***OMT***Tottenham Hotspur FC v West Ham

[DHSF]

Some promising signs, but a lot still lacking.

21-12 in shots, but West Ham had 8 on target we only had 4.

Sandro and a legitimate centre back sorely missed. Allardyce not the man you want to come up against with your smallest first team centre back and a defensive midfielder at the back.

Southampton will be a completely different kettle of fish, hopefully the team will reflect that.

I think it will. I liked how the team played but the personnel werent our best personnel. I think Tim will change it around

 

[PochettinoPochettinoPochettino]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHhhahahahahaahhahahahaahahahahhahahahahaahhahaah

 

[DHSF]

Bull****! he has been at the club for years. He knows the players and most of them are internationals. Ade has been training he just took him off to play a more defensive side and ruined our possession.

No mate it aint bull****.

 

[SpurMeUp]

All the subs were logical. But I am just thinking..only 1 striker on the bench again.

We need strikers. Oh, well more grief at work tomorrow.

Brush it off! When did Spurs fans ever have it easy. Not in my lifetime. I know plenty of glory-hunting supporters of *******. We can take it. And will be back.

 

[braineclipse]

Playing that midfield in front of that back line was ludicrous. Defoe being his usual wasteful self meant we might as well have played 4-4-1. If anything, it's the death of 4-4-2 with two out and out wingers putting crosses into the box. We created **** all in terms of goal scoring opportunities.

Agreed. It might be more exciting to watch crosses put in that are cleared by defenders like Collison than to watch long range efforts fly wide, but both approaches are very speculative in terms of actually getting goals.

If Sherwood or whoever comes in sees this kind of a 4-4-2 with out and out wingers as our main approach going forward we at least need to buy a target man striker or two in January. I'm guessing it was more of a "back to basics", attacking 4-4-2 formation against a fairly poor West Ham team at home and not a change in approach.

Criticism of the subs is knee-jerkery of the first order.

> Ade has played 45 mins in last 10 years. On a yellow. May well play Sunday. Perfectly reasonable sub to make. Could have been Soldado on, but if he's playing Sunday that'd be 3 games in 7 days. Not the wisest to put him on. 12 minutes to go. So, Holtby was the decision...really, not as bad a decision as many are saying.

> Rose. Hasn't played in ages. Might have been tightening up/signalled bench. Very important player for Sunday. Good sub.

> Chadli/Townsend. No choice.

Agreed to some extent.

I thought Ade should have been left on because of his physical presence compared to Defoe. Both for defensive set pieces and for when we were forced to play it long. He was on a yellow, but seemed perfectly in control of that and seemed alright physically to continue the game. Defoe had a poor game overall and didn't deserve to stay on.

Not horrible subs by any stretch though and the game didn't really change because of the subs, the game changed because West Ham started pushing forward because we had taken the lead.

 

[SpurMeUp]

Why are people slating the subs ? Rose and Ade have been put for ages and were very bright clearly wants them Sunday I have no problem with that. We were undone by two **** goals but we were weak at the back not exactly even 3rd choice defence. Soldado and Ade Sunday please !!!

=D>

 

[thfcsteff]

Steff, he made mistakes granted, but he has had a day with that squad and team. He made some strange subs the Ade one but in both rose and Ade subs I can see why - they werent and arent match fit

Mate…did you READ what I wrote? Please!!! I did not question the restng of Ade per se, i questioned WHO came on and WHY our remaining forward was then suddenly seen residing on the left-hand side for the final 20 minutes instead of being uptop near the thing with sticks and a net. IF you want Defoe there, then bring on Soldado! You cannot start with two strikers and end with one on the left-hand side on the pitch. I had no argument with Rose personally…of course, I'd like to say that I do believe we will be far better off when Dembele is rested. He gives us nothing other than possession stats.

BTW, and final comment, I was jesting about sack Sherwood. It was a joke. Much like the club is right now, but even I am not stupid enough to suggest he be canned right now, because it's clear Levy has not got anything ready and needs a rabbit from the hat. Tim is a hamster masquerading but hey, he's OUR hamster, so he continues to get my support because of that.

COYS, etc, etc...

