FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk Vs Tottenham: Match Thread

kungfugrip · Feb 21, 2014

postigol said:
As we now know, Bent was a flop and we were lucky to get most of our money back, Bentley was a complete loss of £15m, and Pav did okay without being a runaway success and we ended up making a small loss on him. Only Modric was a successful signing.

I think Bent gets a bit of a hard time. He only started 32 league games for us, and scored 18 league goals during his time with us. I think he was far from a flop.....more Redknapp didn't fancy him and Bent didn't fit the way he wanted the team to develop and play.

SlunkSoma · Feb 21, 2014

Wheeler Dealer said:
Soldado's is a player of proven quality and a history of impressive goalscoring facts. His and our biggest problem is that neither suit each other and the consequences of this are far from positive. We needed a striker, but not just any striker, a striker with certain attributes. Soldado was identified by our scouting team as this man, when we all know he is not that man and will never be that man.. IMO the only viable solution is to find a way out that benefits both parties.

I don't agree that we should be looking to get rid just yet, but I do agree with the fact that on the face of it, he wans't the sort of striker we expected to get in, given his previous achievements and our apparent building toward a certain system. I really do wonder what AVB thought when we got Soldado. It didn't seem like the most obvious fit. His play has been good in parts, other times he has seemed a bit lost tactically.

I think we are prone to write off players (and write up in some ways). He's had a slower start than we would have liked, but it the grand scheme of things he hasn't done too badly given the changes he and we have faced. He's been in and out of the team, a new team, playing different systems. I can afford him time to get it right, he just needs time to find his place in the team and the level of his teammates (who keep changing).

Huddlestone22 · Feb 21, 2014

dondo said:
No you didnt compare the 2 but you mocked the guy that did, as if to say lamela is better than anderton or so i thought as kendal pointed out i may have the wrong end of the shitty stick

I mocked him because he was referring to Lamela's injury as a case for him being injury prone like Anderton was.

only1waddle · Feb 21, 2014

There is far bigger fault with the way this squad has been assembled than the Soldado factor, that is the lack of a player with genuine vision, only Eriksen, Soldado and Lamela (if he still exists) and *Holtby (if we can find him after Magath's training) have really shown any nous for a clever pass, very frustrating.
I do wonder how we were supposed to play possession football, suffocate teams and then break them down with a very small percentage of genuine passers in the side.
Which then brings us round to Soldado, forget his form for the moment and then ask why we bought a Poacher style player without many genuine passers in the squad, there seems to be no clear vision at work at all.

robin09 · Feb 21, 2014

Kendall said:
1, Agree
2, Agree,
3, Questionable. Is he really performing well other than scoring? I don't really see that he's contributed much at all. In fact, he just stands around for long periods waiting for the ball.

I've always stopped short at writing him off completely or labelling him a flop because I agree that it is too soon. but to date, he has not been nearly satisfactory. Yes it can take time for some strikers to settle, but that's why we bought a more mature striker, to limit that period. It is acceptable for someone like Lamela who looks like he wouldn't say boo to a goose to take time, because he's only just out of nappies. For Soldado I expect, nay, I demand more effort if he's going to be off form in front of goal.

He set up Paulinho with a great through pass yesterday that should have ended in a goal, but Paul kicked the floor and got a free kick instead.

I have been watching his play pretty closely, he set someone down the wing yesterday with a lovely back heel, and even after his open goal miss was one touch volleying with the outside of his boot to team mates feet.

The thing I'm most surprised at with fans, is that some don't see how obvious his quality is when he touches the ball. It's not ALL about goals. Ironically Soldado always struck me as a Lineker type, but he's actually shown great link up play deeper, and his shooting has let him down in the last few months.

I cannot bring myself to write off a new player, especially when the sample size to judge him is so small. If he'd scored 1 yesterday, this conversation wouldn't exist! One single shot on target makes all the difference to fans, and I just keep trying to convince people to look long term.

If his conversion rate is as low next season, we'll have to move on. But not right now, definitely not.

TottenhamMattSpur · Feb 21, 2014

Phomesy said:
Has there ever been a more unlucky player than Soldado? You just gotta laugh...

I once missed a sitter and a particularly funny team mate immediately shouted "that weren't even unlucky Matt!"

Unlucky is having a beach ball put you off, the wind change the direction of the ball, tripping over a lace.
Missing an open goal, from 3 feet without a hint of a challenge having had the ball put on your foot is just shit.

If it happened once it'd possibly slip under the radar. But he's done it too many times now.

He's a donkey.

Gaz_Gammon · Feb 21, 2014

yusrisafri said:
Theyre both problems. Lamela's weakness does not give an excuse that soldado is worth the money.

