AVB & Spurs Tactics and Formations discussion thread

[braineclipse]

Because then we've basically given Everton the entire right side of our pitch? We've turned up to Everton and said 'nothing is going to happen down here' which is just silly when we should be getting at them.

Having Bale there pins Baines back and gives us an attacking threat. Bale should be able to play on the right. Many left footed wingers do it. Many right footed wingers play on the left. Chelsea were devastating under Mourinho with Duff and Robben switching, and one of them was always playing off of their weaker side. It's not a completely stupid decision.

You don't think Sandro would have been able to track back and deal with Baines? You really think the best use of Bale is to "pin back" an opponents left back to defend better?

Many wingers do brilliantly as "inverted wingers". That's not the same as it being a good idea for everyone. Bale has looked extremely one footed when being played on the right and rarely, if ever looked a threat going down the outside of players. Something Robben, Duff, Ribery, Ronaldo do with ease.

There is also a big difference between playing as an inverted winger in a 4-4-2 and in a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 like Robben and Duff did for Chelsea, Ronaldo does for Real or in fact Bale does for Wales. Especially when we have no creative players in the centre so we have to rely on our wingers to pick the ball up at the half way line!

I have no problems at all with young players playing in multiple positions, I think it's a great idea. But when we are in tough games at the business end of the season and things aren't working for us I'm not sure it's the best idea.

 

[mick cooper]

absolutely spot on.

I cannot believe that Redknapp, Bond, Jordan couldnt have realised such a simple idea. Absolutely baffling

makes you wonder how they got to 3rd without you rocket scientists for technical consultants

 

[braineclipse]

One more thing about Bale as a right winger. Bale has one, truly exceptional, world class, outstanding quality. His ability to deliver quality crosses consistently while running at great speed and under pressure. By playing him on the right you take that away from him. That makes very little sense to me.

It's a bit like taking Defoe, who has one real outstanding strength - his shooting ability. And playing him as a winger.

 

[braineclipse]

makes you wonder how they got to 3rd without you rocket scientists for technical consultants

I'm guessing it has something to do with us having the 3rd best squad in the league.

Not to say that I agree with all the criticism aimed at Harry, nor to say that I don't think Harry has done a good job. I just don't think Harry and the management has done a job exceeding the comparative ability of our squad and thus raising him above questioning.

 

[Rossi22]

oh come on, he has the pace of a dead cat

Where have I said he doesn't? All I've pointed out is that Kranjcar's lack of pace has no relevance to this poor run we're on because he's barely played in these games. Hence I found it a strange thing to say considering that when he has played this season he and the team have performed well on the whole. Try again mick.

 

[indianspur]

makes you wonder how they got to 3rd without you rocket scientists for technical consultants

easy tiger

 

[mick cooper]

Where have I said he doesn't? All I've pointed out is that Kranjcar's lack of pace has no relevance to this poor run we're on because he's barely played in these games. Hence I found it a strange thing to say considering that when he has played this season he and the team have performed well on the whole. Try again mick.

OK - how about he's just not good enough and pinning your hopes on someone with no pace, no discipline and an occasional flash of brilliance smacks as nothing short of desperation

 

[indianspur]

OK - how about he's just not good enough and pinning your hopes on someone with no pace, no discipline and an occasional flash of brilliance smacks as nothing short of desperation

funny then how the management team deemed him good enough to start the NLD away from home. Desperate decision indeed

 

[mick cooper]

easy tiger

errm no

we just lost 3 tough games, two of which we dominated and were unlucky - and you and the rest of the "oh so satisfied with myself" phalanx question everything as if it were all so easy to resolve

arcmchair genius and and an answer for everything.

Do you remember the Harry Enfield character - "Now I don't believe you wanted to do it like that....."

Mind you, for you and the rest of the carping and whining club, if we won the league and cupo double - you would still find something to moan about.

You won't be happy until we get some idioat savant like AVB in to seriously fudge up the club and the team, and then what will you all do - oh - I know, you'll still pour your "I know better" posts onto here, telling the next hapless manager how he's doing it all wrong.

