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Ratings v Fiorentina 2nd leg

Bus-Conductor

SC Supporter
Oct 19, 2004
39,837
50,713
decisions, decisions, execution and carelessness.

This was a post from last weeks game. It could be a post from many games in the last couple of years. Tonight it's the epitaph etched on our Europa League tomb stone.

I'm surprised Lloris, Vertonghen, Lamela and Eriksen were started. But I guess if we wanted to seriously pursue the CL spot on offer in this tournament, and I understand why we might, then some compromises were always going to be made.

We didn't exactly deserve to lose this game, but we didn't do enough to win it either. Most disappointing is that once again I don't think we applied ourselves with the tenacity and cohesion we did against Arsenal and Liverpool, and like West Ham I thought Fiorentina did. They were busy, energetic and pressed us furiously out of any real creative rhythm.

There were some disappointing individual performances out there, most notably Soldado who not only was guilty of one of the three catastrophic pieces of carelessness, but was also just plain insipid and wasted the slim pickings he offered with flicks to no-one and other such fuckery.

Chadli and Lamela were both piss awful with the ball, but Lamela did a least see twice as much of it as Chadli, created the best chance of the game and was once again our most prolific tackler.

Until his fuck up I thought Vertonghen was one of our better players, but by a country mile our best player on the night was Eriksen, who was back to his industrious best. Saw shit loads of ball, worked hard off it and gave it away less than most.

Everyone else worked hard enough but offered little by way of creative inspiration. We largely dominated the game but found their pressing and organisation very hard to fracture. Any slim chances to make something happen, the pre situation situations, were squandered with poor final decisions or execution of those decisions.

And once again Pochettino's subs were utterly counter productive. Why leave Soldado up front offering insipidity and put Kane into the "10" spot where he always looks laboured and tend to run into more dead ends. And why the fuck put Townsend on the right and move Lamela over to the left ? Tactical moves that made things much worse not better. We now had a ponderous "10" instead of the excellent Eriksen, Townsend in his cut inside and shoot high or wide position and Lamela in his least effective position out left. And if the sub of Vertonghen was a petulant punishment I think it's piss poor. He made a mistake, as did many others.

It's a mark of how far we have come as a club, in some ways, that we are going away to Italian clubs with a make shift team and competing and dominating the game, just a shame that what is costing us so often is schoolboy stuff.

Individual

Lloris - Couple of vital saves.

Chiriches - decent game defensively and got forward but wasted every chance to put a decent ball in.

Dawzio - Second time he's cost us with a piece of dopey carelessness.

Vertonghen - I thought he was having a very good game until the fuck up.

Davies - OK.

Stambouli - Works very hard, saw lots of ball, lacks a bit of ingenuity or vision. Decent game.

Bentaleb - OK+

Lamela - As ever was busy, did see plenty of the ball, did work for the team and make the chance of the game but other than that was careless with the ball quite a few times.

Eriksen - Very good performance, worked tirelessly, tried to make things happen and had a part in the great chance we created. Still would be nice if he could find a killer pass a bit more often.

Chadli - Nearly as poor as Soldado overall. Not involved enough and when he was he made poor choices and wasted the odd situation he was involved in.

Soldado - bad.

Subs - Badly used and had very little impact.
 

Blake Griffin

Well-Known Member
Oct 3, 2011
14,133
38,225
really haven't been sure what to make of stambouli so far but tonight i thought he did well. that was the only positive i took from this performance anyway.
 

ajspurs

Well-Known Member
Jul 7, 2007
22,986
31,166
really haven't been sure what to make of stambouli so far but tonight i thought he did well. that was the only positive i took from this performance anyway.

I think he's getting better, seems more confident on the ball. He's a defensive midfielder, I'm not sure why so many people expect much from him in a creative sense. The thing is he plays next to Bentaleb or Mason who are also not the best in a creative sense.
 

stemark44

Well-Known Member
Mar 17, 2005
6,598
1,829
I really couldn't understand his substitutions,Lamela and Soldado should have been hooked as soon as they scored the first goal.
Just don't ever play Harry Kane as a number 10 again.
 

wosH

Well-Known Member
Jan 31, 2013
348
820
I think both Bentaleb and Verthongen subs were with Sunday in mind.
Bentaleb for me was the best of our players when he was still on the pitch.
 

stemark44

Well-Known Member
Mar 17, 2005
6,598
1,829
I think both Bentaleb and Verthongen subs were with Sunday in mind.
Bentaleb for me was the best of our players when he was still on the pitch.

I agree, I thought Bentaleb was easily our best player when he was on.
 

Black

Well-Known Member
May 21, 2007
4,807
4,872
How far be Bentaleb has come, last season people wanted to send him on loan.
 

dricha1

Well-Known Member
Jul 26, 2005
1,311
2,579
Having just seen the Soldado miss, was surprised to see it was actually a two on one, and not the one on one widely reported. Would say some blame has to be apportioned to Chadli, he didnt make a good run for Soldado, he was actually running towards him, made the area the keeper to protect smaller.

