Emmanuel Adebayor - Officially gone \o/

[Little Luka]

I am as frustrated as anyone by recent performances, but did anyone see the sudden change in his play after Bale scored the 3-2 goal? All of a sudden his touch was perfect, he linked up with Siggy on the left and generally looked completely different for those few minutes.

His quality as a player is obvious to anyone, you would be a fool to deny it is not there. He has shown as much in the past, but his consistency is really horribly. I don't know exactly what is going wrong for him, but judging by AVBs reaction to him missing the sitter, the general attitude of the public, is he now in the middle of a self-fulfilling prophecy? I am bad, thus I play bad? Is it confidence that is missing? I can only hope he can get back to his best.

That said, I have to say that while his performance hasn't been good, he does get to chances. Once he puts one away a lot can change. Jaaskelainen was overperforming yesterday, even that horrible first miss would have gone in a lot of times, and his header the same.

And finally, let us not forget that as long as we play as we do, defenders have an easier time dealing with simple play up to Adebayor because they always have the numbers to hit him hard every time. That is an essential part of defending against us as we play now. We need someone to threaten the middle when we play the ball up on him (that's why Bale is destroying teams atm, see his first goal). And apart from Bale I don't think we have done enough to support Adebayor up front so far.

 

[braineclipse]

Is it fair for Bale to carry the burden of scoring key goals by himself though? Last night was a perfect chance for Ade to tap in one of those sitters and take some of the pressure off.

Bale seemed happy to take responsibility last night Must have had close to 10 shots in the game.

Apart from the miss, and it was a bad miss, I thought Ade did alright again last night. Not a lot of service, especially in the first half, fought hard against a tough team and got himself involved. Seemed to close down fairly well and work pretty hard. He also didn't let his head drop after the miss from what I could see on the telly, if anything he looked more determined to close down to make up for his mistake.

 

[Yiddo]

He never seems to celebrate goals now either. He just stood there when Bale scored, its a 90th minute winner in our most important game of the season so far he should be jumping for joy.

 

[Spursalot]

He never seems to celebrate goals now either. He just stood there when Bale scored, its a 90th minute winner in our most important game of the season so far he should be jumping for joy.

He celebrated the first two.


Not the last one though.

 

[ArcspacE]

Why is his second touch always a tackle?

Because his first is shocking?

 

[diego_maradona]

Because his first is shocking?

kind of what he was implying

 

[BrainOfLevy]

He's clearly lacking confidence, but he is putting the effort in. And he can still come good this season and contribute for us.

I was so annoyed at the miss, I wondered quite how he managed that. But he's our player and all we have right now, so we need to get behind him.

 

[Robbo]

Should have scored yesterday, apart from that he did ok.

I have a feeling there might be a ketchup effect to come from Ade - one goal, a bit of confidence and then hopefully a goalscoring streak. The positive thing is he keeps getting himself into goalscoring positions. While he's not been as good for us as last season, I still have hopes for him for the remainder of the season.

 

[Hootnow]

His quality as a player is obvious to anyone, you would be a fool to deny it is not there. He has shown as much in the past, but his consistency is really horribly. I don't know exactly what is going wrong for him, but judging by AVBs reaction to him missing the sitter, the general attitude of the public, is he now in the middle of a self-fulfilling prophecy? I am bad, thus I play bad? Is it confidence that is missing? I can only hope he can get back to his best.

After the initial fury with the miss, that was actually what I thought as well. I think there has been an improvent in overall play in the last couple of games but that miss can only have decimated whatever small amount of confidence he has left. He'll be over-thinking every chance now, going hiding from goal scoring opportunities. We really need one to bounce off his ass or something.

 

[Pandy]

Thought Ade looked pretty good last night. If he had put away a couple of the easy chances he missed people would be giving him 10/10. Just warming up for le scum, doesn't want to waste his goals!

 

[diego_maradona]

We had some incredible chances last night. Ade's miss, his point blank header, Caulks' hatrick of corner header misses. Bale, Siggy... we could have spanked them now I think about it!

 

[ArcspacE]

kind of what he was implying

 

[Baleforce]

Thought Ade looked pretty good last night. If he had put away a couple of the easy chances he missed people would be giving him 10/10. Just warming up for le scum, doesn't want to waste his goals!

i was playing football manager iOS on the tube this morning, home to the goons, 2-0 win, both goals Ade

its a sign

 

[spurspinter1]

I do find it quite hard to really judge how Ade is doing from watching football on the TV, it seemed like everytime the ball was cleared Ade would be in a different part of the pitch where he wasn't doing anything at all. These were times when it seemed obvious to me where the ball would be cleared to and by putting himself in that area he'd be able to make a genuine challenge for the ball. It's frustrating.

I was a big fan of his, thought we were lucky to have him at the club last season but game by game I am losing faith completely with him. Going through the motions seems to be a relevant phrase. If his first touch stays as it is he won't produce anything of note, it's hard to create space and find people in promising positions in the premier league, and if the touch takes the ball a metre away from that player, the best you can hope for is that player to send the ball back where it came from.

 

[Jurgen the German]

Thought Ade looked pretty good last night. If he had put away a couple of the easy chances he missed people would be giving him 10/10. Just warming up for le scum, doesn't want to waste his goals!

If my auntie had a **** etc.

The facts are we can't gloss over his appalling misses, he's paid to score goals. If we want a striker who plays well but never scores we might as well sign Heskey. For a team that wants to be in the top 4, 3 goals just ain't good enough. I accept we aren't creating as many chances as last season, but he's still getting chances and he's missing all of them.

I just pray Defoe is back for Sunday cos I can see Ade getting sent off again, especially if things aren't going his/our way.

 

[metalgear]

we're winning why change things?

 

[Hotspur]

Thought Ade looked pretty good last night. If he had put away a couple of the easy chances he missed people would be giving him 10/10. Just warming up for le scum, doesn't want to waste his goals!

Wrong, wrong and wrong. Do actually believe what you just wrote?

 

[Jurgen the German]

we're winning why change things?

Because we're winning in spite of him and could replace him with a striker who offers a goal threat.

Honestly, football forums do make me laugh sometimes. I have yet to meet a Spurs fan in real life either at the games or just in general that actually believes he is playing well at the moment and doesn't need to get his act together. I know people like a debate but I don't see how people can make a case that he's playing well.

 

[Spaceman]

people just see the game in diffferent ways. i think ade is shocking atm

 

[scaramanga]

I think Ade was a lot better than recently but still far from enough to earn his wages.

Strangely for the last few minutes of the match (after the winning goal) he was able to control the ball, hold off defenders, lay it off to teammates, etc.