Please note, I'm calling it now. This geezer will become a Spurs legend. 10 years for now we'll still be chanting his name. Because, in spite of all the abuse he's had this....
In the same way that Freund is a legend? Maybe.
I wonder how long I've actually wasted my life on this board.
Dont go there mate, it wont make you (or any of us!) feel good!
If a player performs well I will acknowledge it, equally if they perform below required standards I'll point it out.
But to repeatedly chastise a player regardless of output, well it speaks to a larger issue lurking that I've raised previously.
That connection is one made by people who like to defend Sissoko. As a means, I suspect, to negate the criticism.
The idea being, those consistently criticising him, arent being reasonable - theres a larger agenda at play.
Speaking for myself, thats horsebrick. I work on the first principle, and dont give a second thought to the second.
Its possible I look at others from my own point of view, but IMHO most of those who have criticised him have done so genuinely, not "regardless of output" at all.
I'm sure even Moussa's harshest critics are happy that he's putting in some good performances now. I've been pretty savage on him when he's had sh1t games and I'm happy to sing his praises now he's doing good. You can bet your boots that Poch is delighted with him at the moment and the fans at the games are singing his name, even I can hear it on the telly! I think he got more singing for his name than any of our other players v Palace, his efforts are being appreciated and I'm sure he knows it, regardless of the title of this thread.
I am delighted he is putting in performances now that arent a complete liability.
If I were to critique, Id say that the praise is well OTT, IMHO - but that his performance was decent enough.
He had a couple of very Sissoko moments, played it out of play, a suicide ball - but these were minimal and nothing like as galling as usual.
He worked his socks off, as always, and I think putting Wanyama next to him was smart. As with last week where I criticised his movement, it was again poor IMO but Wanyama being there meant it wasnt exposed.
He played a few unexpectedly good passes, but in general I dont think his passing was particularly good. Partially in technique, he still underhits them so the receiver has to check their run, and he still punts them at people so they are hard to control. More so, though, he simply didnt see the right pass so many times, which was disappointing. He'll find himself in space, there is a ball into the channel on - we can attack - and he plays it back. This did become frustrating.
On the scale of general performance for our players, he was a 6.
On the special scale of Sissoko, his own personal scale that seems to be employed, clearly an 11/10.