Having said that, Soldado should just have put his laces through it.
 

prawnsandwich

Well-Known Member
Jul 19, 2014
6,035
4,064
How far be Bentaleb has come, last season people wanted to send him on loan.
Last season nobody even heard of him.
Until that mug Sherwood played him. What a mug that Sherwood was. Played 4-4-2 with Adebayor and Kane up front. We scored loads of goals but tactically it was ridiculous.
 

thinktank

Hmmm...
Sep 28, 2004
45,893
68,893
Having just seen the Soldado miss, was surprised to see it was actually a two on one, and not the one on one widely reported. Would say some blame has to be apportioned to Chadli, he didnt make a good run for Soldado, he was actually running towards him, made the area the keeper to protect smaller.

Having said that, Soldado should just have put his laces through it.
No, he should have just passed it properly.

Chadli could have checked half a yard, fine, but there is no excuse not to pass that out of the keeper's reach.

Fuck my life.
 

St José Dominguez

Well-Known Member
Jul 15, 2014
3,592
11,648
Most disappointing thing from the game was the subs at 1-0 and change of formation. Basically ended any chance we had and not surprised we conceded decisive goal quickly after.
No idea why Soldado stayed on, he's less a goal threat than Vorm, his celebrated link play was woeful until then and he wasn't working that hard. We took off possibly best player in Bentaleb leaving Stambouli on his own (Stambouli was doing ok until then, dreadful after losing his central partner.)
We shifted Lamela to a position where he's utterly atrocious in and had Kane in a position where I don't want him and I actually don't rate him in.
All we needed was to get a goal to keep tie going, I've no idea why we couldn't simply have put Kane on for Soldado and Townsend on for Chadli (on left). Too many managers follow this mythology that two strikers on pitch = more threat when majority of time it does the opposite.
 

matthew.absurdum

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
3,732
10,120
I think it might work to play 442 or 4411 with kane as a no10/false 9 in the future with new center forward, but not this season anymore, the kane + soldado partner won't work (or simply soldado's problem)
 

Bobbins

SC's 14th Sexiest Male 2008
May 5, 2005
21,548
45,031
This was a post from last weeks game. It could be a post from many games in the last couple of years. Tonight it's the epitaph etched on our Europa League tomb stone.

I'm surprised Lloris, Vertonghen, Lamela and Eriksen were started. But I guess if we wanted to seriously pursue the CL spot on offer in this tournament, and I understand why we might, then some compromises were always going to be made.

We didn't exactly deserve to lose this game, but we didn't do enough to win it either. Most disappointing is that once again I don't think we applied ourselves with the tenacity and cohesion we did against Arsenal and Liverpool, and like West Ham I thought Fiorentina did. They were busy, energetic and pressed us furiously out of any real creative rhythm.

There were some disappointing individual performances out there, most notably Soldado who not only was guilty of one of the three catastrophic pieces of carelessness, but was also just plain insipid and wasted the slim pickings he offered with flicks to no-one and other such fuckery.

Chadli and Lamela were both piss awful with the ball, but Lamela did a least see twice as much of it as Chadli, created the best chance of the game and was once again our most prolific tackler.

Until his fuck up I thought Vertonghen was one of our better players, but by a country mile our best player on the night was Eriksen, who was back to his industrious best. Saw shit loads of ball, worked hard off it and gave it away less than most.

Everyone else worked hard enough but offered little by way of creative inspiration. We largely dominated the game but found their pressing and organisation very hard to fracture. Any slim chances to make something happen, the pre situation situations, were squandered with poor final decisions or execution of those decisions.

And once again Pochettino's subs were utterly counter productive. Why leave Soldado up front offering insipidity and put Kane into the "10" spot where he always looks laboured and tend to run into more dead ends. And why the fuck put Townsend on the right and move Lamela over to the left ? Tactical moves that made things much worse not better. We now had a ponderous "10" instead of the excellent Eriksen, Townsend in his cut inside and shoot high or wide position and Lamela in his least effective position out left. And if the sub of Vertonghen was a petulant punishment I think it's piss poor. He made a mistake, as did many others.

It's a mark of how far we have come as a club, in some ways, that we are going away to Italian clubs with a make shift team and competing and dominating the game, just a shame that what is costing us so often is schoolboy stuff.

Individual

Lloris - Couple of vital saves.

Chiriches - decent game defensively and got forward but wasted every chance to put a decent ball in.

Dawzio - Second time he's cost us with a piece of dopey carelessness.

Vertonghen - I thought he was having a very good game until the fuck up.

Davies - OK.

Stambouli - Works very hard, saw lots of ball, lacks a bit of ingenuity or vision. Decent game.

Bentaleb - OK+

Lamela - As ever was busy, did see plenty of the ball, did work for the team and make the chance of the game but other than that was careless with the ball quite a few times.

Eriksen - Very good performance, worked tirelessly, tried to make things happen and had a part in the great chance we created. Still would be nice if he could find a killer pass a bit more often.

