AVB & Spurs Tactics and Formations discussion thread

[Kingdawson]

Not in my opinion. Keane used to drive me fudging nuts because he'd spend more time in our half than the oppositon, taking balls off the centre half. Teddy used to do it way too often too, but at least Teddy had an excellent passing game. VDV drops deeper no more or less than Teddy and Keane did.

Ok you sort of have a point in regards to Keane but even then it's not the same. During a game we would sometimes see Keane dropping deep which would be infuriating but then we'd see him be the furthest forward and pop up with a goal. He mixed it up during the 90 minutes whereas Rafa literally just drops deep 99% of the times. How many times have we seen VDV futher forward then the striker he's supporting? i'd say it's very very very very very very rare but with Keane it was around 50% of times (tbh with Berbs he was the furthest forward 90% of the times where he was most effective).

 

[The Moonlit Knight]

Ok you sort of have a point in regards to Keane but even then it's not the same. During a game we would sometimes see Keane dropping deep which would be infuriating but then we'd see him be the furthest forward and pop up with a goal. He mixed it up during the 90 minutes whereas Rafa literally just drops deep 99% of the times. How many times have we seen VDV futher forward then the striker he's supporting? i'd say it's very very very very very very rare but with Keane it was around 50% of times (tbh with Berbs he was the furthest forward 90% of the times where he was most effective).

VDV does that too in my opinion. Admittedly not so much since Crouch has gone, but that's also down to VDV struggling for fitness and not starting games.

 

[Kingdawson]

VDV does that too in my opinion. Admittedly not so much since Crouch has gone, but that's also down to VDV struggling for fitness and not starting games.

Ok he did do that for sure but no where near the level Robbie Keane did. Not even close.

 

[africanspurs]

african... we need your wisdom.

Explain. Where the hell are we going wrong and what does Harry need to do to correct it?

I think the flaws are obvious. I'm happy to go 4-4-2 with 2 front men proper, with Bale and Lennon playing. Otherwise its the old 4-2-3-1/4-3-3/4-5-1/4-4-1-1 style formation for me.
Balance is everything.

Modric and Bale were of course the key concerns. Our 2 best players shifted around. In hindsight I think we would have even been better with Niko or even VdV lining up on the right yesterday if we were not going to go 4-4-1-1

my wisdom? well thanks but i think i personally overrate myself enough without the help of good online buddies LOL

in all honesty, i cant quite put the finger on whats going on. its pretty obvious, when you compare it to arsenal and united, what we are lacking but what i dont get is why the players we have aren't doing it.

this is why i think metal gear actually put it on a plate , well prepapred IMO

when you see arsenal play, even though they live and die by a playing style...its a playing style that they know to the genetic level and carry out with urgency. the little mistakes they make when someone plays a ball and walcott makes the wrong run and the ball goes behind him, the reason that happens is because in both their minds there is a predefined, outlined 'play' or set of movements that are suposed to be made at that point.....the passer and walcott might have got their wires crossed as to which one was in action at the time but at least they know there is something they are supposed to do at each given moment

for our guys i get the feeling the there arent really many set plays in games that are carried out. i feel we just 'wing it'...play the ball around and see what opens up.

united on the other hand do the same like arsenal but have a variety of styles for whatever tempo they want to play. but one thing i do like about united is the urgency or getting into and creating passing lanes.....and also the way that passers actually EXPECT their team mates to create passing lanes for them to promote counter attacking or transition games. like when wellbeck (who isnt as good as ade ) knows how to push the back line slightly deeper, recognises the space created behind parker when parker goes pressing and then just drops off the CB to occupy that space, turns and faces a lacklustre kaboul

basically those two teams know what they are supposed to do , how they are supposed to move as a team, defend as a team, and they do it with urgency when they want.

another thing is bales movement......in general i like it but i think he's moving all over the place a little too much. moving central and coming narrow is the correct thing for a winger to do from time to time but it seems that bale just moves central and just sort of stays there without switching things up....as opposed to holding the wide position that drifting in central, then back out again....and on the way in and out see's if there is an opening to exploit or get on the end of a pass. cause if bale moves central and just hangs around there then the opposing team just re-adjusts and sets up to counter the new shift in formation.......if he ghosts or drifts in from the wide side into the middle and keeps on ghosting and drifting its less likely that team re-adjust quick enough and that opens things up for everyone

but anyway, all that stuff is gonads if we dont move the ball fast enough and play with some kind of urgency on the pitch. everton basically outhustled us and sat back abit and kept things tight. when a team does that you have to start moving the ball quicker and getting back in their faces...which seems like our players were not up for

then there is the belief factor, you get the feeling that its missing or waning abit.

