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*** Tottenham Hotspur - Arsenal OMT ***

Also Dubai, I don't know what your problem is with Rose in this game. I thought he did ok. Dawson was shaky and Dembele wasn't his usual self. But Rose largely did his job.
 
BrainOfLevy said:
Also Dubai, I don't know what your problem is with Rose in this game. I thought he did ok. Dawson was shaky and Dembele wasn't his usual self. But Rose largely did his job.
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I will say that IMO, it's about details and for the second week in a row he got caught. Yes, the CBs didn't look across the line, but what on earth was Rose doing so far inside? He needs to not ball-watch like that. If he's more aware/positionally correct, that chance doesn't happen. AVB is a details man, and I suspect he will be close to a new left-back in the next 12 hours...of course I wish he'd just give BAE another chance, but there we go...

Other than that, as I said in another thread, I think personally the knee-jerking is OTT, that with those few adjustments/some time together, this team will be excellent...Goons played like an away side today, especially second-half...
 
BrainOfLevy said:
Sorry mate but I really don't think it was as negative as you are making out. I'm not saying we are there where we want to be, I'm saying we will be soon. The pieces are there, they just need a few sessions to come together.

Your criticisms of our style of play 'pass, pass, pointless pass' etc it's just the symptom of being a possession based, controlling team. And if we were a defensive team we'd get criticisms saying we don't move forward enough and if we are an attacking team we would get told we are too open. We play for control and the criticism is that the passing is too pointless. Well, it will look like that when we are still trying to gel. Doesn't mean it's not a good way to play. Everton fans are saying exactly the same about Martinez at the moment, but obviously there is more to the system than pointless passing. The rewards, in terms of pinning teams back and playing the game away from our goal, are obvious.

I just don't buy that Wenger 'let us have the ball'. When has Wenger ever played like that, ever?? He is notorious for being stubborn and sticking to his principles, and focussing on his own game rather than trying to nullify the opposition. Last year at the height of the Bale hype, he said he wasn't making any special plans for him. So he's either changed the habit of a lifetime for us, which is a compliment to our team in itself, or we actually were just better on the ball than they were today. They ended the match with 4 full backs for crying out loud, desperately trying to hold on for a 1 goal win after spending the entire game in their half!

I'm not saying we are the finished article yet. But once we settle and the new signings get integrated, we will be a machine.
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There is a considerable difference between passing with purpose and passing to avoid being dispossessed. If you subscribe to that 'control' philosophy, then our game plan would have been to get the defensive line all the way to the half-way line, and then slowly advance towards the goal while playing passing triangles and making off-the-ball runs to provide the man in possession with at least two forward passing options. It's the way that strategy is supposed to work, as evidenced by Rodgers detailing it last year in one of his earliest interviews. Today, our players had no forward options beyond the two wingers, and the wingers themselves were isolated. No one was able to string more than two passes together in the offensive third, we only got shots from Townsend's direct runs and any control we hoped to display was shattered by Arsenal's repeated counter-attacks, all of which were executed with pace, purpose and technique that was absent from our play today.

Hanging back trying to avoid being closed down is not controlling the game. Very few players took responsibility, and overall, our ultimate goal of winning the goddamn game was compromised by our inability to get beyond even the first line of Arsenal's defence.

I appreciate your positivity, I really do. And I believe AVB has a plan to mould this side into one where the sort of play you describe can be confidently executed. But it isn't now, and there was no evidence of it against Arsenal, merely individual mistakes, a lack of cohesiveness and no creative threat whatsoever. And, as a final statement on the matter, if controlling possession was our aim, perhaps aimlessly lifting the ball forward a la Capoue or putting in several utterly useless crosses a la Rose and Walker isn't the best way to achieve that. AVB's always stated his preference for direct play, 'vertical penetration' as he stated when being interviewed by Daniel Sousa. Quick, effective transitions from defense to attack. That's what I believe he went for. And that's what we failed to do. Ergo, it was a bad performance either way: we failed to control the flow of play and we failed to penetrate.

It was a bad performance, and we'll learn from this and improve. I believe both those things. Move on.

