lloris is good and I have no issues with him starting over Friedel, but the way that toon move broke, Lloris wouldn't have been in any more of a position to stop the goal
- IMV
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- IMV
Vlad Chiriches gets injury (2 weeks stop) he miss the play-off games of Romania (vs.Greece) 
FRF (romanian federation of football) announce already his replacement (another defender) ,so Vlad will remain (possible) in London for the recovery... incredible what bad news for the romanian fans
just right now!
a key player for the national team lost ...for the play-offs
FRF (romanian federation of football) announce already his replacement (another defender) ,so Vlad will remain (possible) in London for the recovery... incredible what bad news for the romanian fans
just right now!
a key player for the national team lost ...for the play-offs
sorry, but I disagree, the old boy done good, maybe one corner he could have got a better punch on, but apart from that he was solid all game.
Mate, we dont even have a plan A
All these different players, and no matter who he picks we do the same old shit. Eriksen created 9 chances today, but Holtby was preferred for the last 2/3 games.....then mysteriously dropped again today??
Siggy LW...or Lennon LW? Lamela benchwarming for 90 minutes...a "perfectly healthy" Lloris dropped.....two defensive subs at 1-0 down at HT?
Im lost
Your other points are fair enough but I have to pick up on this one.
Chiriches was of course an injury so he had to come off and the other "defensive" sub was inspired because Sandro bossed the game when he came on. We couldnt make the third sub until the latter stages of the game incase of injury, but that was an offensive one and look how that panned out for Defoe. Not very well...
He didn't at the chavs and doesn't here either. I think it's something he's yet to learn but the big test will be whether he is too proud to deviate from his way of playing. He's got time here, I don't think Levy (or any other chairman bar maybe Vincent Tan) would consider getting rid in the circumstances
Result on Spurs unfair according to AVB. Well if we could finish easy chances from 10 yards we wouldn't have this conversation. The starting lineup was very odd, cost us.
Fair enough....but it painfully obvious that 442 with Defoe and Soldado is shite, yet he keeps utilising it.
I was all for giving it a bash.....but its shit. Fucking woeful...why persist?
As for the injuries forcing our hand, true, but how about 2nd half:
......................................................Brad
...................Walker...........................Kaboul...................Vertonghen
Lennon/Lamela................Paulinho............................Sandro..............Townsend
..................Siggy............................................................Eriksen
...................................................Soldado
IMO, those three at the back are quick and/or clever enough to cover Brad...we also have enough strength in CM, and enough to actually give Soldado something to run onto, plus wing play.
Just a thought, I dont think Im better than AVB, but would rather lose taking a risk, than lose being predictably shit
No but not starting Sandro could well have done. Game changed when he came on.
Well so did our 4321 as well as our 442....so...whatever
I
I was a bit nervous when I saw Friedel in that starting line up today
But if you asked me going into the game if you'd be happy with the performance you got from Friedel today, i would have been ecstatic Today's result falls on the attack and AVB for me.
aulinhofacepalm:Now there's a surprise....so again we were good enough according to our manager?
Last time it was the fans...what was it this time...Newcastle had a goalie?
I'd forgotten how middle class the West is! Might have been pretty much the only one singing in that stand but I gave it a go. Didn't enjoy a couple of old blokes behind me complaining at half time about how boring it was and "I won't bother turning up for the next one if it's this boring" - Fine I said to him we won't miss you, don't think he quite worked out what I meant the dozy twat
This is my biggest problem.
I don't mind giving time for the players to gel, I don't mind that we are not playing like how we should, and deep inside I don't mind that in the progress we end up losing winnable games.
But ... the thing is that there appears to be NO (well, at least not much) gelling going on.
So many changes - week in, week out - and because of that nothings seems to be clicking. There's no cohesion.
You would think after so many of these PL games, EL games, and cup games ... AVB would know our strongest side, or at least try to impose one.
After having some time to discuss, reflect, and digest I'd say my thoughts are as follows:
Everyone takes some of the blame today, piss poor first half, some selection errors, and apathy on the pitch from some of the players.
Sandro should have started today's game. Dembele and Paulinho don't work together as neither wants to help out the center backs defensively as a destroyer or going forward by creating space and dragging strikers out of position. If Sandro was fit enough for the bench, he was fit enough to start. If he couldn't go the full 90, take him off late on, not bring him on as a sub. Similarly, Dembele was poor today and has been unconvincing all season. I love him as a player but numerous times he got himself into bad situations with the ball and was unable to recover. He will need to improve vastly if he wants to start again IMO.
Sigurdsson was also an odd choice. I was okay with him starting, but only with the idea to bring Lamela on as an impact sub against tired legs. Today, besides the deflected free kick that almost went in, I can't recall Siggy doing anything of note. If AVB is going to reward form as he has earlier in the season, then why not repay Lamela's performance on Thursday with a start and at the very least a 30 minute impact cameo. Personally, having played, it would be crushing to have a great game and follow it up by riding the bench while the team struggles the next game.
Vlad going off hurt us dearly because it took away one of our subs. Similarly, I though he was great today, both carrying the ball forward and mopping up. Yes, he was out of position on the goal, but I think that falls more on the midfield losing the ball carelessly than him.
If Hugo plays, I don't think we concede that goal. Yes its a case of "what-if" but I think Hugo knocks the ball away from Remy's feet. You can see that as Brad came out, he hesitates when Remy goes to take a touch, even though it is fairly clear he can only take the ball to his (Brad's) right hand side. Knowing this he should have been able to get a touch on the ball. Otherwise today Brad played well enough, but when you concede an early goal, at times that is all that matters.
