I can't agree with this, or at least I will not let myself believe it. We pressed the fuck out of them in the first half, if we are a jaded side you simply will not be able to do it, it would be impossible.The players are knackered. Kane did not even have a summer off and he's our only striker. Look at him at the end of the West Ham game, almost falling over his own feet. Dembele can't play two games in a week. They can't keep playing Thursday-Sunday and winning both games, when other teams don't have this problem. We were dead yesterday and only found a new lease of life when they had a man sent off. Fitness is massive in today's game and if we keep up both competitions we are handing it to Leicester on a plate.
Yes, at the end of games you can see our boys have given everything, yes they look tired BUT that is exactly how they should look having given everything. "If you don't have to drag yourself off the field exhausted after 90 minutes, you can't claim to have done your best." Bill Nic. Are we saying towards the end of games we want to see a spring in our step? See them in pristine white shirts, still with the ironing creases in them? I want to see them fucked, I want to see them on their last knees.
The time I concede that we are spent, is when we turn up and park the bus, but if we continue on our way to out press and out run teams teams (and we did out press and run them on Sat) then all is well.
There is a narrative building, a naritive created based on what? First off people say this because it happened to Bielsa's teams, think about that, have you ever heard such a unfounded statement as that? Secondly it is said that Poch's team fading in the last few games in the season is common place, there may be some truth to this but look at the context. His Southampton squad was tiny, outside of maybe 13 players, he had a very small pool of players he could bring in. Last season exactly the same situation with us, by the end of the season it was absolutely crystal clear who he trusted and who he didn't, he had frozen out a number of players thus reducing the pool of players he could wanted to bring in.