Felt like a spurzy game to me. Manure on a roll, we have a hatful of chances and don’t QUITE hit the ball exactly where it needs to be a the keeper plays a blinder while the ref lets him take weeks on a goal kick and allows the oppo to almost foul at will.
Pah - Parachutes and Viva La Vida were damn good albums, and I'll fight anyone that suggests otherwise.
When we lose, we look for reasons why. That's logical. But it wasn't one factor. We'd like it be. That would be easier. But the truth is, a number of things happened. If you want one predominate factor, it was Sissoko going off.
Then you've got the manager not getting the team setup right, or asking them to hold back a bit and the defensive line to drop off a touch until half time. You've got Trippier intercepted pass. You've got verts not being sharp and being out paced. You've got Lloris being beaten. And about 20 shots that didn't head a goal for us. To blame Tripper is easy, but its not the only factor.
Seeing that image, I can't help thinking that we'd be better off playing Sissoko as a right wing-back, dropping Trippier and playing a 3rd centre-back in his place. That would also allow number 33 (Davies) to push higher on the left and give us better balance.
I've never thought he was as good as many seem to think on here. But in your photo above, there is only one pass. The cross field balls you need a moment to see them, step back and strike the ball. Time he didn't have. He went for the open pass, and it was intercepted. It wasn't great, but on here it is as though no one's ever seen that happen before. Lamela made a worse pass, but it didn't result in a goal so no knee jerk.
As I said, Poch should set the side up to contain for a couple of minutes until the break. Trippier had Sissoko supporting him all game, then suddenly he's got no options. @thfcsteff wants to heap all the blame on one guy for not playing it long to get to half time, when the manger, verts, etc are also part of the equation, its a team sport.
Trippier has become the new Sissoko?
Pah - Parachutes and Viva La Vida were damn good albums, and I'll fight anyone that suggests otherwise.
View attachment 5760
Tahsnit my photo or scribble by the way
Trippier took a bad call when he didnt need too and wasn’t under pressure
I don’t remember him making those mistakes before this season
The issue with him is that his main feature is his crossing but that isn’t enough now
First of all, as I said, I rarely coat a player. I like to give them chances. I have kept my counsel on Tripps this season, despite his having made a fair few mistakers, having got caught too many times this season and generally not playing well.
That being said, yes. You are correct. I do blame him for this specific situation. He is now one of our experienced players. Aa such, he should NOT be risking passes like that. He could've turned around and lumped it back to Lloris. He'd have been better off over-hitting a pass into a channel. But to play a square ball that high up when your only defender back there is Verts and your covering player just went off (bear in mind the adjustment to cover would have come at HT), and yes, I blame him. 400%. Because he was at fault.
"The new Sissoko"? Don't make me laugh. Not even close.
Seeing as we're here though, do explain to me what Pochettino could've done in that 5 minute spell, save screaming at the team not to let Trippps over the halfway line until HT??
In Order:
- Winks and Dier started vs Madrid before Sissoko had to come and Dier replace Alderwiereld in the back 3
- Winks and Sissoko, and sometime Eriksen at Nou Camp. Barcelona played a semi-B team. When they played their A-team at Wembley we saw what happened. In fact, you cold argue the one goal they scored at the Nou Camp doesn't happen with our old cm axis..
- Dier and Sissoko. We played it perfectly that day; not sure we could say that on Tuesday when we could barely keep the ball and control posession. We won only on a penalty and dogged defensive work not because our cm controlled things.
- Dembele did indeed put in some worldies but from about March onwards you could see the physicality of our league start to catch up with him and he was starting to actually be dominated at times.
The grass is indeed not always greener, but as a club you give yourself the best chance by planning to push on and give yourselves more options to keep yourselves ahead of your competitors or try and reign some in who are ahead of you...obviously within reason.
I think it was within reason to give ourselves some cm options to slowly transition away from the Dembele-Wanyama axis that has been declining before our eyes.
And speaking of our cm options again here: we have now lost 6 games by early January. I'm not sure of the last time we've done that, perhaps Poch's first season? Ironically, when our (then porous) cm was similarly a cause for concern...
Winks is very good but he's not world class, he may turn out to be but he's not there yet.
Dembele was awesome against Juve but that's one game. I'm talking about the entire season.
It's easy to cherry pick Dier's great passes but there have been many times where his passing has put us in trouble, just because they didn't lead to a goal doesn't mean they should be ignored.
Look, our CM's are all of a decent standard (and I include Sissoko in that) but none of them are world class or elite players. We have elite players in pretty much every other position; GK (Lloris), LB (Rose), CB (Toby and Verts), AM (Eriksen, Son and Alli), FW (Kane). It doesn't take a forensics expert to realise that RB and CM are the two weakest positions in the team.
I don’t agree Sissoko going off was the over riding factor. We created much more in the second half. The main factor was our poor finishing, we easily had enough chances to win the game....When we lose, we look for reasons why. That's logical. But it wasn't one factor. We'd like it be. That would be easier. But the truth is, a number of things happened. If you want one predominate factor, it was Sissoko going off.
Then you've got the manager not getting the team setup right, or asking them to hold back a bit and the defensive line to drop off a touch until half time. You've got Trippier's intercepted pass. You've got verts not being fully match sharp and being out paced. You've got Lloris being beaten. And about 20 shots that didn't head a goal for us. To blame Tripper is easy, but its not the only factor.
When we lose, we look for reasons why. That's logical. But it wasn't one factor. We'd like it be. That would be easier. But the truth is, a number of things happened. If you want one predominate factor, it was Sissoko going off.
Then you've got the manager not getting the team setup right, or asking them to hold back a bit and the defensive line to drop off a touch until half time. You've got Trippier's intercepted pass. You've got verts not being fully match sharp and being out paced. You've got Lloris being beaten. And about 20 shots that didn't head a goal for us. To blame Tripper is easy, but its not the only factor.