Tottenham Hotspur 24/25: To Dare is to Didgeridoo

[Kliq]

How's everyone feeling about Spurs and Ange at the moment? The injuries are real, but some of that has to be assigned to Ange and staff for minimal rotation. We don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but the non-use of Spence is problematic. Seems to me they rushed both CBs back and now they'll have to take their medicine and sit them for another period before giving it another go.

I thought Son was abjectly terrible yesterday, and while some of the wisdom re Son is that you have to play him through his rough patches, he's getting close to the age where you maybe don't want to let him play through it. Nevertheless, Spurs are forced to because of Odebert and Moore's injuries (what is Moore's injury BTW?). With Johnson going down, we may be seeing a lot more of Deki at RW, forcing Madders back into the 10. Maybe a good problem to force the hand, but certainly going to put more miles on the players and reduce tactical flexibility.

Will be interesting to see where the season goes from here. If Spurs crash out of cups and are still mid-table, I do think Levy will consider moving on, even if it's not something I agree with. Spurs have lurched to and fro too much these last 5 years, and they need some stability, but if the feeling in the board room is that Ange has found his ceiling and this isn't a squad issue, they'll be ruthless to cut him IMO.

Bad.

 

[Jimy Hendrix]

I'm cautiously optimistic about the overall project, not so optimistic about the season but hoping we can sneak a cup trophy, and extremely unexcited for the rest of December.

 

[Kliq]

The midfield play was so abysmal yesterday, and given their CB injury situation, they need Bissouma and Sarr to both be very, very good. Not only did they each give away bad penalties, but they were almost non-existent in terms of the offensive attack, finding it very difficult to string together progressive passes that would punish Chelsea for playing so aggressively. After the 30 minute mark or so, Chelsea really dominated the game, with Spurs unable to really find any sustained possession of the ball and instead conceding to Chelsea's pressure, as they hammered away for an equalizer and eventually a winner.

Missing Bentancur I think really hurt--out of the regular holding midfielders he is our best progressive passer and would have been a much better fit than either Bissouma or Sarr. I would have also gotten Madders into the game earlier--they desperately needed another player in the center of the pitch who could make a turn and move the ball forward without getting into trouble

I don't really blame Ange for anything, in general I find blaming managers to be too common of a case for fans, but the direction the team is heading in over the last month or so, taking away the historic City result, is not encouraging.

 

[Zososoxfan]

Copying from the other thread:

How's everyone feeling about Spurs and Ange at the moment? The injuries are real, but some of that has to be assigned to Ange and staff for minimal rotation. We don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but the non-use of Spence is problematic. Seems to me they rushed both CBs back and now they'll have to take their medicine and sit them for another period before giving it another go.

I thought Son was abjectly terrible yesterday, and while some of the wisdom re Son is that you have to play him through his rough patches, he's getting close to the age where you maybe don't want to let him play through it. Nevertheless, Spurs are forced to because of Odebert and Moore's injuries (what is Moore's injury BTW?). With Johnson going down, we may be seeing a lot more of Deki at RW, forcing Madders back into the 10. Maybe a good problem to force the hand, but certainly going to put more miles on the players and reduce tactical flexibility.

Will be interesting to see where the season goes from here. If Spurs crash out of cups and are still mid-table, I do think Levy will consider moving on, even if it's not something I agree with. Spurs have lurched to and fro too much these last 5 years, and they need some stability, but if the feeling in the board room is that Ange has found his ceiling and this isn't a squad issue, they'll be ruthless to cut him IMO.

Feels like Ange needs a younger squad and a deeper squad to play his very-high-line, very-high-risk-and-high-reward style. For just one example, van de Ven's pace at CB has let Ange cheat much further forward, knowing that vdV can sprint back and catch up with a counter. But.... if he keeps going down with hammy pulls, like he did this weekend, it's going to shorten his career.

I agree that Son is teetering on the edge of his pace deserting him. It happened to Vardy much later than I thought it would, and he's got enough nous and balls that he's having a good season anyway (by most lower-half-sides' strikers' standards).

But... again, maybe the solution with a squad like Ange has, is to not make them play like Westphal's Nuggets, for 38 league fixtures, plus cups, plus Europe.

Son's pace is an issue, but it's really the quickness and decision-making that has me worried. Finishing skills never really go, but the ability to create a yard and the decision-making calculus that players make based on their abilities sometimes never adjust to their new realities. Son likely needs to move inside so he can become a 2-touch striker--receive and hit--to remain useful. His days receiving the ball wide, beating a defender, and then creating havoc and goals are likely numbered. That said, everyone looks bad right now, so I don't want to read too much into it.

Some lower competition in Rangers and then Southampton could really help galvanize the group, or it could raise the alarms to new levels.

 

[Jimy Hendrix]

It's funny with Son. The other Spurs site I frequent has a weird thing going where whenever he plays wing there's a sizable contingent of people convinced he absolutely can no longer play the wing, and when he's up top there is a similar contingent absolutely convinced he can't play up top, and meanwhile he continues to be near the top of the club's charts for G+A every year. He's certainly closer to the end of his time at Spurs than the beginning (they bought multiple young wingers for a reason), but he's still pretty indispensable to the team as it is now. That said, the same circumstances that are making the entire team look bad (thin squad forcing insufficient rest from the guys who are playing) is gonna hit the 30+ dude worse than most.