Long story short, all these issues are evident but i dont actualy know why they are showing up. with the players we have and the strides we have made this season it shouldnt be like this

 

[BrainOfLevy]

It's ridiculous to say a formation is killing us or we are missing a player when we have a stupid amount of shots on goal away from home and barely concede any chances ourselves. The ball didn't break for us in an attacking sense, that's why we didn't score.

However, we are losing games and something is up. I think it's concentration. It's fine margins. Normally if we dominate like we did against Everton or Man United we'd kill the game off, because we are a good side. However because games at this level are won and lost on fine margins, we are losing games we normally wouldn't. Modric losing his man from a throw, Walker from a corner, Kaboul getting done by Osman today. If the team was fully focussed that wouldn't be happening. We'd play well and kill games off, or at the very least catch a more than deserved drive.

Concentration is slipping. I don't know why, I don't know why players would suddenly concentrate less because of England speculation, but maybe they would. I'm not sure. But I don't think there's any problem with what Harry is doing. I have no complaints from yesterday, when he made perfect changes and we absolutely dominated the second half. It's not actually poor management, and maybe it is just an unlucky period of the season. But maybe they are distracted.

 

[africanspurs]

Do you think we ever played 4-4-2 when Teddy was our first choice forward? Or Robbie Keane for that matter.

i think the difference lies in where there primary positions start with, VDV can be seen alot more frequently in midfield and sticking plays together on the flanks as opposed to being right there beside Ade. even though teddy droped deep there was no question that he supported his partner on the defensive line and was right there neck and neck with them on the end of service

speaking of which, VDV gets into the box as a late trailer which isnt the mark of a player playing in a 442. VDV hangs on the edge of the final third or outside the box and pings balls in rather than actually being the guy letting someone else do that so he gets into the hot zones for shots..or get on the receiving end of shots. again not something i would liken with teddy

robbie keane tried to do what VDV does and was crap at it but at least keane knew he was a forward first and foremost and after picking the ball up deep and watch himself dribble with no clear goal of what he was supposed to do next for 1000000 years, he would pass the ball and get into the box...if nothing happened he'd come back out and scream for the ball and start the horrid cycle all over again.............one other thing with keane is that he morphed himself to be the other half of his strike partner. i cant quite remember how he was with Mido but keane playing with defoe is very different with keane playing with Berbatov...whereas VDV will play like this no matter who his strike partner is

i would never confuse VDV as playing in a 442 with the way he isolates his strike partner, never. the only compromise is that i could say its a 4411

 

[africanspurs]

It's ridiculous to say a formation is killing us or we are missing a player when we have a stupid amount of shots on goal away from home and barely concede any chances ourselves. The ball didn't break for us in an attacking sense, that's why we didn't score.

However, we are losing games and something is up. I think it's concentration. It's fine margins. Normally if we dominate like we did against Everton or Man United we'd kill the game off, because we are a good side. However because games at this level are won and lost on fine margins, we are losing games we normally wouldn't. Modric losing his man from a throw, Walker from a corner, Kaboul getting done by Osman today. If the team was fully focussed that wouldn't be happening. We'd play well and kill games off, or at the very least catch a more than deserved drive.

Concentration is slipping. I don't know why, I don't know why players would suddenly concentrate less because of England speculation, but maybe they would. I'm not sure. But I don't think there's any problem with what Harry is doing. I have no complaints from yesterday, when he made perfect changes and we absolutely dominated the second half. It's not actually poor management, and maybe it is just an unlucky period of the season. But maybe they are distracted.

agree with this, but the number of shots on goal i dont think is indicative of anything. last season we would rack up a number of shots but they werent good ones

i play a basketball game, NBA 2K12, and in it you can tell the game to show shot timing (as in release at the players best shooting technique) and something else they've added called Shot Quality (which is the scenario shooting) generally if you work your way into a situation that frees you up a bit then thats a better shot quality than you shooting over a 7 footer

...basically the shot quality in the everton wasnt consistently good enough, which leads to the creation of the shot itself, which could mean the formation and the way its carried

but i am in agreement with you that its less about the formation and more about some extra edge that is missing from our players. a split second decision making and pitch awareness is missing

or something. not really sure what it is

 

