The Wembley Move & next season expectations

[arunspurs]

WHL Keys are handed over to Mace.

Our rivals, media pundits and Journos are already lowering expectations on Spurs for next season. This seems a repeat of last season where we literally written off before start of season for a top4 finish. Reality is we had our best league season in 50+ years.

Daniel Levy has managed to get permission to have 90k full capacity for 27 home games & remaining home games at reduced 50k capacity. Season ticket renewal is already going on, with club giving the chance to move fans as a block. So, atleast from fan experience perspective, there is every chance that athmosphere would be fairly decent.

Now lets talk about myth of pitch sizes...

Wembley - 105*69
WHL (Kane,Winks,Rose,Walker)- 100*67
Ajax (Eriksen, Jan,Toby)- 105*68
AZ Alkamar (Dembele,Janssen)-105*68
Liberty Stadium (Davies,Vorm) -105*68
Burnley (Trippier) -105*68
Southampton (Wanyama)-105*68
SP Lisbon (Dier) -105*68
Stadium MK (Dele) - 105*68
Bayer Arena (Son) - 105*68
Lyon (lloris)- 105*68
St James Park (Sissoko) - 104*68

Looks like Majority of our squad has already played in similar pitch size to Wembley in their pro career.
Poch said yesterday, next season we don't have to switch between 2 home stadiums. We consistently play in 1 home stadium. This means there is continuity in how team is setup.

I really don't think pitch size is going to be problem. If anything, I believe its the rivals who raise their game in front of 90k packed stadium would be the problem. Atleast we won't face a Monaco or Chelsea every week. We know how Poch works. I am fully expecting Poch to prepare us well for Wembley next season.

If Chelsea win the FA cup, then we will play them in Community Shield. May be some small trophy to help us settle in.

My exectation : Hope to win a League or FA Cup. Go as farther into CL as possible. And hopefully finish again in top4. We need to settle well before even starting on title talks.

 

[riggi]

Where did arsenal finish when the played at wembley?

 

[arunspurs]

Where did arsenal finish when the played at wembley?

I don't think Arsenal played at Wembley for PL games.

They only played CL, if I am not wrong. Arsenal's record at Wembley (P6 W2 D1 L3)

 

[walton]

Unfortunately, it has turned in to a 'thing'. Mainly by virtue of opposition fans and the media drawing attention to it, but that doesn't really matter. What matters is that at the moment it's a monkey on our back. It'll therefore be absolutely critical that we put it to bed in our first home game. Win that, and we can pretty much start afresh with Wembley as our temporary 'home; if we lose, or even draw (unless it's against a top 4 side), and the attention it'll receive will be a real test...

 

[nailsy]

I think it took us a few games to get used to Wembley, but you could see in the semifinal that we weren't overawed by it anymore. I expect a lot of the visiting teams will suffer from nerves, especially with 90% of the fans cheering us on.

 

[SargeantMeatCurtains]

WHL Keys are handed over to Mace.

Our rivals, media pundits and Journos are already lowering expectations on Spurs for next season. This seems a repeat of last season where we literally written off before start of season for a top4 finish. Reality is we had our best league season in 50+ years.

Daniel Levy has managed to get permission to have 90k full capacity for 27 home games & remaining home games at reduced 50k capacity. Season ticket renewal is already going on, with club giving the chance to move fans as a block. So, atleast from fan experience perspective, there is every chance that athmosphere would be fairly decent.

Now lets talk about myth of pitch sizes...

Wembley - 105*69
WHL (Kane,Winks,Rose,Walker)- 100*67
Ajax (Eriksen, Jan,Toby)- 105*68
AZ Alkamar (Dembele,Janssen)-105*68
Liberty Stadium (Davies,Vorm) -105*68
Burnley (Trippier) -105*68
Southampton (Wanyama)-105*68
SP Lisbon (Dier) -105*68
Stadium MK (Dele) - 105*68
Bayer Arena (Son) - 105*68
Lyon (lloris)- 105*68
St James Park (Sissoko) - 104*68

Looks like Majority of our squad has already played in similar pitch size to Wembley in their pro career.
Poch said yesterday, next season we don't have to switch between 2 home stadiums. We consistently play in 1 home stadium. This means there is continuity in how team is setup.

I really don't think pitch size is going to be problem. If anything, I believe its the rivals who raise their game in front of 90k packed stadium. Atleast we won't face a Monaco or Chelsea every week. We know how Poch works. I am fully expecting Poch to prepare us well for Wembley next season.