 

[thfcsteff]

Steff, he made mistakes granted, but he has had a day with that squad and team. He made some strange subs the Ade one but in both rose and Ade subs I can see why - they werent and arent match fit

Mate…did you READ what I wrote? Please!!! I did not question the resting of Ade per se, i questioned WHO came on and WHY our remaining forward was then suddenly seen residing on the left-hand side for the final 20 minutes instead of being uptop near the thing with sticks and a net. IF you want Defoe there, then bring on Soldado! You cannot start with two strikers and end with one on the left-hand side on the pitch. I had no argument with Rose personally…of course, I'd like to say that I do believe we will be far better off when Dembele is rested. He gives us nothing other than possession stats.

BTW, and final comment, I was jesting about sack Sherwood. It was a joke. Much like the club is right now, but even I am not stupid enough to suggest he be canned right now, because it's clear Levy has not got anything ready and needs a rabbit from the hat. Tim is a hamster masquerading but hey, he's OUR hamster, so he continues to get my support because of that.

COYS, etc, etc...

 

[braineclipse]

Bull****! he has been at the club for years. He knows the players and most of them are internationals. Ade has been training he just took him off to play a more defensive side and ruined our possession.

That makes no sense.

Did you expect West Ham to continue playing the same way after we had taken the lead? Of course they weren't. Of course they would press higher up the pitch. If anything putting Holtby in giving us 3 midfielders should have allowed us to keep more possession than when staying with two strikers. Our players weren't capable of taking responsibility and holding on to the ball though.

 

[Modric THFC]

Once West Ham went for it Capoue and Chiriches where shown up as unable to defend against high balls.
If we scored in the 90th minute instead of the 67th we would have won the game as those two wouldnt have been tested.

 

[suffolkspur]

Sherwood ended!

Thats why i love this club. Just when you think we've got as bad as we can the next game comes along and kicks you in the balls just to prolong the agony.

Enjoyed the start to the game, thought we looked threatening and was glad to see Adebayor looking fairly impressive.

That aside i think Sherwoods changes in the 2nd half cost us. I don't why he switched Townsend and Lennon in a 442 formation when they were both looking good and causing problems down their respective flanks. Its almost like its cool as a manager to use inverted wingers for the sake of it. Didnt do anything for us or our shape at all.

Disappointed to see Adebayor taken off and not Defoe if we were going to change formation to tighten up. I'm also disappointed that we have lost to a **** team after going one nil up. For all the supposed leaders we have purchased there still seems to be a mental frailty rife throughout the squad and the next manager whoever that may be is going to have to instill some confidence sharpish.

Stinker.

 

[Mumorn]

******** did they! I hate that English fans give so much credit to teams that work hard, that should be a pre-requisite of any team. They sat and defended and rode their luck. Then got two goals from hoisting it into the box. If they played well then AVB's teams played like masters!!!

Right...

So you thought WE deserved to win then? A team that could barely hit the target? West Ham were away from home against a team that were dominating them for 45 minutes. "Rode their luck" ? really? What luck? Were we denied a stone wall penalty? Did they clear numerous shots off the line? Did we miss open goals? Not that I remember, West Ham defended well, went a goal down and with 10 minutes to go scored two goals, took their chances and go through to play in the Semi Finals of a domestic trophy.

AVBs teams didn't play like masters, but they knew how to win. Hence why he as the highest win percentage of any Spurs manager. His football at times might not have been the best, but he knew how to get us to win games. Do I think AVB would have won us that game? I have no idea, but that was supposedly the best football we had played all season, yet we lost.

Good football doesn't equal wins.

 

[Bedfordspurs]

But did he have to change the shape as much as he did? And with a team 1-0 down in a one-off win or lose game it is bleeding obvious they are going to go for it, especially with a defense including Capoue and Fryers (a midfielder and a very inexperience lad). Spurs are soft. End of. Missing hatloads of chances and then not able to lock it up at the end.

That's what cost us.... He went back to a more defensive system with a team that can't defend!!!!