[milo]

i think the difference lies in where there primary positions start with, VDV can be seen alot more frequently in midfield and sticking plays together on the flanks as opposed to being right there beside Ade. even though teddy droped deep there was no question that he supported his partner on the defensive line and was right there neck and neck with them on the end of service

speaking of which, VDV gets into the box as a late trailer which isnt the mark of a player playing in a 442. VDV hangs on the edge of the final third or outside the box and pings balls in rather than actually being the guy letting someone else do that so he gets into the hot zones for shots..or get on the receiving end of shots. again not something i would liken with teddy

robbie keane tried to do what VDV does and was crap at it but at least keane knew he was a forward first and foremost and after picking the ball up deep and watch himself dribble with no clear goal of what he was supposed to do next for 1000000 years, he would pass the ball and get into the box...if nothing happened he'd come back out and scream for the ball and start the horrid cycle all over again.............one other thing with keane is that he morphed himself to be the other half of his strike partner. i cant quite remember how he was with Mido but keane playing with defoe is very different with keane playing with Berbatov...whereas VDV will play like this no matter who his strike partner is

i would never confuse VDV as playing in a 442 with the way he isolates his strike partner, never. the only compromise is that i could say its a 4411

The difference between now and when Teddy or Keane first played for us is that far more teams now line up with five in midfield. Meaning that we need one of our attacking players to drop back and help make up the numbers. Whereas then, it was far more common that teams would line up with two up front.

 

[DHSF]

Did Moyes not say we are the best team to come to Goodison? Ok granted he may have said that to talk up his teams win but we cannot be THAT bad if managers come out and say stuff like.

Its one or two things that are killing us and not performances nor is it formations its mistakes. our mistakes are killing us. These are mistakes from players who are low on confidence such as Kaboom and Walker.

I think all we need is an easy win or two against Stoke at home and use that as a catapult for the remaining 10 games.

 

[Bullet]

I think if the challenge by Heitinga on Defoe was given as a pen, we would have gone on to win and we'd have a 10 page thread about how it worked, why we played so well, why we dominated, why Harry is such a genius...

 

[braineclipse]

Did Moyes not say we are the best team to come to Goodison? Ok granted he may have said that to talk up his teams win but we cannot be THAT bad if managers come out and say stuff like.

Its one or two things that are killing us and not performances nor is it formations its mistakes. our mistakes are killing us. These are mistakes from players who are low on confidence such as Kaboom and Walker.

I think all we need is an easy win or two against Stoke at home and use that as a catapult for the remaining 10 games.

We were terrible in the first half. Don't care what Moyes or Redknapp said. That was really bad.

agree with this, but the number of shots on goal i dont think is indicative of anything. last season we would rack up a number of shots but they werent good ones

i play a basketball game, NBA 2K12, and in it you can tell the game to show shot timing (as in release at the players best shooting technique) and something else they've added called Shot Quality (which is the scenario shooting) generally if you work your way into a situation that frees you up a bit then thats a better shot quality than you shooting over a 7 footer

...basically the shot quality in the everton wasnt consistently good enough, which leads to the creation of the shot itself, which could mean the formation and the way its carried

but i am in agreement with you that its less about the formation and more about some extra edge that is missing from our players. a split second decision making and pitch awareness is missing

or something. not really sure what it is

I agree fully. The shot stat on it's own doesn't tell a full story. We were good in the 2nd half, but still didn't create many clear cut chances. A lot of them were from range, poor scuffed shots under pressure etc. And we only managed to get 5 shots on target, as many as Everton.

 

[africanspurs]

The difference between now and when Teddy or Keane first played for us is that far more teams now line up with five in midfield. Meaning that we need one of our attacking players to drop back and help make up the numbers. Whereas then, it was far more common that teams would line up with two up front.

and yet you have rooney playing in a 442 capacity and still making up numbers when his team needs to

and the other thing is that, even if teams line up with 5 against us, whats to stop VDV from still being a receiver in the final third?

every game that defoe and ade have played together in a 442 we have played well. i cant remember a really brick game with those two at the top....then you have ade or defoe BOTH helping out by defending from the front...pressing holders, yet they manage to get back up front to play as strikers

?

 

[Kingdawson]

But it wasn't a pen?

 

[DHSF]

But it wasn't a pen?

i THINK IT WAS.

Heitinga dived into the tackle and didnt get the ball.

 

[The Moonlit Knight]

Did Moyes not say we are the best team to come to Goodison? Ok granted he may have said that to talk up his teams win but we cannot be THAT bad if managers come out and say stuff like.