If Chelsea win the FA cup, then we will play them in Community Shield. May be some small trophy to help us settle in.

My exectation : Hope to win a League or FA Cup. Go as farther into CL as possible. And hopefully finish again in top4. We need to settle well before even starting on title talks.

I don't think the fact that they've all played on similarly sized pitches to wembley at other clubs matter really.

I doubt many of those teams play in a similar way to how we do. Personally, I think it's just a mental thing and not necessarily the size of the pitch that hinders us, but we'll see.

 

[arunspurs]

I don't think the fact that they've all played on similarly sized pitches to wembley at other clubs matter really.

I doubt many of those teams play in a similar way to how we do. Personally, I think it's just a mental thing and not necessarily the size of the pitch that hinders us, but we'll see.

Agreed its just mental.

Hopefully, we get lucky with the draw for PL home games and get some favourable sides in the first 2 months to help us settle.

 

[CockOnBall]

Interesting that most of those pitches referenced are 105*68. I am guessing this is some kind of standard for pitches?

If so, we may not be permitted to make Wembley as small as WHL (which was perhaps exempt due to the limitations of the ground)?

One thing that strikes me when we play Wembley is how exposed our pressing game is. It's not just at Wembley but our record away at big clubs is also quite poor. Like we saw vs UTD yesterday, our style is to suffocate our opponent's play high up the pitch and we have a very high line as a result. Naturally if a pitch is longer, there is more space in behind. Rashford for e.g. would have had more time to control the ball and shoot then he was afforded yesterday. We may need to adapt our style a little.

We need to adapt to a bigger pitch as NWHL will be bigger than current WHL but we have a full preseason to sort this out.

 

[easley91]

Potential Charity shield game would be a perfect warm up. Every week will be better than once a month.

 

[danielneeds]

The pitch size thing is not a myth. WHL just suited Poch's game perfectly, and even though the square yardage difference is not massive, it just meant that opponents felt like we were always on top of them (weird to speak about WHL in the past tense! *sob*) and that our defenders felt like there was that little bit less space behind them when they squeezed high.

It's done now though, and we've just got to get used to it. Agree with other posters that we've just got to adjust our mentality and find new ways of pressuring the opponent. Poch has also got to develop more subtle variations to his philosophy of playing too. Like how we react when we're not on the front foot, because I think there will be times at Wembley when we won't necessarily be.

 

[teok]

It's also the atmosphere. Teams aren't intimidated playing at wembley.

 

[arunspurs]

It's also the atmosphere. Teams aren't intimidated playing at wembley.

This is why club willingness to move ST holders in blocks makes perfect sense. It minimises the chance of families mixing with more vociferous section and avoids chants dying down.

 

[hughy]

Potential Charity sheild game would be a perfect warm up. Every week will be better than once a month.

I desperately want Chelsea to win the FA Cup for this reason alone. Would be nice to have another day out and Wembley in a 'neutral' capacity.

 

[dontcallme]

We have won 17, drawn 2 and lost none at home this season. I just can't see us matching that at Wembley.

So we need to improve our away record by quite a lot to match this season's league performance.

At this stage I would predict us for top 4 next season.

 

[The Scarecrow]

I don't think it's the pitch size itself that is the problem, but rather the fact that it's different from WHL. So as long as WHL was our main home ground, that was what the players were used to. Going to Wembley was more or less like any other away game (apart from the fans, but there was no atmoshpere anyway). I think we'll get used to paying at a bigger pitch soon enough, and in the long term I think we'll benefit from a season at Wembley.

 

[tiger666]

Every premier league club apart from Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Everton and Liverpool has a pitch size of 105 x 68. We've played on that size plenty of times.

 

[absolute bobbins]

The pitch will have to comply to Premier League regs 105m x 68m so the dimensions thing is irrelevant. The pitch will also be set up to be played on every week rather than a couple of times every few months which means we shouldn't have any issues with what has often been a pretty crappy surface.

 

[pook]

Every premier league club apart from Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Everton and Liverpool has a pitch size of 105 x 68. We've played on that size plenty of times.

which, if one considers our home and away records, tends to support the concerns, if we're honest.

 

[tiger666]

which, if one considers our home and away records, tends to support the concerns, if we're honest.

Is there evidence our away form is down to the pitch size?

 

[arunspurs]

Is there's evidence our away form is down to the pitch size?

Absolutely no...If we get 4 points in remaining two away games, we would have 5th best away record, better than Arse. Thats not bad at all.