Premiership and Champions League esp Spurs
It’s frustrating to say the least but that’s the way Premier League football works. After the magnificent result against Manchester City last time out, much was expected from this game. Would Spurs be too strong for WBA? On paper perhaps, but football games aren’t played on paper.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! NEVER SAY DIE – DELE SALVAGES A POINT AT WBA
Tottenham Hotspur have been under the radar of most football pundits as a contender for this season’s Premier League title. But today, against leaders Manchester City, Spurs proved that their challenge for the title will not be ignored.
Simply put, the Spurs squad passed the difficult test put before them in this tricky Champions League fixture in Moscow against CSKA. Without 5 first-teamers, Spurs did enough to take away 3 points from the Russian champions.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! RUSSIAN DELIGHT IN THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE!!
Unbeaten and up to second. All told, a very successful away day for Spurs. Manager Mauricio Pochettino tested his squad by resting key players Danny Rose, Eric Dier and Moussa Dembele ahead of the tricky midweek Champions League tie in Moscow against CSKA.
Six games have been played so far in the Premier League 2016-17 season. Six points separate the top six clubs, which centre around three footballing regions viz. Manchester (City and United), North London (Tottenham and Arsenal) and Merseyside (Liverpool and Everton). Continue reading DRIBBLING: IS THE PREMIER LEAGUE NOW A SIX CLUB MINI-LEAGUE?
Last time out in the Premier League, Spurs ground out a narrow 1-0 victory (over Sunderland) with alarm bells ringing out loud over injuries to Harry Kane, Eric Dier and Moussa Dembele. Whilst Kane is definitely out with an ankle injury, manager Mauricio Pochettino will take a late decision on the fitness of Dier, Dembele and Danny Rose (suffering from a hamstring injury picked up on international duty).
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! SPURS VS MIDDLESBROUGH – TESTING THE SQUAD
Clearly, progress in the EFL Cup this season is not top priority for manager Mauricio Pochettino after he selected a completely different eleven from the one that beat Sunderland over the weekend in the Premier League.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! YOUNG TEAM PUTS FIVE PAST GILLINGHAM
It took a mistake by Sunderland defender Papy Djilobodji to let Harry Kane (and Spurs) in, to score the decisive winner in this one-sided encounter.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! KANE SOLVES SUNDERLAND PUZZLE BUT AT WHAT PRICE?
After the elation of the last Premier League match – that 4-0 drubbing of Stoke – Spurs were cruelly brought back to earth with that 1-2 defeat to Monaco in the Champions League.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! SPURS VS SUNDERLAND – REACTION TIME!
A frustrating night for Spurs as everything that could go wrong did. Much capital was made about the sell-out 85,000 crowd and of course, Spurs’ return to Champions League football but it was Monaco’s night as the French Ligue Un table toppers gave a superb away performance to earn themselves a precious 2-1 win.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! TOTTENHAM CHAMPIONS LEAGUE RETURN SPOILED BY MONACO
Tonight is a special night for Spurs fans as Tottenham Hotspur returns to Champions League football, playing current French league leaders Monaco at Wembley.
Continue reading COME ON YOU SPURS! TOTTENHAM VS MONACO – BACK IN THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE!!
Well, I haven’t written about Spurs or football for some time. And I’m not going to start. Will let the headlines and images tell their own stories.
“Kane’s double inspires derby win” (BBC)
Continue reading … DRIBBLING … SPURS RULE THE NORTH LONDON DERBY
Italo Zanzi: Roma want to be world’s best football club
According to a BBC Football report, chief executive Italo Zanzi claims that Serie A side Roma (acquired by an American group, led by James Pallotta) have ambitions to be the “world’s best football club”. In the report, it states that “Roma appointed Lille boss Rudi Garcia as head coach in the summer and have won every competitive game since then”. In that context, it is perhaps worrying that Roma had no issue with selling Erik Lamela to Spurs, albeit for a big fee. Perhaps the Italian club did not rate Lamela as much as we did and were happy to get good money for him. After all, the loss of Lamela has not hurt Roma at all and thus far, the Argentinean winger has not exactly set White Hart Lane alight. Mm.
SPURS 1 CHELSEA 1
I have to say that I was pretty much pissed off after this game. As usual, the ‘Special One’ had the last say – asking for Jan Vertonghen to get a retrospective three match ban – which was a pretty brilliant smokescreen. After all, nobody seems to be talking about how the Chavs should not have been given their equalizer to begin with.