Chadli - Nearly as poor as Soldado overall. Not involved enough and when he was he made poor choices and wasted the odd situation he was involved in.

Soldado - bad.

Subs - Badly used and had very little impact.

Three things made me laugh in this post:

"we didn't deserve to lose"

"we dominated the game"

"Dawsio"

:LOL:
 

fortworthspur

Well-Known Member
Nov 12, 2007
11,244
17,536
Good - Ericksen, Bentaleb, Lloris
Okay - Stambouli, Verts (good except for a horrendous gaffe), Davies, Chiriches
Meh - Lamela
Poor - Chadli, Soldado (just fucking score)
SOS - Fazio. 13 appearances, 2 reds, 2 PKs conceded and tonights goal gifted. (its an aggregate rating)


Soldado and Fazio do the basic requirements of their jobs and we are probably through.
 

Strikeb4ck

Well-Known Member
Aug 8, 2010
4,483
9,409
Good - Bentaleb
Solid - Lloris, Stambouli
Ok - Eriksen, Davies, Chiriches
Welp - Lamela, Chadli
Bad - Verts, Fazio
Disastrous - Soldado

No sub did well and I hope Kane never plays behind Soldado again.
 

EastLondonYid

Well-Known Member
Jan 26, 2010
7,837
16,145
This was a post from last weeks game. It could be a post from many games in the last couple of years. Tonight it's the epitaph etched on our Europa League tomb stone.

I'm surprised Lloris, Vertonghen, Lamela and Eriksen were started. But I guess if we wanted to seriously pursue the CL spot on offer in this tournament, and I understand why we might, then some compromises were always going to be made.

We didn't exactly deserve to lose this game, but we didn't do enough to win it either. Most disappointing is that once again I don't think we applied ourselves with the tenacity and cohesion we did against Arsenal and Liverpool, and like West Ham I thought Fiorentina did. They were busy, energetic and pressed us furiously out of any real creative rhythm.

There were some disappointing individual performances out there, most notably Soldado who not only was guilty of one of the three catastrophic pieces of carelessness, but was also just plain insipid and wasted the slim pickings he offered with flicks to no-one and other such fuckery.

Chadli and Lamela were both piss awful with the ball, but Lamela did a least see twice as much of it as Chadli, created the best chance of the game and was once again our most prolific tackler.

Until his fuck up I thought Vertonghen was one of our better players, but by a country mile our best player on the night was Eriksen, who was back to his industrious best. Saw shit loads of ball, worked hard off it and gave it away less than most.

Everyone else worked hard enough but offered little by way of creative inspiration. We largely dominated the game but found their pressing and organisation very hard to fracture. Any slim chances to make something happen, the pre situation situations, were squandered with poor final decisions or execution of those decisions.

And once again Pochettino's subs were utterly counter productive. Why leave Soldado up front offering insipidity and put Kane into the "10" spot where he always looks laboured and tend to run into more dead ends. And why the fuck put Townsend on the right and move Lamela over to the left ? Tactical moves that made things much worse not better. We now had a ponderous "10" instead of the excellent Eriksen, Townsend in his cut inside and shoot high or wide position and Lamela in his least effective position out left. And if the sub of Vertonghen was a petulant punishment I think it's piss poor. He made a mistake, as did many others.

It's a mark of how far we have come as a club, in some ways, that we are going away to Italian clubs with a make shift team and competing and dominating the game, just a shame that what is costing us so often is schoolboy stuff.

Individual

Lloris - Couple of vital saves.

Chiriches - decent game defensively and got forward but wasted every chance to put a decent ball in.

Dawzio - Second time he's cost us with a piece of dopey carelessness.

Vertonghen - I thought he was having a very good game until the fuck up.

Davies - OK.

Stambouli - Works very hard, saw lots of ball, lacks a bit of ingenuity or vision. Decent game.

Bentaleb - OK+

Lamela - As ever was busy, did see plenty of the ball, did work for the team and make the chance of the game but other than that was careless with the ball quite a few times.

Eriksen - Very good performance, worked tirelessly, tried to make things happen and had a part in the great chance we created. Still would be nice if he could find a killer pass a bit more often.

Chadli - Nearly as poor as Soldado overall. Not involved enough and when he was he made poor choices and wasted the odd situation he was involved in.

Soldado - bad.

Subs - Badly used and had very little impact.




I didn't see the Verts sub that way, i read it at as the game was lost and Poch was saving him for sunday.Verts looked pissed off but probably he was thinking of his cock up...there is no way we could beat Chelsea with Fazio and Dier as a pairing.

The Italians pressed us 2nd half i agree, but the 1st i disagree, we had the freedom of the park and were playing round them, the fact that we had no cutting edge was our own problem.

I went into this game expecting us to go out telling myself not to get too bothered about it, but after what went on the 1st half Tottenham managed to get my hopes up and succeed in making me really bothered.

Fiorentina visble stepped it up 2nd half after getting away with a hiding the 1st. and we didn't respond.
 
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