The Winger Thread

[Raziel]

Disagree re Chadli, to me it was a big mistake getting rid of Duece, similar for Chadli. With 1 functional striker, getting rid of a midfielder that even when he plays brick, scores and manages double figures for season makes no reasonable sense whatsoever.

Re wing options, I do agree we need additions, my view, players who can add pace, goals and option to go wide (instead of only inverted)

To me

- Chadli stays (too hard to make up those goals right now), LW starter next season
- We need a new RW, Townsend can go, Lamela either needs to up game or be a little more inside (I would listen to offers for Lamela).
- I would keep Lennon as cover, option for when we want to use more width, winger for cups
- Mirallas to me is a highlight real player .. we don't need another player that has "moments"
- Bolasie is interesting, his pace, pressure, constant involvement in every game I've seen him play makes him the kind of player opposing teams hate (and we don't have a lot of that), his end product is a bit brick (not Lennon myth brick), and at 26 I'm not sure it will improve drastically.

Re the rest, especially the ones from leagues most of us never watch, who knows, as I said, summary view

- Keep Chadli, Lamela (if no big offers) & Lennon
- Add at least 1 proven RW option that has pace, goals and can fudging cross from the outside
- Involve one of younger players as options (Pritchard?)

 

[billyiddo]

Pritchard to understudy Chadli, a more established player to rotate with Lamela.

sell Lennon and Townsend.

job done

 

[glasgowspur]

I like Chadli but would he get those goals if he chased back? Most of his goals aren't really winger style goals. Either the system needs tweaked and we keep most of who we have or better fitting players are needed.

 

[Raziel]

I like Chadli but would he get those goals if he chased back? Most of his goals aren't really winger style goals. Either the system needs tweaked and we keep most of who we have or better fitting players are needed.

Chadli is never going to chase back .. at best he will protect his line up the pitch.

The tweak the system needs is a more defensive minded midfielder behind our pivot, so the wingers can commit a little bit more.

 

[glasgowspur]

Chadli is never going to chase back .. at best he will protect his line up the pitch.

The tweak the system needs is a more defensive minded midfielder behind our pivot, so the wingers can commit a little bit more.

Agreed, makes us to one sided when lamella chases back.

 

[Gutter Boy]

Can we re-name this to the 'wing forward' thread, seeing as wingers haven't existed for about 20 years?

I'd like to see our AMs looking something like:

---Ayew----Eriksen---Lamela
(Chadli)--(Pritchard)-(Townsend)

 

[Pirate55]

Chadli is never going to chase back .. at best he will protect his line up the pitch.

The tweak the system needs is a more defensive minded midfielder behind our pivot, so the wingers can commit a little bit more.

Agreed. Personally, I like to see attackers primarily attack and defenders ( ie full backs ) primarily defend. Getting a forward to defend blunts their natural attacking instincts - one of the main reasons Townsend, Chadli, Lamela and Lennon have failed to inspire imo. It was the principal reason John Barnes was fantastic for Liverpool but underwhelming for England ( with one notable exception!).

Additionally, the sometimes gung -ho overlapping by Rose and Walker has been a key reason for the shakiness of our defence and our vulnerability to the quick switched diagonal ball.

 

[milo]

Agreed. Personally, I like to see attackers primarily attack and defenders ( ie full backs ) primarily defend. Getting a forward to defend blunts their natural attacking instincts - one of the main reasons Townsend, Chadli, Lamela and Lennon have failed to inspire imo. It was the principal reason John Barnes was fantastic for Liverpool but underwhelming for England ( with one notable exception!).

Additionally, the sometimes gung -ho overlapping by Rose and Walker has been a key reason for the shakiness of our defence and our vulnerability to the quick switched diagonal ball.

I'm struggling to think of a decent team who play this way

 

[Pirate55]

I'm struggling to think of a decent team who play this way

Er, just about all of them. Look at our goals scored and goals conceded as evidence of our ineptitude in this respect.

 

[parklane1]

Chadli is never going to chase back .. at best he will protect his line up the pitch.

The tweak the system needs is a more defensive minded midfielder behind our pivot, so the wingers can commit a little bit more.