As Mata floated the ball into the Spurs box, Ivanovic held and pushed Mousa Dembele into the box allowing Terry to ghost in onside and score easily. A clear foul – but somehow the issue is about Vertonghen? Ridiculous. And as the picture above shows, Torres should have been red carded much earlier for laying hands on Vertonghen. Typical Chavs misconduct.
CARDIFF CITY 0 SPURS 1
Again, my prediction of a 1-0 win was proven correct. But for 90 minutes, it really looked like we were not going to get the three points we richly deserved. At the very end, the combination of substitutes Lewis Holtby and Erik Lamela provided the pass which Paulinho finished off with aplomb (a back heel no less). Cue pandemonium as the Spurs players celebrated wildly. And well they should as the victory had looked increasingly unlikely as the match wore on.
The inane rants of a Spurs fan (since 1973)
CARDIFF CITY (AWAY)
Spurs sit in third place going into this match, knowing that a victory will at least put them joint top (or even in the clear, if Arsenal is unable to beat Stoke earlier in the day). In midweek, Spurs strolled to a comfortable 3-0 win over Europa League minnows Tromso with goals from Jermain Defoe (2) and Christian Eriksen (an absolute stunner). And head coach AVB will be hoping that his new-look team will continue the good work of the last two games and maintain the good start to the season.
Inane rants of a Spurs fan (since 1973)
Spurs 2 Norwich 0
I predicted that the game would be close and that Spurs would win by at least two goals. Well, the first part of that prophecy was off the mark for sure! In fact, Spurs dominated the game so much that 4-0 or 5-0 would have been a greater reflection of its superiority. Christian Eriksen was given his debut and immediately, he demonstrated why he is one of the most exciting young prospects in European football. Eriksen provided the link play between midfield and Roberto Soldado (which had been missing from the first three games) and was behind most of Spurs’ penetrative forward moves.
Inane rants of a Spurs fan (since 1973)
NORWICH (HOME)
What have we learned after three games?
1. New players take time to bed in.
2. We still have problems breaking down teams who ‘park the bus’.
3. Dembele is not the solution to our playmaker problem.
On the plus side, AVB’s pressing game seems to help us to dominate games by and large but now we need to add goals and we are going to have a highly successful season. Norwich at White Hart Lane seems to be reasonable opposition from which to bounce back from the NLD defeat but under-estimating the Canaries might prove fatal.
With the window closed till January, we now have the opportunity to see whether either Eriksen (above) and/or Lamela will help to fill in the gap left by Bale. In all other departments, we appear fairly solid – but we dearly need someone to make that incisive pass and to bring the others in offensive play. At the back, it just may be time to ditch Dawson and bring in Kaboul for starters. New boy Chiriches is unavailable so depending on Kaboul’s fitness, AVB might need to risk Dawson once more.
In midfield – with Capoue injured and Dembele off-form – it seems clear that the Brazilian pair of Sandro and Paulinho (above) will start in the middle of the park with the possibility of Townsend and Chadil taking the flanks due to the lack of fitness of Lamela and Lennon. With Soldado a fixture upfront now, it must be the moment for Eriksen to show what he can do in a creative role.
I fully expect Norwich to be very disciplined and defensive and so, it might mean yet another 90 minutes of almost total possession. How quick can Eriksen adapt to the Premiership and fit in to the AVB’s tactics and formation remains to be seen. Overall, I expect it to be close game with Spurs coming up on top by at least two goals.
COYS!!!!!
Well, at the end of the day, this was the most predictable outcome as Spurs chairman Daniel Levy elected to appoint ex-Porto / ex-Chelsea manager Andre-Villas Boas as the new Spurs head coach. AVB has signed a 3-year contract with generous bonuses if he brings Spurs into the Champions League and wins the title (yeah right).
So with Harry Redknapp consigned to the history books, Spurs fans are eagerly anticipating the replacement manager who will move the club forward. Or at least that is the sincere hope. Well, the press has not been idle to present to us all the candidates being considered by Spurs. Allegedly.
The above image is ‘borrowed’ from a Mirror column (from Feb 2012) that advocated that the English FA sack Fabio Capello and appoint Harry Redknapp as England manager immediately! Of course, Capello subsequently resigned and Redknapp was installed by the media as the favourite to replace him. Redknapp himself encouraged this speculation, talking up the England job non-stop. This had a devastating effect on Spurs’ season, then sitting comfortably in third position, a good ten points clear of Arsenal.
