Tottenham Hotspur - Official thread

[EJG1980]

Brilliant afternoon of results or us. Caught up West Brom and Chelsea to go level with them, increased the gap back to Everton and Arsenal. Defoe is on fire at the moment Nice to see Sigurdsson and Dempsey setting up the goals too.

Only downside were the injuries to Dawson and Bale. Hopefully neither is serious.

[NW2013]

Yep, good to be on a roll. Hopefully we can do Panathinaikos on Thursday too.

[fallenangle]

No goals let in, three scored - improves our GD very usefully and we're up into 4th spot now. As HE said add in the other results and today has been pretty darned good for Spurs. Let us hope we can maintain this run of form.

[EJG1980]

Good win tonight, little bit nervy when it was 1-1 but got the win in the end without really needing to get out of second gear. Really glad to be into the knock-out rounds, hopefully we can go all the way! I love that AVB is taking the Europa League seriously, there are some very big names in the last 32 so there could be some great European nights to come if we can keep on going.

[fallenangle]

Lucky goal to put us in front but Spurs were fairly comfortable for most of that second half. Then AVB decides in the last 15 minutes that he'll change the shape of the team and try to sit on it. Fail.

[EJG1980]

Gutting result I'm expecting a slew of expletive laden texts from my brother in a moment, who had the misfortune to make the trip up to Liverpool today. Late goals have really cost us this season; I saw that if matches had ended at 80 minutes we'd be top of the league.

Lucky goal to put us in front but Spurs were fairly comfortable for most of that second half. Then AVB decides in the last 15 minutes that he'll change the shape of the team and try to sit on it. Fail.

You'd think that being 1-0 down, Everton are going to attack anyway, so why not keep the shape the same and make them worry about us hitting them on the counter? That might curb their attacking intent a little bit, rather than going defensive which only encourages them to attack even more.

It's definitely our Achilles' heel and needs sorting out.

[On The Edge of Insanity]

In fairness we were under more pressure before he took Lennon off. Huddlestone's introduction allowed us to keep hold of the ball better and generally alleviated the pressure on our defence. Dembele was clearly spent so no problem with that sub, and Defoe wasn't exactly offering a lot either.

Everton were always going to lump balls into the area in the closing minutes and unfortunately a defensive mistake - poor clearance from Caulker when Lloris may have been able to claim - allowed them to equalise and then we were at sixes and sevens for the winning goal.

[fallenangle]

As the guys on radio I was listening to said, the changes made Spurs go into a more defensive posture. They sat too deep and certainly for Everton's first goal that was a significant factor.

[EJG1980]

In fairness we were under more pressure before he took Lennon off. Huddlestone's introduction allowed us to keep hold of the ball better and generally alleviated the pressure on our defence. Dembele was clearly spent so no problem with that sub, and Defoe wasn't exactly offering a lot either.

I was only following the match via the official Spurs Twitter feed, but having chatted with my brother he echoes what you said. He actually thought that the last twenty minutes or so was our most comfortable period of the match (until their equaliser obviously).

Whatever the reasons AVB acknowledged in an interview I read that we're letting in far too many late goals and need to improve our ability to see a game out. We're having a good season even now, so if we can manage to improve in that area it could turn a good season into a great season.

I see on Twitter that a fair few people were meant to be laying into Stephen Caulker for his poor clearance that lead to the goal. It's a real shame that people feel the need to slag off an obviously talented young kid who's still learning the game, especially when he's generally been excellent. Do they think a player that young is going to make no mistakes at all???

As someone said, it's lucky Twitter wasn't around 10 years ago, the same people would probably have hounded out a young Ledley King for every mistake he made too. I think I'm going to go back to only following factual news feeds on Twitter, makes my blood boil too much otherwise!

[On The Edge of Insanity]

Yeah, I wouldn't pay much mind to those ranting on Twitter. You get the whole spectrum on there, but it can be very hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Caulker was at fault, but, as you say, there is no point vilifying him for it - he is young, still learning the game, and has shown a great deal of promise to date. Once Kaboul is fit again I think Caulker will see less playing time, but if we persevere with him he has the potential to develop into an excellent defender.

[EJG1980]

Yeah, I wouldn't pay much mind to those ranting on Twitter. You get the whole spectrum on there, but it can be very hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Caulker was at fault, but, as you say, there is no point vilifying him for it - he is young, still learning the game, and has shown a great deal of promise to date. Once Kaboul is fit again I think Caulker will see less playing time, but if we persevere with him he has the potential to develop into an excellent defender.

I generally don't pay attention, and I never put any credence in what I read on Twitter when I see that kind of ranting. It's just that sometimes when I people mentioning "People on Twitter giving player X a hard time" I can get annoyed that such people exist

[EJG1980]

Good performance and win today. Passing and movement was good, invention and creativity good, looked comfortable at the back (thought Gallas had a good game today). The only negative was not taking our chances, but on another day we'd score a few playing like that. Great to see Scott Parker back on the pitch at the end too! Let's keep it going against Stoke.

[fallenangle]

Yes, very useful and pretty good performance win. Almost as importantly no goals conceded. Yay!Should have put more of those goal chances (23 according to MotD) away though. Scott Parker coming back was indeed good news. Once up to speed I hope we'll see less of Tom Huddlestone. He's not been quite up to the job this season.

[EJG1980]

The Europa League last 32 & 16 draw is today at 13:00. Our potential opponents for the last 32 are:

Viktoria Plzen, Fenerbahce, Bordeaux, Steaua Bucureti, Dnipro, Genk, Rubin Kazan, Lyon, Metalist, Hannover 96, Cluj, Olympiacos or Benfica.

Dnipro would be an interesting opponent as they're managed by a certain Juande Ramos.

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We face Lyon! Should have realised it might be them after the Lloris transfer. One of the toughest teams we could have drawn but I much prefer a glamour tie, playing a big name in a knock-out match under the lights at WHL is what being in Europe is all about.

If we get through that we play Cluj or some little club called Inter

[On The Edge of Insanity]

Agreed, an excellent draw as far as spectacle is concerned. Much rather watch us go toe-to-toe with a similarly skilled opponent than struggle to break down an obdurate, limited side.