Bingo.

 

[Bedfordspurs]

The best defensive midfielder in the world won't stop us conceding unless we work as a unit from the front back

If we defend as a team then we will stop conceding so many goals

The wingers have to work all the time. What invariably happened last season was out of the 3 behind the striker, - would have a good game, 1 was ok and the other was awful. When we had 3 players firing in all cylinders we were excellent (Chelsea, everton and arse at home and west brom away)

Any players we sign have to compliment those we want to keep and they have to work their arse off

I like the look of Ayew from what I've seen and on a free it's a no brainer for me as we can flog Townsend easily enough for good money

Chardli for all his faults weighed in with so many goals that you'd be A fool to get rid.. However he could be upgraded on. And lamella is the weka link attack wise still (despite the stats) as he doesn't offer a goal threat. Hopefully eh will push in next season but who knows

What no of them have is that raw pace and it's such a threat in this league.

 

[Cochise]

Completely agree with you SUIYHA. We need that talented wing player who will put out a lot of pressure and take the defenders eyes off of the likes of Eriksen and Kane.

I'd agree with the sales of Townsend and Lennon, whilst viewing Lamela has being the RWF cover and AM cover. That would leave us with Lamela, Eriksen, Pritchard and Chadli. I'd like Ayew to come in as competition for Chadli or even Fischer if we could snag him. The new RM has to be that pacy trickster. It seems that Poch shares that opinion given the links to Thauvin, Salvio, Yarmolenko and Rafa Silva. Yarmolenko is my pick from those although Thauvin does strike me as being closer to the tricky winger description.

 

[Bullet]

I wonder if Sissoko of Saudi Sportswashing Machine could play this role

He has extreme pace. Power. Work rate. Goals

 

[parklane1]

The best defensive midfielder in the world won't stop us conceding unless we work as a unit from the front back

If we defend as a team then we will stop conceding so many goals

.

I do agree with that, however our M/F players ( who seem to be the first choices) at this time are Eriksen, Mason, Bentaleb and none of them have a defensive mind set and until we bring in someone who has that ability we will leave our back four wide open ( as it has been all season).

 

[milo]

Er, just about all of them. Look at our goals scored and goals conceded as evidence of our ineptitude in this respect.

You think that the top teams do not play with attacking fullbacks or ask their forwards to defend from the front?

 

[braineclipse]

Chadli is never going to chase back .. at best he will protect his line up the pitch.

The tweak the system needs is a more defensive minded midfielder behind our pivot, so the wingers can commit a little bit more.

You're calling for a change to a 4-3-3 / 4-1-2-2-1 type formation?

I don't think a change like that is necessary or particularly likely. If we did change to that I think Bentaleb would play that role very well.

For me what we need is a bit more competition for places in central midfield and attacking areas, with players coming in that are willing to work as hard for Poch as our current youngsters are. And for our currently very young team to keep growing and learning from experience.

 

[Raziel]

You're calling for a change to a 4-3-3 / 4-1-2-2-1 type formation?

I don't think a change like that is necessary or particularly likely. If we did change to that I think Bentaleb would play that role very well.

For me what we need is a bit more competition for places in central midfield and attacking areas, with players coming in that are willing to work as hard for Poch as our current youngsters are. And for our currently very young team to keep growing and learning from experience.

Change to personnel more than formation, strangely enough in the last preseason we saw Poch's style more than we did during season

As we know, we play inverted wingers and through the middle a lot, width comes from the FB's spending a lot of time forward, this basically leaves the two CB's isolated, and us open to a ball over the top (especially diagonal wide ball). In preseason we countered that by having a designated midfielder actually go the space behind the FB to counter that.

Neither Mason/Bentaleb naturally do that, hence why I think a naturally more defensive midfielder (one with positional discipline) would make a significant difference, and if one did the preseason play model, it would allow for one or two players (like Chadli or a new luxury player) to stay more forward.