4-4-2 is pointless with two similar strikers. This has been said ad-nauseam but Defoe and Soldado are too similar in their approach. While Soldado didn't have a great game today and should have scored from his free header from a corner, I don't think Defoe should have even been in the conversation to come on. I'd have rather had Kane come on simply because he would offer us a different style of 4-4-2. In the end though the right choice of sub would have been Lamela. We were all over them and we didn't need to change shape at the time. By changing shape, we lost some of the impetus and our attacking power petered out some.
Townsend didn't have a great game, along with Eriksen (except his abysmal finishing), but I can't fault either of them too much today. Similarly Walker didn't have his greatest game but he wasn't bad either.
In the end it was a poor all around performance and the player should realize that. The most worrying thing for me was why it took until halftime for our players to start showing fight and impetus. Why didn't we play like that for the whole first 45? Why didn't we come right back at them after scoring? Some of it has to do with formations and players on the pitch, but some also has to go down to hunger and desire. TBH we simply didn't show that in the first half.
Poor performance today, some poor decisions were made, team needs to pick themselves back up. We need a leader to kick the team up the arse and get them playing hard from the off. AVB needs to play a role in this as well. He had a poor managerial performance in some aspects but we simply need to come back stronger. Can we do this though? Personally, I really don't know.
-Trying to keep the faith
Everyone takes some of the blame today, piss poor first half, some selection errors, and apathy on the pitch from some of the players.
Sandro should have started today's game. Dembele and Paulinho don't work together as neither wants to help out the center backs defensively as a destroyer or going forward by creating space and dragging strikers out of position. If Sandro was fit enough for the bench, he was fit enough to start. If he couldn't go the full 90, take him off late on, not bring him on as a sub. Similarly, Dembele was poor today and has been unconvincing all season. I love him as a player but numerous times he got himself into bad situations with the ball and was unable to recover. He will need to improve vastly if he wants to start again IMO.
Sigurdsson was also an odd choice. I was okay with him starting, but only with the idea to bring Lamela on as an impact sub against tired legs. Today, besides the deflected free kick that almost went in, I can't recall Siggy doing anything of note. If AVB is going to reward form as he has earlier in the season, then why not repay Lamela's performance on Thursday with a start and at the very least a 30 minute impact cameo. Personally, having played, it would be crushing to have a great game and follow it up by riding the bench while the team struggles the next game.
Vlad going off hurt us dearly because it took away one of our subs. Similarly, I though he was great today, both carrying the ball forward and mopping up. Yes, he was out of position on the goal, but I think that falls more on the midfield losing the ball carelessly than him.
If Hugo plays, I don't think we concede that goal. Yes its a case of "what-if" but I think Hugo knocks the ball away from Remy's feet. You can see that as Brad came out, he hesitates when Remy goes to take a touch, even though it is fairly clear he can only take the ball to his (Brad's) right hand side. Knowing this he should have been able to get a touch on the ball. Otherwise today Brad played well enough, but when you concede an early goal, at times that is all that matters.
4-4-2 is pointless with two similar strikers. This has been said ad-nauseam but Defoe and Soldado are too similar in their approach. While Soldado didn't have a great game today and should have scored from his free header from a corner, I don't think Defoe should have even been in the conversation to come on. I'd have rather had Kane come on simply because he would offer us a different style of 4-4-2. In the end though the right choice of sub would have been Lamela. We were all over them and we didn't need to change shape at the time. By changing shape, we lost some of the impetus and our attacking power petered out some.
Townsend didn't have a great game, along with Eriksen (except his abysmal finishing), but I can't fault either of them too much today. Similarly Walker didn't have his greatest game but he wasn't bad either.
In the end it was a poor all around performance and the player should realize that. The most worrying thing for me was why it took until halftime for our players to start showing fight and impetus. Why didn't we play like that for the whole first 45? Why didn't we come right back at them after scoring? Some of it has to do with formations and players on the pitch, but some also has to go down to hunger and desire. TBH we simply didn't show that in the first half.
Poor performance today, some poor decisions were made, team needs to pick themselves back up. We need a leader to kick the team up the arse and get them playing hard from the off. AVB needs to play a role in this as well. He had a poor managerial performance in some aspects but we simply need to come back stronger. Can we do this though? Personally, I really don't know.
-Trying to keep the faith
With regards the play, I thought we were pretty good second half and you certainly couldn't fault the team for urgency right from the first whistle after the break (stark opposite to the first half), but we still try to run straight at the opposition. We must get back to passing in triangles, quick one-time passes, that's how we will break down defences.
Today Newcastle scrapped out that win by running their arses off, they constantly had at least two men covering every attacking run we made. If we'd had a few snappy one-twos in there we'd have gotten in behind them no problem.
We've basically turned into England under Sven - everyone wants to play centre attacking midfield. Horribly congested and easy to defend. Still, that second half was decent overall and I came away from the game positive in spite of the result. Just want to see those triangles.
Today Newcastle scrapped out that win by running their arses off, they constantly had at least two men covering every attacking run we made. If we'd had a few snappy one-twos in there we'd have gotten in behind them no problem.
We've basically turned into England under Sven - everyone wants to play centre attacking midfield. Horribly congested and easy to defend. Still, that second half was decent overall and I came away from the game positive in spite of the result. Just want to see those triangles.
