** which is why their significantly up on points this season but there still reliant on one or two to create (coutunho and Suarez plus a limited used Moses) which will cost them against good sides. No coincidence two good sides they have played they have dropped points in Arsenal and Southampton and they drew with Saudi Sportswashing Machine again creating but looking very vulnerable.

 

[ringo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I really don't think it is the quality of players that is the problem. Sure we can improve, but they are not a bad lot.

It is set up, style of play, tactics, player instruction where we are suffering. Look how we got a better second half performance (not too difficult admittedly) even though it wasn't really to a plan, and is not the way AVB seems to want to play.

There are a lot of changes that could be made --but one important overall one is be a bit bolder, and accept we might concede a few goals as a direct consequence of that approach.

 

[milo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

And we only had 2 strikers in the 18 today. Absolutely ridiculous.

United won the EPL last season with 4-4-2. Some say they did not have 11 excellent players. City won the year before with 4-4-2.
For 4-5-1 to work you need excellent players in every position. We only have very good or promising players.

Both played variants on 4-2-3-1 more than they played 4-4-2 during the seasons you mention

 

[Cochise]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I'd rather we be winning 2-1 than scraping 1-0's. At least we could be confident that the team could go out and score goals if needed.

 

[onlyme]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

i wonder if who his assistant makes a difference.....at Porto he had Victor Pereira and Porto were pretty attacking, and this style continued once AVB left. At Chelsea AVB had Di Matteo and imo Chels were as boring as we are now, and once AVB left Chels were still cr@p to watch under RDM. At Spurs he has Freund and the Portuguese chap. Uninspiring football again, since the start of last season

I noticed him today talking to an Iberian type and pointing to a page in a thick exercise book. He used to have a chat with Steffen.

As DHSF says there does not seem any joy in our play.

 

[braineclipse]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I really don't think it is the quality of players that is the problem. Sure we can improve, but they are not a bad lot.

It is set up, style of play, tactics, player instruction where we are suffering. Look how we got a better second half performance (not too difficult admittedly) even though it wasn't really to a plan, and is not the way AVB seems to want to play.

There are a lot of changes that could be made --but one important overall one is be a bit bolder, and accept we might concede a few goals as a direct consequence of that approach.

We do have good players, but we lack tempo and too many of our players are too fond of taking many touches and that won't help our tempo. We have ballplayers in our squad, we have Lamela, Eriksen, Sig, Holtby (and imo Capoue to some extent at least), but we're not getting enough of them on the pitch at the same time imo.

I agree that being a bit bolder would be good. Holtby as a central midfielder for example.

Both played variants on 4-2-3-1 more than they played 4-4-2 during the seasons you mention

Agreed.

Even if that wasn't the case it would only really be a couple of examples amongst many of teams playing various formations with varying success. I don't think anyone can claim that 4-4-2 has been consistently better for the teams playing that style in recent years.

 

[Rossi22]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Both played variants on 4-2-3-1 more than they played 4-4-2 during the seasons you mention

Rooney, Van Persie, Tevez and Aguero are all strikers. Most 442s in the history of the game have had one striker who plays slightly deeper than the other.

 

[Modric THFC]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I noticed him today talking to an Iberian type and pointing to a page in a thick exercise book. He used to have a chat with Steffen.

As DHSF says there does not seem any joy in our play.

Freund looks very isolated on the bench. Never see him talking to the rest of the guys anymore.
I reckon he has no input tbh.

 

[milo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I'd rather we be winning 2-1 than scraping 1-0's. At least we could be confident that the team could go out and score goals if needed.

I posted this in another thread recently (or it might have been this one I cannot remember) but it is an interesting read, so worth reposting

http://www.soccerbythenumbers.com/2010/09/clean-sheets-and-wins-is-there.html

Clean sheets (denoted by the 0 line, which indicates no goals allowed in a match) on average produce almost 2.5 points per match. And even only 1 goal allowed still gives a team slightly more than 1.5 points on average.

http://www.soccerbythenumbers.com/2011/03/value-of-clean-sheets-season-update-for.html

Going from not having a clean sheet to having one increases the average team's odds of coming away with 3 points from .20 to .72 - a staggering difference in the probability of winning of .52. To put this in perspective, to generate a similar swing in points the average team would have to go from taking 0 shots on goal to 50

 

[milo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Freund looks very isolated on the bench. Never see him talking to the rest of the guys anymore.
I reckon he has no input tbh.