 

[mick cooper]

funny then how the management team deemed him good enough to start the NLD away from home. Desperate decision indeed

INJURIES..........yes we were desperate, plus he came off the back of one of his purple patches against Saudi Sportswashing Machine

 

[indianspur]

errm no

we just lost 3 tough games, two of which we dominated and were unlucky - and you and the rest of the "oh so satisfied with myself" phalanx question everything as if it were all so easy to resolve

arcmchair genius and and an answer for everything.

Do you remember the Harry Enfield character - "Now I don't believe you wanted to do it like that....."

Mind you, for you and the rest of the carping and whining club, if we won the league and cupo double - you would still find something to moan about.

You won't be happy until we get some idioat savant like AVB in to seriously fudge up the club and the team, and then what will you all do - oh - I know, you'll still pour your "I know better" posts onto here, telling the next hapless manager how he's doing it all wrong.

this is an open forum, surely the carpers and whiners have as much right to have their say as the jolly everything is ok fans

 

[scaramanga]

Because then we've basically given Everton the entire right side of our pitch? We've turned up to Everton and said 'nothing is going to happen down here' which is just silly when we should be getting at them.

Having Bale there pins Baines back and gives us an attacking threat. Bale should be able to play on the right. Many left footed wingers do it. Many right footed wingers play on the left. Chelsea were devastating under Mourinho with Duff and Robben switching, and one of them was always playing off of their weaker side. It's not a completely stupid decision.

I don't think that's the case at all. Bale was hardly able to offer an attacking threat down that side during the game, something I'd expect Sandro/Walker to at least be able to match. I'd also say that BAE overlapping Modric with Bale cutting back on the right is less attacking than Bale going down the left with Walker overlapping anyone on the right.

Without Lennon one of our wingers was going to be tucking in and allowing the overlap. I'd rather the tucking in wasn't done by one of our flair players and instead by someone who could help out on the defensive side of things.

 

[scaramanga]

errm no

we just lost 3 tough games, two of which we dominated and were unlucky - and you and the rest of the "oh so satisfied with myself" phalanx question everything as if it were all so easy to resolve

arcmchair genius and and an answer for everything.

Do you remember the Harry Enfield character - "Now I don't believe you wanted to do it like that....."

Mind you, for you and the rest of the carping and whining club, if we won the league and cupo double - you would still find something to moan about.

You won't be happy until we get some idioat savant like AVB in to seriously fudge up the club and the team, and then what will you all do - oh - I know, you'll still pour your "I know better" posts onto here, telling the next hapless manager how he's doing it all wrong.

Out of interest Mick, just how wrong does a decision have to be and how many of our fans need to see it before it makes Redknapp wrong?

Had he played Friedel on the right wing with Bale in goal would you have been defending the decision? How much of the match do we all have to see it going completely wrong before Redknapp's made the change too late? I'm just interested to see how far infallibility goes.

As for whining about winning a double, if we were lined up for the quadruple but Redknapp inexplicably changed a working formula losing us two finals in a row, then of course I would complain. Isn't is right that fans always want their club to improve? That they always want the club to perform to the best of it's ability?

 

[Rossi22]

OK - how about he's just not good enough and pinning your hopes on someone with no pace, no discipline and an occasional flash of brilliance smacks as nothing short of desperation

Pinning my hopes on? Just what are you on about? You got all that from me saying it's strange to slag Kranjcar off when he's played roughly 50 minutes in these 3 games(in which Spurs are actually at +1 while he was on the field)

In League games Kranjcar has started either wide left or right ....

Wolves 0-2 Spurs
Spurs 4-0 Liverpool
Spurs 3-1 Wigan
Spurs 5-0 Saudi Sportswashing Machine
Liverpool 0-0 Spurs
Arsenal 5-2 Spurs - he went off at 2-2

Clearly he is a dependable backup, but sure, spacegoat Kranjcar because Harry has screwed up these past few weeks.

 

[ArcspacE]

Well he's making that post on the back of 3 losses and inferring that Kranjcar is to blame for that? Kranjcar has played well this season and has done a solid job stepping in for Lennon so bringing his name up when he'd barely played in these 3 losses is silly.