 

[braineclipse]

Change to personnel more than formation, strangely enough in the last preseason we saw Poch's style more than we did during season

As we know, we play inverted wingers and through the middle a lot, width comes from the FB's spending a lot of time forward, this basically leaves the two CB's isolated, and us open to a ball over the top (especially diagonal wide ball). In preseason we countered that by having a designated midfielder actually go the space behind the FB to counter that.

Neither Mason/Bentaleb naturally do that, hence why I think a naturally more defensive midfielder (one with positional discipline) would make a significant difference, and if one did the preseason play model, it would allow for one or two players (like Chadli or a new luxury player) to stay more forward.

I don't see how that is "a more defensive minded player behind our pivot"? Are you describing Mason and Eriksen as our current "pivot"?

I think we're playing a style that is fairly demanding, physically, mentally and not least tactically. Like you say a lot of our width comes from our full backs, with defensive cover for their attacking movement coming from one of the two deeper midfielders (Bentaleb and Mason this season at least). Particularly when both full backs attack at the same time. That's quite different from a (imo) simpler model where the full backs are essentially told not to venture too far forward at the same time and all the full back has to do to balance things out is to look at the other full back and make a decision.

That's quite a few difficult decisions to be made on when to attack and when to defend. Mason seems to have the most attacking freedom with Bentaleb more defensive responsibility when we attack. So it's been up to Rose, Bentaleb and Walker/Dier/Chiriches/Naughton to balance the attacking movement with defensive responsibility to not leave the two centre backs isolated.

This is combined with a (at times) high pressing system where we try to win the ball back quickly quite often and press high up the pitch when the opponents are building from the back at least some of the time. We're doing this with a very young front 4, and with some players not ideally suited to a pressing game like that (I'm thinking primarily of Townsend and Chadli, but whatever). Again this is more complex than a "when we lose it just run back and get behind the ball" system. Again some difficult decisions have to be made, perhaps particularly for those 2 full backs and 2 deep midfielders.

I keep coming back to two points:

1. We're trying to do this with a very young team. Both the full backs and deep midfielders are young, inexperienced, and sometimes playing in relatively new positions (Dier, Chiriches, Mason - even Bentaleb). The attacking 4 is also young and learning when to press, when to drop back etc - more important when we press against teams building from the back than when counter attacked on, but still important. Even without any new signings (though we will make new signings) I would expect us to defend better next season - a year more experienced and a year of learning Pochettino's system. There will also be some continuity, for the first time in a handful of years.

2. We have a very talented player in Bentaleb with few (if any) real weaknesses in his game playing the deepest midfield role. It might be that we can find a short term upgrade on him, but I really doubt we can find someone that's currently better that also has his obvious talent and (imo) extreme potential. Those players quite simply don't sign for Spurs.

This is as situation where I think it's for the best to accept some short term pain for a long term gain. I don't think we should look to replace a player as talented as him in the starting line-up. Instead I think we should persevere as he continues to develop and learn to become the player he seems to be likely to develop into. This is key for our progress, developing talented players into big stars. And that takes a bit of short term pain to make happen.

 

[veron23]

I've said this before but

Lamela and Townsend are not right sided players.

The few good pieces of play that Lamela has ever produced with end product was when he is in the middle. He doesnt have the poise or pace to play wide. Through the middle howewer he can play through balls and shoot very well.

Townsend - likewise his best work has never been on the right. On the left he can beat players and put dangerous balls in the box which actually amount to chances created. On the right he is non existent but I believe there is a player In their but fear he won't achieve his optimum levels.

This is my major problem with Poch and why I call him a one trick pony. He seems to stick with inverted wingers because that's what everybody else does even tho for us it doesn't work.

If it was me..

Eriksen on the left as our hazard. He can score so many goals cutting in and if a defender takes him on the outside he has an excellent cross on either foot. Townsend as backup for a pacey option towards ends of games.

Lamela number 10. His hard work means he will tuck in helping out the midfield 2.

New rw forward.

Chadli as a utility player

 

[billyiddo]

@veron23 i think Eriksen left Lamela center and a new rwf could be the way forward

Eriksen would provide more defensive cover than Chadli and we wouldn't lose the goals from that side but it'd require Lamela to up his goal scoring game considerably to cover losing Chadlis contribution.