 

[fletcherpost]

Rangers have a Cup Final against Celtic at the weekend which might mean some players are rested for that match. They're on 10 points in the EL standings, (same points as Spurs, a point ahead of Man Utd) and might look at the Spurs match as a free hit. There's no love for Ange in Govan so it could be a feisty encounter. Conversely i would have no problem if a few Rangers players hobble off with knocks on Thursday and Ange gets another one over The Kings 11.

I am keen to hear what new chants 50,000 royalists have for Ange.

 

[Zososoxfan]

It's burning down a bit, innit?

 

[coremiller]

1) The lack of depth is killing them. They have only four CBs in the squad and they're all injured right now, such that they've been playing an 18-year-old midfielder at CB. A lot of the players look exhausted, and the pressing intensity has notably dipped. Forster is solid shot-stopper but a mess with the ball at his feet. Etc.

2) There's not enough quality at several positions. They badly need a good midfield passer from deep; maybe Bentancur can be that, but between his injuries and suspensions he hasn't shown it yet. Udogie has regressed badly this season. Kulusevski and Maddison are their two best creative players, but both are natural #10s and it's tricky to play them both at the same time.

3) They're probably a bit better than than they seem right now. They've had a very weird distribution of results this year. All of their seven wins have been by 2+ goals, with 6 of them by 3+ goals. Meanwhile, 8 of their 9 losses are by 1 goal; they probably deserved to get at least some points from most of those games. It's been a very strange season.

 

[Kliq]

I thought yesterday they were very hesitant to give the ball away--understandably so given how frequently they are giving up goals on the counter at the moment. That is not Ange ball. There were several times during the game where I felt like a player got into a promising position with the ball, and had a chance to make an incisive pass, but instead resisted, held on to the ball for too long, and allowed Forest to get into a stronger defensive shape. It happened to Udogie several times. The result was a lot of fruitless corner kicks, which without Romero and Mickey, are not nearly as threatening.

 

[eddiew112]

1) The lack of depth is killing them. They have only four CBs in the squad and they're all injured right now, such that they've been playing an 18-year-old midfielder at CB. A lot of the players look exhausted, and the pressing intensity has notably dipped. Forster is solid shot-stopper but a mess with the ball at his feet. Etc.

2) There's not enough quality at several positions. They badly need a good midfield passer from deep; maybe Bentancur can be that, but between his injuries and suspensions he hasn't shown it yet. Udogie has regressed badly this season. Kolasanic and Maddison are their two best creative players, but both are natural #10s and it's tricky to play them both at the same time.

3) They're probably a bit better than than they seem right now. They've had a very weird distribution of results this year. All of their seven wins have been by 2+ goals, with 6 of them by 3+ goals. Meanwhile, 8 of their 9 losses are by 1 goal; they probably deserved to get at least some points from most of those games. It's been a very strange season.

They are also really lacking in winger/striker quality as well. The current healthy options (unfortunately including Son in his current form) are probably the worst I've seen at Spurs since I started following ~20 years ago.

 

[Jimy Hendrix]

Four CBs (counting Davies) is a problem that should have been known going into the season and simply wasn't resolved. It's a stroke of terrible luck that literally all of them are hurt, but I've been looking at other PL rosters and they all seem to have 5 - 6.

As for winger/striker depth, there are 3 guy meant to be on that depth chart who are all hurt as well. Richarlison being a lock for 2500+ minutes the three seasons before coming to Spurs and so far totaling that many league minutes in 2.5 seasons with Spurs has been an absolute killer.

Injury lists have always been weirdly underemphasized in European football coverage, and the injury list along with the questionable squad building decisions over the summer leaving a threadbare squad getting ground to paste over December is pretty much the entire story for me.

 

[coremiller]

Yeah, Richarlison and Wilson Odobert were supposed to play major roles in the attack and they've both been hurt the whole season.

The squad is thin everywhere. It's bad luck that all the CBs are hurt at the same time, but Spurs don't have any positions where they can afford to fade a couple significant injuries. They did a good job over the summer getting a lot of dead weight off the books, but they didn't replace those bodies.

 

[Zososoxfan]

Bump for winning the first leg against Pool yesterday. Gives us a puncher's chance to reach the final, but Pool will bring it hard in the return leg at Anfield next month. Shout out to the new keeper--he's really going to push Vicario and I love having 2 excellent keepers. No way they can keep both beyond next season. I expect they'll do the 'cup keeper' approach, but the question is who gets the EPL! Hope Ben10 is OK--that looked awful.

Just looking at the schedule, I'm shocked the League put the NLD midweek. That's something the NFL--despite all of its awfulness--would never stand for.

Quite an important month coming up--FA Cup tie on the weekend (Tamworth from the 5th division National League), NLD next Wednesday, and then the remaining 2 UEL group matches (against Hoffenheim and Elfsborg). Spurs do need to push for a top 8 UEL finish to avoid adding to the fixture congestion, but I'm heartened a bit by the fact that Hoffenheim and Elfsborg have negative GD but both are also going to push to make the playoff and likely will treat these games as priorities too. Hoffenheim are in a relegation battle so maybe they'll focus on Bundesliga matches but Elfsborg is 7th in the Swedish league and I imagine advancing in UEL is much more lucrative to them.