On the plus side of lamela though, he is only 21, although we can still question why we paid so much for someone so young who was good at roma but not world class. To me, 30mil is world class

There's a plus side?

Sorry i have walked all the way around the problem child and can see no "plus side". He will be gone in the summer for half what we paid. That Bentley deal that Danny Boy arranged looks cheap now does it not?

Gaz_Gammon · Feb 21, 2014

Oscar22 said:
Amazing. We now refuse to even give new signings one entire season before hailing them as flops.

Give it two years and we can be at a stage where if you don't have a 'Mido debut' the fans storm the pitch and tear up your new contract in front of you citing "he didn't get us in the champions league this week" as the reason.

Hold on a minute there Tonto, we paid THIRTY MILLION. This kind of money is usually paid (unless you are owned by a mad Russian or oil Sheikh) for a player who should be capable of playing one good game against a team like Palace, or Hull or Sunderland. I am not looking for him to run rings around the defence of the likes of the Man Citeh's of this World.

I know of no other Club that have spent this sort of money on one player who needs three quarters of a season to make an impact. He is simply a busted flush and a couple of step overs against EL cannon fodder does not make him the second coming of Messi.

His signing is the single biggest fuck up that this Club has ever made, and we have signed some complete dross over the years.

JUSTINSIGNAL · Feb 21, 2014

TottenhamMattSpur said:
I once missed a sitter and a particularly funny team mate immediately shouted "that weren't even unlucky Matt!"

Unlucky is having a beach ball put you off, the wind change the direction of the ball, tripping over a lace.
Missing an open goal, from 3 feet without a hint of a challenge having had the ball put on your foot is just shit.

If it happened once it'd possibly slip under the radar. But he's done it too many times now.

He's a donkey.

Hahahaha! wow, just wow.

So the fact a player misses a couple of chances for us makes him a donkey? So you're writing off the rest of his career?

I can't quite believe some of the rubbish I've read in this thread.

Gaz_Gammon · Feb 21, 2014

coopsieyid said:
A total of 10 goals and 4 assists in 27 appearances, in a brand new team, brand new country, brand new culture, brand new system (twice), brand new manager (twice), whilst struggling to find his best form. I genuinely think people are going way over the top with their dismissal of Soldado, and are far too quick to not acknowledge what he HAS done, so far, in a THFC shirt.

I expect, "yeah 4 of them were penalties", and you'd be right. However, those penalties have played a MASSIVE part in keeping us, somehow, in contact with the teams above us. His assists have done the same. His penalties are easily dismissed, yet our £26mil penalty taker would've been MUCH appreciated if he replaced the £42.5mil penalty taker that Arseanal have in their ranks (who, I believe, has missed his 2 penalties so far?).

Maybe it's better to appreciate what Soldado HAS done, rather than concentrate solely upon what he is yet to do? Didn't the brilliantly gifted Suarez (and he IS a heck of a player) only score 7 goals in his first season in the PL? How'd he get on after settling properly? Perspective people, perspective..

Maybe take into account that Soldado never decided the fee we paid for him too?

Spot on with your summing up.

Soldado isn't up to the pace yet of the PL, and i think the biggest issue he's had to face is the total lack of support and in particular from our so called wingers. Perhaps next season will be the making of the player, but you just do not become a bad player overnight with the record that he brings with him. No way.

dudu · Feb 21, 2014

TottenhamMattSpur said:
I once missed a sitter and a particularly funny team mate immediately shouted "that weren't even unlucky Matt!"

Unlucky is having a beach ball put you off, the wind change the direction of the ball, tripping over a lace.
Missing an open goal, from 3 feet without a hint of a challenge having had the ball put on your foot is just shit.

If it happened once it'd possibly slip under the radar. But he's done it too many times now.

He's a donkey.

By exactly the same logic you can look at the amount of times he has scored and say he is a fantastic striker.

He is going through a bad spell,i dont see why that means is is anything other than a very skilled striker who is going through bad patch?

dudu · Feb 21, 2014

JUSTINSIGNAL said:
Hahahaha! wow, just wow.

So the fact a player misses a couple of chances for us makes him a donkey? So you're writing off the rest of his career?

I can't quite believe some of the rubbish I've read in this thread.

Finally we agree on something

TottenhamMattSpur · Feb 21, 2014

JUSTINSIGNAL said:
Hahahaha! wow, just wow.

So the fact a player misses a couple of chances for us makes him a donkey? So you're writing off the rest of his career?

I can't quite believe some of the rubbish I've read in this thread.

I'd be astonished I'd Levy and Baldini aren't desperately trying to sell him this summer.
Unlike Adebeyor he's not on excoriate wages so it's just a question of how much he can recover of the transfer fee.
At 28 and with a season like this we'll be lucky to get £15m back.