The last Liverpool manager to win the English First Division title was Kenny Dalglish back in 1990. Since then, the club has seen a succession of managers (including Dalglish a second time around) fail to emulate this achievement. Now, after a middling season that saw the once-great club win the Carling Cup, place as runners-up in the FA Cup but finish below arch-rivals Everton in the Premier League, the club has sacked Dalglish and installed 39 year old Brendan Rodgers.
Haha yes, …dribbling… is back! No, I am NOT going to talk about the recently concluded Premiership season or the Champions League Final but I just want to say a short word or two about remembering a memorable moment in the history of the UEFA European Championship.
I make no secret of the fact that (along with West Ham), Newcastle is a club that I despise. Much has to do with the manner in which they have (like West Ham) conducted themselves in transfer dealings in the last couple of seasons. The other factor is probably down to the fact that Newcastle has been a bogey team for Spurs, especially at St James’ Park, with our last victory there coming seven years ago, courtesy of a Timothy Atouba (remember him?) goal.
This time round, even though Spurs did not play as well as they are able to (due to Harry’s selection? Gareth Bale on the right and Luka Modric on the left to accommodate Rafael Van der Vaart?), it looked odds on that Spurs might finally win at St James’ Park but it was not to be. In the end, the single point looked well earned as Newcastle piled on the pressure. However, there were plenty of good points to take away from the game.
One, Jermain Defoe’s third goal of the season, demonstrated that the little man is back to his best and has put last season’s dismal poor form firmly behind him. Two, Spurs are the first team to put two goals past Newcastle this season, which indicates at least that our attacking prowess is back on track (Manu Adebayor and Van der Vaart always looked dangerous). And finally, the point gained maintained our momentum of the last five games, as we sit comfortably outside the top four but poised to make our attack.
Sadly, a big negative was the injury to Ledley King. Certainly a question mark must hover over King’s continued presence in the Spurs squad as his fitness problems haunt the skipper yet again. With Michael Dawson on the long term injury list – our central defence looks rather shaky and with William Gallas still injured, much will now depend on whether Sebastian Bassong and Younes Kaboul can rise up to the task. Definitely a worrying prospect.
COYS!!!
After the hand-wringing and soul-searching brought about by two heavy defeats to both Manchester clubs, it is fair to say that Spurs’ season has well and truly begun with this emphatic victory over top four rivals, Liverpool. Red fans will probably point to the numerous yellow cards which left them with only 9 men with still almost half an hour to play but that would do a disservice to Spurs’ total dominance in this game.
Everything went right for Spurs as they came racing out of the blocks and the only surprise was that Spurs were only a goal ahead at half-time, thanks to Luka Modric’s screamer in the 7th minute. The way the little Croatian celebrated the goal gave some indication perhaps that he has put aside his animosity towards the club for blocking his Chelsea move, at least until January, of course. It is a very good sign for Spurs as Modric – with superb support from the tenacious Scott Parker – operated as the fulcrum for Spurs’ excellent passing moves.
Liverpool never quite got into the game and this frustration was evident in the amount of reckless challenges that were deemed necessary in a vain attempt to deal with Spurs’ fluency. Charlie Adams earned two yellows in a short space of time for his challenges on Modric and Parker, the second of which probably deserved a straight red. Spurs fans will feel that this is just desserts for his illegally putting Gareth Bale out of the Blackpool game at White Hart Lane last season.
Liverpool’s 10 men still managed to deal with Spurs for the beginning of the 2nd half but once Martin Skrtel recklessly floored Bale and obtained his marching orders, the game was a bridge too far for the Red’s nine men as goals from Jermain Defoe and Emmanuel Adebayor (2) made the scoreline a bit closer to what Spurs’ magnificent performance deserved.
Without a doubt, the acquisitions of Adebayor and Parker have strengthened the Spurs side in key areas. Adebayor has made a dream start with three goals in his first two games, and his presence in the team has also rejuvenated Defoe, who now looks more like the predatory striker he is capable of being. A mention must be made also of the calming influence of Brad Freidel in goal and skipper Ledley King in the heart of defence – as two clean sheets in a row (after the eight conceded in the first two games) are just as important statistics as the six goals scored (NB. Five from the new striking partnership!)
After the early doom and gloom, things are looking up again especially with key players (Sandro, Huddlestone, Lennon, Dawson) to return from injury. If Harry Redknapp can keep the likes of Adebayor, Parker and Modric contributing, then surely Spurs fans can look forward to a promising season.
COYS!!!