Oh, and as for Rose, he was caught out too often in defense (Giroud went past him like he wasn't there for one of the shots that Lloris saved, for example) and he put in terrible crosses. That's why I think he had a bad game. He needs to improve, but again, I believe if he's given game time he will. Will he get it, though? I have a feeling that we'll get a full-back in before the deadline, so I fear he won't.
 
chancer said:
Excellent post Dubai, that's exactly how I saw it. I'm really, really surprised at the fairly positive reviews here for our play. I thought we were awful.

AVB was totally owned by Wenger, our supposedly brutal midfield were shirking tackles and looked so laborious, we passed sideways all day or in harmless areas and, most of all, whenever one of our players got the ball it was like they wanted rid of it as quickly as possible. I thought there were seriously worrying signs out there. Lamela and Eriksen desperately, desperately needed. (Lamela I thought was immediately impressive in his half dozen touches. You could just see the quality oozing off him.)
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Our CMs looked like didn't know how to play with each other. We looked poor but I thought it was a chemistry issue. Let's see how we improve over the next few weeks
 
DubaiSpur said:
There is a considerable difference between passing with purpose and passing to avoid being dispossessed. If you subscribe to that 'control' philosophy, then our game plan would have been to get the defensive line all the way to the half-way line, and then slowly advance towards the goal while playing passing triangles and making off-the-ball runs to provide the man in possession with at least two forward passing options. It's the way that strategy is supposed to work, as evidenced by Rodgers detailing it last year in one of his earliest interviews. Today, our players had no forward options beyond the two wingers, and the wingers themselves were isolated. No one was able to string more than two passes together in the offensive third, we only got shots from Townsend's direct runs and any control we hoped to display was shattered by Arsenal's repeated counter-attacks, all of which were executed with pace, purpose and technique that was absent from our play today.

Hanging back trying to avoid being closed down is not controlling the game. Very few players took responsibility, and overall, our ultimate goal of winning the goddamn game was compromised by our inability to get beyond even the first line of Arsenal's defence.

I appreciate your positivity, I really do. And I believe AVB has a plan to mould this side into one where the sort of play you describe can be confidently executed. But it isn't now, and there was no evidence of it against Arsenal, merely individual mistakes, a lack of cohesiveness and no creative threat whatsoever. And, as a final statement on the matter, if controlling possession was our aim, perhaps aimlessly lifting the ball forward a la Capoue or putting in several utterly useless crosses a la Rose and Walker isn't the best way to achieve that. AVB's always stated his preference for direct play, 'vertical penetration' as he stated when being interviewed by Daniel Sousa. Quick, effective transitions from defense to attack. That's what I believe he went for. And that's what we failed to do. Ergo, it was a bad performance either way: we failed to control the flow of play and we failed to penetrate.

It was a bad performance, and we'll learn from this and improve. I believe both those things. Move on.

Oh, and as for Rose, he was caught out too often in defense (Giroud went past him like he wasn't there for one of the shots that Lloris saved, for example) and he put in terrible crosses. That's why I think he had a bad game. He needs to improve, but again, I believe if he's given game time he will. Will he get it, though? I have a feeling that we'll get a full-back in before the deadline, so I fear he won't.
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There was clearly a similar issue to that we would encounter when Parker and Sandro played together i.e. Paulinho needed to push further forwards and Moussa looked a bit lost. But the main thing missing today (other than a Lamela or Ericsson!) was cohesiveness. That needs time but you can see it clicking. As for the 'inability to get beyond the first line of Arsenal's defence' well, we suffered the same against lower league sides last season when they put 10 men behind the ball!!!! Sorry mate, I think you're waaaaaay too down given the context...
 
thfcsteff said:
There was clearly a similar issue to that we would encounter when Parker and Sandro played together i.e. Paulinho needed to push further forwards and Moussa looked a bit lost. But the main thing missing today (other than a Lamela or Ericsson!) was cohesiveness. That needs time but you can see it clicking. As for the 'inability to get beyond the first line of Arsenal's defence' well, we suffered the same against lower league sides last season when they put 10 men behind the ball!!!! Sorry mate, I think you're waaaaaay too down given the context...
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We lacked cohesiveness, made errors, had no options, couldn't get past their defense. You acknowledge most of these things.