If Levy doesn't shift him then he can write the full £26m

only1waddle · Feb 21, 2014

Funny how people confuse "shit player" with "total lack of form and confidence in front of goal"

#blacknwhiteinnitho

TottenhamMattSpur · Feb 21, 2014

dudu said:
By exactly the same logic you can look at the amount of times he has scored and say he is a fantastic striker.

He is going through a bad spell,i dont see why that means is is anything other than a very skilled striker who is going through bad patch?

Hardly, he's missed a lot more than he's scored. It's not even like most of them are from world class saves, he just looks like an ametuer in front of goal.

I'm, by my own admission, terrible at playing football. But even I score regularly playing 5 a side. It doesn't change the fact I'm shit more often than I'm not shit.

Bobbins · Feb 21, 2014

postigol said:
Yes, it's not alot of time but for £26m for a player judged to be at their peak you'd expect them to make a near immediate impact. He has missed several complete sitters, the latest being last night. I agree his all-round play looks classy, but we need someone to stick it in the net.
Time is a luxury neither players nor managers get much of, so I can't see the club giving him 2 full seasons to come good to be honest.
How can Soldado be judged? I guess the best yardsticks are against other strikers at the club and against other strikers we could have bought or who moved to the PL last summer for similar fees or less. I'm thinking Negredo, Wilfried Bony and Benteke. He has fared very poorly by the standards of the best of those (Negredo, Bony, Adebayor) and rather poorly by the standards of the worst (Defoe and Benteke).

You say fickle, but the sport as a whole is fickle - you can be a hero one minute and deadwood the next, that's not just spurs fans. Soldado's abilities seem limited to nice touches in build-up play and taking penalties, both very useful but not enough.

So the fact that Soldado's scored 10 in 21 appearances for Spurs marks him out as a flop? What if he went on to finish the season with 16 goals - not an unreasonable expectation, we have plenty of games left - would that still be regarded as a flop?

Incidentally, Dennis Bergkamp scored 16 goals in his first season at Arsenal - who signed him for a club record fee which was 200% higher than their previous record. In the same season, Chris Armstrong scored 22 goals for us. Does this mean Bergkamp was a flop who Arsenal should've sold, and Armstrong was a roaring success? Robert Pires struggled massively in his first season at Arsenal and only scored 8 goals - does this mean he was a flop and they made a mistake keeping him? Should they have sold him? Bear in mind during this time Arsenal were scoring for fun and winning the league.

Some slightly over the top examples I know, but examples of top players who needed time to settle when coming to England, and players who in their second seasons and onwards went on to be regarded as greats for their club. One a young player, the other with huge experience.

If we opt for your 'they missed some shots, sell them now' policy, we will never, EVER establish ourselves in the top 4. The absolute last thing this club needs in the coming summer is massive turnover yet again - we need to do as little business as possible (CB, LB and that's it for me), have as little disruption as possible, and let the squad build and grow together.

Arsenal have been doing this for years and making mugs of us with our turnover of players, and to even think about selling Soldado or Lamela is complete madness.

only1waddle · Feb 21, 2014

TottenhamMattSpur said:
Hardly, he's missed a lot more than he's scored. It's not even like most of them are from world class saves, he just looks like an ametuer in front of goal.

I'm, by my own admission, terrible at playing football. But even I score regularly playing 5 a side. It doesn't change the fact I'm shit more often than I'm not shit.

Except by definition this is what happens "when you are going through a bad patch with no confidence".

Gaz_Gammon · Feb 21, 2014

Bobbins said:
If we opt for your 'they missed some shots, sell them now' policy, we will never, EVER establish ourselves in the top 4. The absolute last thing this club needs in the coming summer is massive turnover yet again - we need to do as little business as possible (CB, LB and that's it for me), have as little disruption as possible, and let the squad build and grow together.

Arsenal have been doing this for years and making mugs of us with our turnover of players, and to even think about selling Soldado or Lamela is complete madness.

And Defoe would have been in Canada years ago...............................

TottenhamMattSpur · Feb 21, 2014

only1waddle said:
Except by definition this is what happens "when you are going through a bad patch with no confidence".

I think when he hangs up his boots in years to come he and we will acknowledge his bad spell started when he joined us and hopefully (for him) ended when he left

only1waddle · Feb 21, 2014

TottenhamMattSpur said:
I think when he hangs up his boots in years to come he and we will acknowledge his bad spell started when he joined us and hopefully (for him) ended when he left

I hope his bad spell ends his next game and he cant stop scoring for the rest of the season, not when he leaves.

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