Just when you thought you got away .. they pull you back in, it's the hope that kills
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Antonio Conte - officially NOT the coach of THFC
- Thread starter Daisuk
- Start date
Just when you thought you got away .. they pull you back in, it's the hope that kills
Also they’ve had barely any injuries - just Jesus. I think that always gets underplayed for some reason. I think most teams that win the title have very few injuries that year. And very good teams can have dips when they do have injuries (see Liverpool this year).
We’ve had injuries to Kulu, Bentancur and Romero - three of our best players. Not to mention Richarlison and Moura. It makes a huge difference.
braineclipse
Steve Sedgley
Said it repeatedly. Our starting 11 is actually pretty strong. Not win the league level strong, but fairly comfortably top 4 level. Need for improvement there, but mostly our issues have been a lack of good options that fit the system.
Lloris and Son going through their worst spells in a decade hasn't helped either. Really hoping we can see them at least be consistent and useful for the rest of the season.
braineclipse
Steve Sedgley
Sweet, painful, lovely, agonising hope. Let it flow!
DeanoAustin
Rafael Van Der Vaart
Walking around smiling like a Cheshire cat today trying to clear the calendar for FA Cup final weekend coz I have a feeling this is our year. Two weeks ago, I was writing the Conte obituary and it'll probably be the same if we lose to Leicester.
Maybe that all says more about me than Spurs. Or maybe it says everything about Spurs and me.
parklane1
Tony Galvin
I believe this is one of the reasons ( the main one in honesty) why we have been so up and down this season. I know all teams suffer from injurys but a lot of ours has taken out probably some of our best players. We have had to make a lot of changes to cover our strongest positions and it has shown in our performances.
Grays_1890
Barry Daines
Injuries are just circumstances, you don't lose points for not having them and TBF even without injuries we are not 5 points clear today
Emirates Marketing Project have not had many injuries but their manager has had several issues with selection of his own doing, Chelsea have load of players available and did from the summer but their managers and owner have self harmed
I fcking hate Arsenal but they have been decent this season which is a massive shame
thfcsteff
Garth Crooks
I think injuries are crippling to a side like ours which relies so much on automations and a small trusted player pool. Deccy’s loss, Romero’s, Richy’s, Bentancur’s…they are four really important players to our overall system.
greatwhitenorf
Edgar Davids
Ha ha. I laughed reading this about the FA Cup final. Had the exact same thoughts. For once, I'm feeling good about my optimism.
braineclipse
Steve Sedgley
Definitely agree. And it's something we need to get beyond at some point to take the next step.
In hopeful that Porro and Danjuma goes some way towards continuing to rectifying that. Danjuma as a direct option. Porro by adding more quality on the ball in a position where that's been lacking, hopefully making us less reliant on those you mentioned along with Kane and Son.
Could really do with either Bissouma, Skipp or Sarr making themselves an even better option in central midfield. Could really do with Son continuing to rebuild his form. Emerson continuing his positive development.
For some of it though it probably takes at least another strong transfer window to really get beyond that vulnerability. We still have too many squad players that aren't a good fit for the system imo.
Will be interesting to see if we see a touch mot rotation when the fixture list again congests. Conte has not done that much so far. Right now though, with few injuries and some additions to the squad along with new signings from the summer having had some time to settle in. Perhaps we'll see a bit more of it.
thfcsteff
Garth Crooks
Sunday’s bench was the first time in a long time we had genuine options everywhere. It made a huge difference. I think Sarr is going to eclipse Bissouma.
glorygloryeze
Tom Huddlestone
Interesting...what makes you say this?
Also, will there be realistic opportunities to do so?
braineclipse
Steve Sedgley
I have my hopes for that as well. But wouldn't expect that this season.
alekaras
The ITK of IDK
It's a shame a few things didn't fall our way with injuries and the team continuing the form from the end of last season. We could have easily been in the thick of the title race, what with Chelsea, Pool, and City struggling this season. Yes, we should improve next season by adding quality on the defensive side, but the league is going to be a tougher nut to crack. It's years like this and the Leicester title year that we will have our chance.
I think we need to really look at the FA Cup this year, we missed the league as you said, but the general competition still isn't what it normally is.
Grays_1890
Barry Daines
The League Cup is one that also sticks with me, losing to NF and lose out the chance to have the run they had and probably go deeper, big miss
glorygloryeze
Tom Huddlestone
Absolutely. It was arguably our worst performance of the season given the opposition and our starting line-up. When we talk about not winning trophies because of other teams having bgger pockets than us, i look at that game as Exhibition A with the phrase "quit with the nonsense excuses"
Grays_1890
Barry Daines
Yeh this is where I can meet in the middle with arguments about money and investments and also questions about the manager. Such as, could we do better in markets? Could we maybe act better at times? Could we support Conte more....all a yes for me, but for balance, should our team be stronger than NF in the League Cup and progress and the failure of doing so be placed on the manager...absolutely
glorygloryeze
Tom Huddlestone
Yes, there was ZERO excuses for getting out-fought, out-thought and generally schooled by Forest that day. Simply embarrassing given the two teams resources, managers etc, so for me no-one can talk about Conte lacking this or that for that game.
An example where scrutiny on the manager, coaching, tactics not being able to be covered up by anything ENIC have done/not done (and i'm no lover of ENIC)
Finney Is Back
Andy Thompson
Our squad is only really now weak in the centre back, goalkeeper and right wing forward position. The key though from here on in is for us to be signing players where the aim is for them to go straight into the first team in the GK and CB position (as those players are a lot easier to upgrade than Kulusevski where there is barely a player in the World that we could upgrade him with).
If we were to sign 2 x CBs, a GK and cover at RWF this summer then the icing on the cake would be a real bona-fide top class left wing back, though I doubt we'll do much there with Perisic, Sessegnon and Udogie perhaps coming in as opposed to being loaned out again.
I think we could have a crack at the title if we signed good options for the above (providing we kept Harry Kane of course).
Moura, Lloris/Forster, Sanchez and Lenglet are those that can make way for the new players.
If our funds won't stretch to all of those players (possible considering we'll have to start paying for Kulusevski, Porro and perhaps Danjuma) then perhaps we'll have to hope that Richarlison and Gill can cover as back-up RWF between them.
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