Its one or two things that are killing us and not performances nor is it formations its mistakes. our mistakes are killing us. These are mistakes from players who are low on confidence such as Kaboom and Walker.

I think all we need is an easy win or two against Stoke at home and use that as a catapult for the remaining 10 games.

I think the doom and gloom merchants are massively over reacting, that's for sure. Man Utd at home for me was the really bad result. Arsenal away, well it's a derby and even if Arsenal was bottom of the league I wouldn't have written them off. It's one of those things. Utd at home, we should be looking to win or at least get a draw. You don't lose your home games. Against a very in form Everton (unbeaten in several matches, including beating the title favourites at home) a draw would have been a good result and one most reasonable fans would've taken before the game started. So if a draw is a good result, then how can a 1-0 loss be a terrible result? Makes no logical sense.

Each game has to be taken into isolation. People are focusing on three successive defeats, but in reality the performance in two of those defeats was acceptable. We'll come good again, and in my opinion we'll still finish 3rd.

 

[The Moonlit Knight]

i THINK IT WAS.

Heitinga dived into the tackle and didnt get the ball.

It was a definite penalty, but I didn't think it was until they showed it really slowed down and showed that Defoes foot was kicked against the ball, hence the wild shot, so I can't blame the officials for not giving it.

 

[mudshark]

agree with this, but the number of shots on goal i dont think is indicative of anything. last season we would rack up a number of shots but they werent good ones

i play a basketball game, NBA 2K12, and in it you can tell the game to show shot timing (as in release at the players best shooting technique) and something else they've added called Shot Quality (which is the scenario shooting) generally if you work your way into a situation that frees you up a bit then thats a better shot quality than you shooting over a 7 footer

...basically the shot quality in the everton wasnt consistently good enough, which leads to the creation of the shot itself, which could mean the formation and the way its carried

but i am in agreement with you that its less about the formation and more about some extra edge that is missing from our players. a split second decision making and pitch awareness is missing

or something. not really sure what it is

I think you've already identified what it is that's missing—pattern of play. So often with Spurs, there's far too much reliance on individual initiative, and not enough on developing coordinated attacks. When the first-choice XI are playing, it's much less in evidence, but in a game like yesterday's, you're left more-or-less with the impression of a group that literally don't know what they are supposed to be doing. One of the most obvious failures, for me, is the lack of pressure on the ball from us in the opponent's half, especially when our possession has just been overturned. When the first initiative fails, we're almost always on the back foot again immediately, and if there's a second-ball situation, we hardly ever seem to win it.

 

[braineclipse]

I think you've already identified what it is that's missing—pattern of play. So often with Spurs, there's far too much reliance on individual initiative, and not enough on developing coordinated attacks. When the first-choice XI are playing, it's much less in evidence, but in a game like yesterday's, you're left more-or-less with the impression of a group that literally don't know what they are supposed to be doing. One of the most obvious failures, for me, is the lack of pressure on the ball from us in the opponent's half, especially when our possession has just been overturned. When the first initiative fails, we're almost always on the back foot again immediately, and if there's a second-ball situation, we hardly ever seem to win it.

I agree.

About the pressing, yesterday we could see strikers and midfielders pressing their defenders, but our defenders were too far back, leaving massive gaps for their midfielders to run into after pumping a long ball up for Jelavic to challenge for. If we press up, good, press up as a unit. If we sit back, good, sit back as a unit.

When we hit long balls, no one there to pick the ball up when it landed. Players seemed to have no idea what movements they should make when Friedel hit the long ball.

These aren't advanced concepts that need a settled starting 11 across months and months to settle in.

 

[nayimfromthehalfwayline]

I dont blame formation at all. All common formations work. Its how they are deployed that is the issue. Modric on the left and Bale on the right was a mistake, one that simply didnt get recognised or rectified.

As well as that I concur that the team lacks organisation and tactical awareness.

for a long time this was a big hang up for me with Redknapp, and it was only this season that I felt we had settled on a pattern of play. Since January though this has gone out of the window. We need it back, ASAP

We also need proper preparation and organisation, everything feels lacklustre and careless at the moment

 

[metalgear]

i think redknapp thought he had found a pattern of play, but in reality, it was individuals coming in together and making it work on the pitch. bale on the left, lennon on the right, modric, parker and vdv in the middle.

it was nothing more than serendipity, and with the injuries forcing change, and an overambitious bale wanting to play a free role, rednapp hasn't been able to "stumble" upon something that works again. this is where a good manager/coach earns his keep.

either that or redknapp is seriously trying to get himself out of the spurs job