All those things together suggest we had a bad game, especially when factored into the fact that we bloody lost against Arsenal....:D

And sure, you put it into context and say I'm waayy too down. But that's exactly what I keep saying, goddamnit! 'We'll learn and move on', 'to be expected'.....come on!:D

I'm not holding anyone at fault for this long-term. Today we had a bad game. It is an individual instance we will learn from. Move on.
 
DubaiSpur said:
We lacked cohesiveness, made errors, had no options, couldn't get past their defense. You acknowledge most of these things.

All those things together suggest we had a bad game, especially when factored into the fact that we bloody lost against Arsenal....:D

And sure, you put it into context and say I'm waayy too down. But that's exactly what I keep saying, goddamnit! 'We'll learn and move on', 'to be expected'.....come on!:D

I'm not holding anyone at fault for this long-term. Today we had a bad game. It is an individual instance we will learn from. Move on.
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As is mate...you're still fired up, I never was, I hate those ****s but things are shifting fast...I don't think we had a particularly bad game today at all, I think we still need to cross our 'i's and dot our 't's...simple really...we need a left-back if BAE isn't his man, Daws will eventually give way to Kaboul or Chichres and Lamela will be great. We missed Lennon a lot today...we agree to disagree IMO.
 
thfcsteff said:
As is mate...you're still fired up, I never was, I hate those ****s but things are shifting fast...I don't think we had a particularly bad game today at all, I think we still need to cross our 'i's and dot our 't's...simple really...we need a left-back if BAE isn't his man, Daws will eventually give way to Kaboul or Chichres and Lamela will be great. We missed Lennon a lot today...we agree to disagree IMO.
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Agree completely with that bit, so maybe we aren't that far apart after all. :)
 
Anyone know a site where I can find out our most used setup of players and positions from last season.. Something is missing (not just Bale) and I cant put my finger on it at the minute and want to go over last season..
 
Ginola99 said:
Anyone know a site where I can find out our most used setup of players and positions from last season.. Something is missing (not just Bale) and I cant put my finger on it at the minute and want to go over last season..
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Few things maybe:

- Tempo of passing? We seem more sluggish this season, and that silly thing I used to hate of passing the ball back and fourth 3 times in 5 yards in midfield suddenly seems appealing just to sustain tempo. Don't think there's as much of that this season.

- Balls/runs through the channels? I thought this season we'd be slipping balls through to Soldado or advancing midfielders through the channels. Or that we'd be playing through there somehow. Not sure we are.

- Getting behind their line? Are we doing this? Doesn't really feel like it. Did we last season?

- Long range shooting? Seems to be quite a lot of it at the moment.


Just off the top of my head - I could be mistaken on any of them.
 
Dembele/Sandro partnership is missing. Dembele has come under scrutiny from a few of us, including a big fan like myself. I personally think it's because he's missed Sandro beside him, they both worked really well, knew of eachothers positions well. Dembele shouldnt be playing advanced as he likes to come back and retain possession, him and Sandro in the middle is a SOLID partnership to have to retain the ball and feed it to the more creative ones upfield.
 
Mumorn said:
Dembele/Sandro partnership is missing. Dembele has come under scrutiny from a few of us, including a big fan like myself. I personally think it's because he's missed Sandro beside him, they both worked really well, knew of eachothers positions well. Dembele shouldnt be playing advanced as he likes to come back and retain possession, him and Sandro in the middle is a SOLID partnership to have to retain the ball and feed it to the more creative ones upfield.
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I think AVB was doing this:

------------Capoue-------------
------Paulinho----Dembele----
LF-----------------------------RF

I think in the next few games he should go with

------Sandro------Dembele-----
-----------Paulinho--------------
LF-----------------------------RF

Personnel wise that could be even 2 of Sandro, Dembele and Paulinho and possibly Eriksen, Holtby or even Lamela in the AM position
 
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