The Defensive Midfielder

[Pandy]

IMO we've already got enough with Lloris, Verts and Fazio. That's a good core of experienced pros.

I just don't want us signing more high-wage deadwood like we usually do when we dip into the mature market - Pienaar, Saha, Nelsen etc.

You don't have to keep having digs at Harry, he left 3 years ago.

Speaking of controversial shouts... Alex Song anyone??

 

[Bedfordspurs]

You don't have to keep having digs at Harry, he left 3 years ago.

Speaking of controversial shouts... Alex Song anyone??

@Maltese Falcon and I were debating one yesterday

Personally I think he is a very good player but he has gone backwards since January

 

[billyiddo]

I don't think Song would put in the work required to be an effective player for us tbh

 

[Pandy]

@Maltese Falcon and I were debating one yesterday

Personally I think he is a very good player but he has gone backwards since January

I don't think Song would put in the work required to be an effective player for us tbh

We don't need him to really. What he would bring is some much-needed experience, a physical presence, someone who can set the tempo and even has a great passing range. Bentaleb and Mason have bucketfuls of work-rate, and if Holtby came back he has a similar work ethic.

I was chuffed when he left Arsenal and considered him one of the best DMs in the world, he is only 27, how much has he really declined since then? Playing for a team with ambition as opposed to Wet Spam will only help. Also... who can honestly deny the chance to call our CM Masongleb?

On the topic of experience, bit of a rogue shout but does anyone think we could bring back VDV purely for dressing room influence? A la Drogba at Chelsea. Spurs legend, knows all about us (and loves the derby), played in the CL for us, came 4th with us, great backup to Eriksen.

 

[Maltese Falcon]

Schneiderlin is the obvious choice though I fear that ship has now sailed.

Cabaye would be perfect; As @Bedfordspurs says, Song seemed the ideal fit at the start of the season. Who knows? Free transfer at the right conditions in a better team....

Cheeky bid for Tiote?

But please do not mention Holtby - yet another lauded on nothing other than chest thumping.

 

[Pandy]

Schneiderlin is the obvious choice though I fear that ship has now sailed.

Cabaye would be perfect; As @Bedfordspurs says, Song seemed the ideal fit at the start of the season. Who knows? Free transfer at the right conditions in a better team....

Cheeky bid for Tiote?

But please do not mention Holtby - yet another lauded on nothing other than chest thumping.

Cabaye would likely cost too much and I think he is too much of a pushover, but in principal, a player we could certainly use. Tiote would be a good buy, but I think an on-song Song (couldn't resist) would be better simply because he rolls the two aforementioned players' best attributes into one.

Not that I have seen him play a single game, but maybe we can offload Holtby and just rely on Alli as backup?

 

[Bedfordspurs]

Cabaye would be an exceptional signing but a highly paid one

His passing range is excellent and he gets stuck in

 

[GrimsbyYid]

To me what's embarrassing is all the entitlement fans throwing tantrums like toddlers, demanding £30m signings because they only know instant gratification.

Building something of our own is not only the smart thing to do, but it will be so much rewarding.

but why is that the only other option? The smart thing to do is get the strongest team and squad that is possjble within your means. whether that's academy, buying in, or a mix. Not use the academy for the sake of it.

Your team would struggle to survive the premiership, way too risky, this season has shown we need a much stronger spine, we NEED a central midfielder so much it's baffling to me how people can't see it.

 

[GrimsbyYid]

To want to buy a couple of experienced players to balance out the squad is not representative of some petulant need for instant gratification, it is footballing common sense.

Its annoying that just because you dont agree with some on here they have to demean your posts or put words in your mouth just to strengthen their own opinions. Bizarre place this forum.

 

[Bedfordspurs]

but why is that the only other option? The smart thing to do is get the strongest team and squad that is possjble within your means. whether that's academy, buying in, or a mix. Not use the academy for the sake of it.

Your team would struggle to survive the premiership, way too risky, this season has shown we need a much stronger spine, we NEED a central midfielder so much it's baffling to me how people can't see it.