Awful call on the Ade sub. Defoe can't hit a barn door when he is on side yet he stays on when we need to hold the ball.... Strange decision

 

[SpurMeUp]

I just got home from work as Ade scored. I watched Sherwood take Ade off (when imo if your going to play for 1-0 then leave the tall man on to at least hold up the ball and relieve some pressure). I saw us looking pretty poor at times in the middle, I saw long balls kill us, I saw Dembele play a very cute pass. Anyone care to fill me in about the match up until the 60th minute?? I cba looking back through the thread

No composure in front of goal. We lose our head with the final pass. Came out the blocks quickly and Defoe skewed an open goal wind after 90 seconds. Encouraged by the more direct attacking, taking the game to wham before they were all back in position defending. And it unlocked them countless times, but we didn't score more than one. When they did get back in position, same old, it was hard to break them down.

 

[chancer]

Also, despite what some are saying, West Ham didn't deserve to win. They were rubbish. They surrendered possession over and over, and gave us 60%+ of the ball and 20 efforts on goal. They relied on one long ball and a hail mary cross to win. Fk em, they were sh1t and deserved to lose.

 

[Modric THFC]

That makes no sense.

Did you expect West Ham to continue playing the same way after we had taken the lead? Of course they weren't. Of course they would press higher up the pitch. If anything putting Holtby in giving us 3 midfielders should have allowed us to keep more possession than when staying with two strikers. Our players weren't capable of taking responsibility and holding on to the ball though.

West Ham were just concentrating on lumping it long, so having 5 in midfield didnt work for us. We werent gonna pass it round for the last 20 minutes as we havent done that since the 2011-12 season.

 

[DHSF]

Mate…did you READ what I wrote? Please!!! I did not question the resting of Ade per se, i questioned WHO came on and WHY our remaining forward was then suddenly seen residing on the left-hand side for the final 20 minutes instead of being uptop near the thing with sticks and a net. IF you want Defoe there, then bring on Soldado! You cannot start with two strikers and end with one on the left-hand side on the pitch. I had no argument with Rose personally…of course, I'd like to say that I do believe we will be far better off when Dembele is rested. He gives us nothing other than possession stats.

BTW, and final comment, I was jesting about sack Sherwood. It was a joke. Much like the club is right now, but even I am not stupid enough to suggest he be canned right now, because it's clear Levy has not got anything ready and needs a rabbit from the hat. Tim is a hamster masquerading but hey, he's OUR hamster, so he continues to get my support because of that.

COYS, etc, etc...

My bad

I agree with you about who came on, I think Soldado for Ade should have been the sub up front.

I know you were jesting (I think I knew anyways).

 

[thfcsteff]

Criticism of the subs is knee-jerkery of the first order.

> Ade has played 45 mins in last 10 years. On a yellow. May well play Sunday. Perfectly reasonable sub to make. Could have been Soldado on, but if he's playing Sunday that'd be 3 games in 7 days. Not the wisest to put him on. 12 minutes to go. So, Holtby was the decision...really, not as bad a decision as many are saying.

> Rose. Hasn't played in ages. Might have been tightening up/signalled bench. Very important player for Sunday. Good sub.

> Chadli/Townsend. No choice.

I disagree.

And I'll try this again…my criticism of the subs is NOT necessarily who he took off, but WHAT HE DID WITH THE SIDE AFTER THEM! Can you explain to me why it is after Ade went off that Defoe was on the left-hand side? And not in front of the 'onion bag'? Was his GPS broken? Did Timbo try something I could not see? Help me.

Again, I UNDERSTAND Ade and Rose being subbed due to lack of match-fitness. i do NOT understand their replacements OR the deployment of players out there. For example, you have Dembele and Sigurdsson, so why not bring on Eriksen who could drop into the gaping holes in front of their defence and work some magic?

So sorry mate, IMO not knee-jerjery at all.

 

[djp82]

Ade sub was needed the man has not played for months. Rest him for Sunday sort league form out over the league cup. That's why rose was subbed too. It's embarrassing yes but rather him on pitch Sunday if that Ade turns up!!

 

[thfcsteff]

My bad

I agree with you about who came on, I think Soldado for Ade should have been the sub up front.

I know you were jesting (I think I knew anyways).

Fair play mate, and sorry for being a bit strong in response, perhaps I wasn't as clear as I should've been first time…