Ironskullll
Well-Known Member
- Nov 15, 2010
- 1,378
- 1,894
They have. The problems with Spurs are much more complex than just tactics/team selection etc, and I think that that is actually why TS is struggling, rather than tactical/technical issues. It's easy to say X should have been picked rather than Y, or that they should have played 451 rather than xyz etc, but this is a more a case of "If the only tool you have is a hammer, then every problem comes to resemble a nail". Once again we had a daft mistake, leading to an OG early on; followed by gifting them possession 30 yards from their goal and seconds later conceding. These aren't tactical or selection related problems. These are individual issues deep within the flow of the game. Yes there are players way off the pace and tempo of the game that you do have to question whether they have the quality to be anywhere in the PL, but some of these players are making mistakes and errors of judgement that aren't in keeping with the rest of their play. That's not tactical or technical. If TS had the selection 100% right every time, along with the tactics, we'd still have these problems, and with those results, right or wrong, he'd still get hammered for getting them wrong, but really, that's not where the problems lie; certainly not where they're confined to. If that were the case, then the solutions would be simple.
I've been to Anfield in recent times and seen some of those players from their team today and they've been absolutely 'kin awful, every bit as bad as our team today. Hoddle is busy making valid points about Spurs, and so is Souness, and basically you could say that they're questioning the character of the Spurs players, and they're right. Oh well, I suppose everyone's seen it. For me it's about individual player coaching, and leadership on the pitch. Sadly, I do think that our club has players who are basically broken and can't handle life in the fast lane anymore. They flatter to deceive, work hard in a running about sort of way but don't have the speed of thought and explosiveness of action that comes with conviction that what they're doing is right or likely to make any difference. That team today had all the hallmarks of one of Harrys teams going to Old Trafford back in the day.
I think I'm saying that it comes down to the alchemy of individual man management, and that's a much more difficult thing to develop useful insights into from afar. Football is replete with examples of good man managers needing the right players/culture/support in order to work their magic. Clough at Leeds is maybe the best example. TS does look lost, like he doesn't understand why players continually switch off and why he can't get his points over (assuming he's making them).
Oh well. Liverpool, by the way. That team is fucking good. Miles better to watch than any of the brutal clogging Liverpool teams of the past. Hope they win it, a triumph of heritage over plastic money that would be.
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