Sorry mate, but Krunchie has been a passenger tourist for the large part of this season

Looks unfit, slow, overweight and largerly disinterested. Whether he's lost his desire due to continous time on the bench (like his buddy Corluka did once he was eventually found out) is another story and one I could understand (Euros coming, etc.) but he simply isn't the standard required to play for a Top 4 challenging PL team.

 

[Rossi22]

Define large part of the season. I've just posted the games he's started, all six of them. All of which he played well bar the Arsenal game. He's a backup player, funnily enough backup players aren't as good as the first team. I have no idea what's going on here, I'm being made to look like a Kranjcar fanboy when all I've done is point out how ridiculous it is to try and blame Kranjcar for this run.

 

[africanspurs]

they are both disciplined players who hold their position and role, not really an asset of Krancjar IMO

both players play central of a 442. i dont think they would make it a habit of erratic movement.

Niko though plays on the left but its a fake position when you play a central attacking player out there. they will always move infield i would imagine. i actually like that kind of system

 

[indianspur]

Define large part of the season. I've just posted the games he's started, all six of them. All of which he played well bar the Arsenal game. He's a backup player, funnily enough backup players aren't as good as the first team. I have no idea what's going on here, I'm being made to look like a Kranjcar fanboy when all I've done is point out how ridiculous it is to try and blame Kranjcar for this run.

dont worry, youve made your point well

 

[diego_maradona]

I think this whole notion of Redknapp experiementing with his formations at the wrong time is a little bit of a myth looking back at some of the games this season.

We started crap when we had no DM for the first 2 games and got hammered.

Then we got Ade and Parker, and started a fantastic run. Lennon and VdV were missing for the first few games in this run. So we lined up:

------------------------Friedel--------------------------
Walker---------Kaboul--------------King---------Ekotto
Kranjcar-------Modric------------Parker----------Bale
----------------Adebayor---------Defoe----------------

This saw us win at Wolves and then Liverpool.

VdV returned against Arsenal. We played him on the right and Defoe and Ade up top. Got a bit lucky but were much better when Sandro came on.

Against Wigan we saw:

------------------------Friedel--------------------------
Walker---------Kaboul--------------King---------Ekotto
----------------Sandro------------Parker---------------
---------Modric-----------VdV--------------Bale--------
-------------------------Adebayor---------------------

First half was fantastic.

Saudi Sportswashing Machine was a similar lineup with Livermore playing.

Then Lennon came back and we played probably our best football this season with this lineup:

------------------------Friedel--------------------------
Walker---------Kaboul--------------King---------Ekotto
Lennon----------Modric------------Parker--------Bale
----------------------------VdV-----------------------
-------------------------Adebayor---------------------

We beat Blackburn, QPR, Fulham, Villa.

Defoe played v West Brom when VdV and Modric were ruled out.

The pattern continued and Harry has toyed with a few different formations with the given personnel he has.

It would certainly appear as though the side has enjoyed playing 4-4-1-1 with Lennon and Bale out wide and VdV tucked behind Ade and results on the whole have reflected that.

Saha's signing I feel has been shrewed but has added to the weight of the "we should be playing 2 up top" argument. Perhaps to the detriment of the team. The Saudi Sportswashing Machine performance was the performance of the season so far. Kranjcar played right and Saha and Ade up top.

I am a firm believer of studying your opposition and not being arrogant enough to simply think they should worry about us. Especially the top sides. We have been unlucky in that in nearly all the games against the top sides we have not been able to field what I would consider our strongest XI.

 

[africanspurs]

If Harry's primary concern was Baines (not sure why - really doesn't bode well for the future of the England team if true), then why didn't he put Sandro on the right as pure defensive cover like we used to with Jenas now and then? Let him tuck in and give Walker all the breathing space he needs whilst keeping the legendary, game-changing, Baines in check.

I'm not one for playing players out of position, but I'd rather play one out of position on the right than both of our best two players.

cause sandro isnt an attacking supplier.. playing him on the right would still be an issue cause he needs to release walker. dont think sandro is that good a passer to weight balls ahead of a marauding full bacjk