Ex-Manager watch: Antonio Conte

[Darth Vega]

Genuine question, can any of our tactically savvy posters explain why our play clicked so well towards the end of last season but now our play looks god awful even with an patented Antonio Conte pre-season?

Only thing I can think of is 2 games a week vs 1. Yes we're struggling with injuries at the moment but we've played like this all season bar a few games.

 

[Bluto Blutarsky]

The Son/Kane partnership was the best in the league. Look at it now.

Arguably it was the best in the league - last season, under Conte...

Kulusevski has been a key player for us - from the time he came in last year. That is a big miss, and not Conte's fault. We brought in Richarlison to give us some depth - again, not Conte's fault that Richi and Lucas are not fit.

Too many people are too quick to look for blame, or a scapegoat.

 

[olliec]

Conte in, but needs a really strong January window or he will walk regardless. I’m pretty sure he’s done with a few of these players.

 

[kendoddsdadsdogsdead]

We do need to properly back him in the window though or there is no point

 

[Wearegoingtowintheleague]

Genuine question, can any of our tactically savvy posters explain why our play clicked so well towards the end of last season but now our play looks god awful even with an patented Antonio Conte pre-season?

Kulusevski

 

[-Afri-Coy-]

How we finish the next few games before the WC will be very telling.

It is only our first loss at home all season though, just for some perspective.

 

[Misfit]

Saw posters saying he's defending his defeats from being too embarrassing so he threw in the towel early in losses against the top teams. Guess his records aren't that good with us now so far

Main problem seems to be he has a system. He's very rigid in having just that system with a tweak to make it 3-5-2 but that's about. That's fine when you have all the pieces, fine enough to win you major trophies in fact, but leaves you nowhere to go if you don't.

And here we are, with a squad lacking the prime WBs needed to fully implement his system effectively, and so largely static and turgid play results. And he finds himself at a club without the pull, maybe even the wages to get those players in when going against all the usual suspect juggernaut clubs for the same players.

A few weeks ago I thought to myself, "maybe this will work out longer term". Eh, the odds are lengthening again.

 

[agrdavidsfan]

Genuine question, can any of our tactically savvy posters explain why our play clicked so well towards the end of last season but now our play looks god awful even with a patented Antonio Conte pre-season?

It’s a number of things teams have worked out contes main tactic 3-4-3 and they just back the midfield and strangle us.

the other way to play against us just switch the wings constantly as although we have 5 at the back defending we defend narrowly, we also can’t deal with being pressed, teams have players in the opposition that they trigger press i.e when they get the ball a team will push knowing they will make a mistake we have about 5 players you can do this too, Sanchez, Wmerson,Perisic,Hojbjerg so on it makes us all really quite easy to play against.

teams opt to play quick triangles around our midfield and soon as beat our single man press which is normally Bentacur uou are in at the defense

 

[PrettyColors]

Honestly. I am totally over the 5-ATB wingbacks system. Maybe if we had Hakimi and Cancelo on the flanks, true livewire creators, it would be different.

But it’s just a waste of two players who are laughable easy to mark, totally one dimensional, and leave us outnumbered in every other area of the pitch.

 

[matthew.absurdum]

It’s a number of things teams have worked out contes main tactic 3-4-3 and they just back the midfield and strangle us.

the other way to play against us just switch the wings constantly as although we have 5 at the back defending we defend narrowly, we also can’t deal with being pressed, teams have players in the opposition that they trigger press i.e when they get the ball a team will push knowing they will make a mistake we have about 5 players you can do this too, Sanchez, Wmerson,Perisic,Hojbjerg so on it makes us all really quite easy to play against.

teams opt to play quick triangles around our midfield and soon as beat our single man press which is normally Bentacur uou are in at the defense

Speaking of the formation I think everyone of us wanted 3-5-2 a week before. Turns out ... well

 

[Danny1]

Does make me sad though to think that we continue to hire managers and just get rid so quickly. It clearly doesn’t work as we have had Pochettino, Mourinho, Nuno and Conte all since November 2019. 4 managers in less than 3 years. No team that does that ever wins anything (baring maybe Chelsea).

In my opinion we just need to stick with a manager and give them the time needed to make the squad their own. Be that Conte or someone else, otherwise we will continue to fail.

 

[FinnYid]

When this goes sour, hope it is last time we appoint these "proven winners" with philosophy that simply isn't Spurs. Gooner George, Santini, Mourinho, Conte

 

[überghost]

Arguably it was the best in the league - last season, under Conte...

Kulusevski has been a key player for us - from the time he came in last year. That is a big miss, and not Conte's fault. We brought in Richarlison to give us some depth - again, not Conte's fault that Richi and Lucas are not fit.

Too many people are too quick to look for blame, or a scapegoat.

Yes, I agree. But it seems that he has changed something there in order to play more adapted to his system. The change was during pre season. He's making the holes more round, while the pegs a perfetcly square.

 

[mil1lion]

Maddison.

Yeah seems an obvious one as can play in off the right or in a central 3. Still feels like we are missing key components for a Conte system.

 

[dagraham]

Just feel like I've blinked and everything's turned to shit.

It's just Tottenham isn't it tbh

It’s just results beginning to catch up with performances unfortunately.

 

[snakehipsspurs]

I was frustrated at Conte for not playing 3-5-2 a few weeks back, but now it’s clear why. We don’t have the personnel in midfield to control games against good teams. When under pressure as a unit, they just don’t have the ability to pass the ball through the lines, or dribble past opponents to beat a press.

3-4-3 works a bit better because we can push opposing midfields back a little and afford our midfielders space to pick a pass out. Especially with the threat of a healthy Deki. But sadly this negative, direct football will continue until the squad improves.

I watched conte’s inter and Chelsea, this was not how they played. Either he’s completely changed his tactics (unlikely), or our squad isn’t up to it yet. I’m believing the latter.

 

[agrdavidsfan]

Speaking of the formation I think everyone of us wanted 3-5-2 a week before. Turns out ... well

It did actually work today for the first 25 minutes before Captain Sabotage turned up, we were actually quite attacking the Italian Tony pulis even looked as if he had asked Skipp to break the lines and go forward which is a shock

 

[Oh Teddy Teddy]

Conte's system can work.

We have very average defenders and goalkeepers.

unlike Newcastle’s world class back line?

 

[SargeantMeatCurtains]

We do need to properly back him in the window though or there is no point

How many times do we need to keep saying this? We backed him considerably in the summer and he’s made us worse.

 

[eddiev14]

I haven't written on here in ages but felt the need to come on. I was a Conte fan and his football works in Italy and maybe England 10 years ago but not anymore.

I'd love him to turn it around and make us a hard to beat great attacking team but he won't. I'd be happy if pochettino came in tonight.

Some will say I'm jumping on the bandwagon but it's actually been bad all season we just scraped a few results. If he's still in charge when we play arsenal it's going to be hard to watch

I love Pochettino but he was stubborn too, just in a different way to Conte. His undoing was his inflexibility in the transfer market. He also signed quite a lot of poor players towards the end of his reign.

The issue we have is we went through a period of underinvestment and - as Conte would put it - mistakes in the transfer market. We are desperately trying to catch up but still it is blindingly obvious that the likes of Emerson, Sessegnon, Sanchez, and to a degree Lloris and Dier are not the future of Spurs if we want to challenge at the top.

Basically we’re in the middle of the painful rebuild. The issue Conte has is he raised all of our hopes when we got top 4 last season.

It’s certainly very painful right now.