I agree with your logic but don't see the central midfielder as the solution

Agree if we can get someone better then we should but looking at the lack of options in the attacking roles, that's the priority for me. I genuinely believe that if we get that right we will be 10% better straight away.

 

[Pandy]

I agree with your logic but don't see the central midfielder as the solution

Agree if we can get someone better then we should but looking at the lack of options in the attacking roles, that's the priority for me. I genuinely believe that if we get that right we will be 10% better straight away.

I think its a bit of both to be fair.

But scoring goals per se hasn't been the problem, we still get there in one way or another every game. Admittedly we haven't given many teams a real hiding this year, but clean sheets are a massive problem, we have barely kept any. I remember Gomes keeping a silly number in our first 4th place finish and it helped us massively.

Also, a player who can add and extra goal or so per game is also gonna cost a lot more than one who can help save the same amount.

Obviously signing both would be ideal though...

 

[Bedfordspurs]

I think its a bit of both to be fair.

But scoring goals per se hasn't been the problem, we still get there in one way or another every game. Admittedly we haven't given many teams a real hiding this year, but clean sheets are a massive problem, we have barely kept any. I remember Gomes keeping a silly number in our first 4th place finish and it helped us massively.

Also, a player who can add and extra goal or so per game is also gonna cost a lot more than one who can help save the same amount.

Obviously signing both would be ideal though...

How many teams have we beat by more than one goal?

From memory it was games where we played at our maximum as in West Brom and Chelsea and a game when we played the worse team in the league in qpr

We have so few goal scoring options really thah we ahem become very easy to play against

We haven't scored in the last two for example against poor defences

Liverpool showed last year that even a toss defence can do well if you create and score enough. Our shot conversation stats I reckon will be high as we don't really create much for the Goals we score

 

[Pandy]

How many teams have we beat by more than one goal?

From memory it was games where we played at our maximum as in West Brom and Chelsea and a game when we played the worse team in the league in qpr

We have so few goal scoring options really thah we ahem become very easy to play against

We haven't scored in the last two for example against poor defences

Liverpool showed last year that even a toss defence can do well if you create and score enough. Our shot conversation stats I reckon will be high as we don't really create much for the Goals we score

We've kept 6 clean sheets in the league this season. That is terrible.

Clean sheets are as valid a way of beating teams by more than one goal as any other. The amount of points we've had to recover from losing positions is ridiculous.

Also, if we had Luis Suarez or anyone remotely as talented, I might agree, but we can't just out-score everyone. Especially against the big teams.. we have been on the end of too many 3-goal plus hidings this year (Man U, Man C, Liverpool, Chelsea) after doing so well in past seasons

 

[Bedfordspurs]

We've kept 6 clean sheets in the league this season. That is terrible.

Clean sheets are as valid a way of beating teams by more than one goal as any other. The amount of points we've had to recover from losing positions is ridiculous.

Also, if we had Luis Suarez or anyone remotely as talented, I might agree, but we can't just out-score everyone. Especially against the big teams.. we have been on the end of too many 3-goal plus hidings this year (Man U, Man C, Liverpool, Chelsea) after doing so well in past seasons

We have been on the end of Hidings from the best teams in the league... We haven't scored goals against two teams recently who could get relegated (villa won't now)

I agree we need to keep clean sheets or at least stop conceding as many but you can do that from the front. You don't score goals from being defensive or defending better.

When we have been poor we have literally created nothing and the lack of a threat has lead to more pressure which makes our already week defence crumble

 

[parklane1]

We've kept 6 clean sheets in the league this season. That is terrible.

Clean sheets are as valid a way of beating teams by more than one goal as any other. The amount of points we've had to recover from losing positions is ridiculous.

And considering we have one of the best keepers in the Prem its a shocking return, we need to defend better and with our CM its like running up hill ( it will not happen).

 

[Jurgen the German]

We've kept 6 clean sheets in the league this season. That is terrible.

Clean sheets are as valid a way of beating teams by more than one goal as any other. The amount of points we've had to recover from losing positions is ridiculous.