A mate of mine interviewed him a few weeks ago and said that he was still very much involved

 

[Baleforce]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

it doesn't matter what system we play if the players only put in the half arsed effort that they did today

 

[onlyme]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

I'd rather we be winning 2-1 than scraping 1-0's. At least we could be confident that the team could go out and score goals if needed.

Last season we were scoring 2 goals a game and we were more or less unbeatable. I thought we could improve on that but we are very beatable this term.

 

[milo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Rooney, Van Persie, Tevez and Aguero are all strikers. Most 442s in the history of the game have had one striker who plays slightly deeper than the other.

Rooney played a lot of games in midfield last season, as did Wellbeck. Same at City the previous season, they frequently played forwards behind a player leading the line.

 

[onlyme]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Rooney, Van Persie, Tevez and Aguero are all strikers. Most 442s in the history of the game have had one striker who plays slightly deeper than the other.

You are correct, of course. I hate pedantic arguments.

 

[milo]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

You are correct, of course. I hate pedantic arguments.

Indeed. A lot of discussions over formations boil down to semantics because formations vary during passages of play. If a team is playing 4-4-1-1 but without coverntional wingers then it is going to look very similar to 4-2-3-1 in attack and 4-5-1 in defence. This is one of the reasons why I think that it is silly to think that a simple change in formation will change our fortunes.

 

[braineclipse]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Rooney, Van Persie, Tevez and Aguero are all strikers. Most 442s in the history of the game have had one striker who plays slightly deeper than the other.

Did you think we played two strikers when we played Dempsey last season? AVB said he thought of him as a striker.

You are correct, of course. I hate pedantic arguments.

You continuously claim that 4-4-2 is at least partly the answer to our problems. But discussions about what is and what isn't 4-4-2 are pedantic?

Indeed. A lot of discussions over formations boil down to semantics because formations vary during passages of play. If a team is playing 4-4-1-1 but without coverntional wingers then it is going to look very similar to 4-2-3-1 in attack and 4-5-1 in defence. This is one of the reasons why I think that it is silly to think that a simple change in formation will change our fortunes.

Agreed.

 

[Kingdawson]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

AVB reagrding Lloris missing the game....

"It was nothing to do with the situation at Everton. The goalkeeper stayed out because my medical department advised that he wasn't ready, although he is very short on coming back. If the game was tomorrow, he would have played."


WTF is he talking about? :ross:

 

[onlyme]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

Indeed. A lot of discussions over formations boil down to semantics because formations vary during passages of play. If a team is playing 4-4-1-1 but without coverntional wingers then it is going to look very similar to 4-2-3-1 in attack and 4-5-1 in defence. This is one of the reasons why I think that it is silly to think that a simple change in formation will change our fortunes.

Whoosh.

I think having 2 strikers on the pitch at the same time is a good option. Except if they are Soldado and Defoe.

Even Wenger tried it last knockings today.

And having a big bloke up front is useful sometimes. Hence Fellaini a few minutes ago.

4-4-2 sometimes, a big bloke sometimes. If you ain't got an egg you can't make an omelette.

 

[Cochise]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

4-4-2 won't solve our problems because you are selecting another forward but leaving a hole in between the midfield and frontline, we would IMO still look isolated at the top. What is clear is that we often don't have enough options in the box. This is where the inverted winger theory is meant to come in with them drifting in at the back post whilst the #8 and #10 offer two other options. Look at Arsenal at times today, they had 4 players in the box attacking Sagnas crosses, we regularly have 1-2 players vs 4 in those situations. Today between 50 and 70 mins we saw how we should be playing and with a couple of tweeks it will be productive, just maybe with some personel changes

 

[onlyme]

Re: AVB - Making Tottenham His Own

4-4-2 won't solve our problems because you are selecting another forward but leaving a hole in between the midfield and frontline, we would IMO still look isolated at the top. What is clear is that we often don't have enough options in the box. This is where the inverted winger theory is meant to come in with them drifting in at the back post whilst the #8 and #10 offer two other options. Look at Arsenal at times today, they had 4 players in the box attacking Sagnas crosses, we regularly have 1-2 players vs 4 in those situations. Today between 50 and 70 mins we saw how we should be playing and with a couple of tweeks it will be productive, just maybe with some personel changes

That is the kernel.

I don't give a f@ck about 4-4-2. I want players in the box when we are attacking.