Also, if we had Luis Suarez or anyone remotely as talented, I might agree, but we can't just out-score everyone. Especially against the big teams.. we have been on the end of too many 3-goal plus hidings this year (Man U, Man C, Liverpool, Chelsea) after doing so well in past seasons

Plus Leicester have outplayed us 3 times and scored 6 goals against us. We've looked shaky against even the worst teams in the league.

 

[Gutter Boy]

And considering we have one of the best keepers in the Prem its a shocking return, we need to defend better and with our CM its like running up hill ( it will not happen).

Not keeping clean sheets isn't a problem if we keep winning as many games as we have been. 2-1 victories have seemed to be our thing this season.

It's a big turnaround from most of the last decade, where we've struggled to score

Poch has lubricated our midfield a bit by adopting a higher risk strategy. Quicker, more aggressive passing and high pressing. This means we will score a lot of goals, but are exposed when we lose possession and concede quite a few too.

I think it's calculated and by-and-large works well.

 

[Raziel]

Not keeping clean sheets isn't a problem if we keep winning as many games as we have been. 2-1 victories have seemed to be our thing this season.

It's a big turnaround from most of the last decade, where we've struggled to score

Poch has lubricated our midfield a bit by adopting a higher risk strategy. Quicker, more aggressive passing and high pressing. This means we will score a lot of goals, but are exposed when we lose possession and concede quite a few too.

I think it's calculated and by-and-large works well.

While I have no problem with us being more attacking focused, we need to be better at defending certain types of play

Pool and Manure have resurrected 80's long ball cave man football, big diagonal, over the top balls to wide pacey runners or center target man and we struggle against it, as do a few teams to be fair (City had a mare against that Fellaini & Young). And quite a few crappier teams have used it against us, sit deep, then punch out via long ball.

It's almost the original Fat Sam tactics that used to drive Wenger mad, it's ugly, and GHod knows who likes it, but we have to be able to counter it.

 

[Finney Is Back]

Not keeping clean sheets isn't a problem if we keep winning as many games as we have been. 2-1 victories have seemed to be our thing this season.

It's a big turnaround from most of the last decade, where we've struggled to score

Poch has lubricated our midfield a bit by adopting a higher risk strategy. Quicker, more aggressive passing and high pressing. This means we will score a lot of goals, but are exposed when we lose possession and concede quite a few too.

I think it's calculated and by-and-large works well.

Hmmmm – I’m not sure your perception matches the reality….

This season under Pochettino we have scored 50 goals so far at an average of 1.56 goals per game. Goal difference of +5

Now if we go back to Redknapp’s first full season to compare

13/14 AVB/Sherwood 55 goals at avg of 1.45 per game, GD +4
(which was actually 40 goals in 22 games at avg of 1.88 per game and GD of +10 under Sherwood)
12/13 AVB 66 goals at avg of 1.74 per game, GD +20
11/12 Redknapp 66 goals at avg of 1.74 per game, GD +25
10/11 Redknapp 55 goals at avg of 1.45 per game, GD +9
09/10 Redknapp 67 goals at avg of 1.76 per game, GD +26
So the reality is that overall we are typically scoring less goals while conceding more.

 

[metalgear]

While I have no problem with us being more attacking focused, we need to be better at defending certain types of play

Pool and Manure have resurrected 80's long ball cave man football, big diagonal, over the top balls to wide pacey runners or center target man and we struggle against it, as do a few teams to be fair (City had a mare against that Fellaini & Young). And quite a few crappier teams have used it against us, sit deep, then punch out via long ball.

It's almost the original Fat Sam tactics that used to drive Wenger mad, it's ugly, and GHod knows who likes it, but we have to be able to counter it.

pace and power - seems like we only have pace from our fullbacks and the strength from kane. the rest are wimpy (eriksen, mason, davies) or just can't bother using their physique and size or just don't dare (paulinho, bentaleb, chadli).

poch talked about quick transitions - recently i see the same no pace no power football that got AVB sacked, only difference being that its now being played by youngsters!