Tottenham
Fans deserve a refund
I’ll be honest here. I didn’t make the early morning trip to Sunderland. I opted for a bit of a lay in and I regretted it up until kick off. Come kick off I was therefore in a pub in East Ham watching on a big screen. And I’m now grateful to my wife for discouraging [...]
I’ll be honest here. I didn’t make the early morning trip to Sunderland. I opted for a bit of a lay in and I regretted it up until kick off.
Come kick off I was therefore in a pub in East Ham watching on a big screen. And I’m now grateful to my wife for discouraging me from taking that long round trip.
Spurs were awful. Against a mediocre side we would have been slaughtered. Fortunately Sunderland had no cutting edge and very little composure. So at least we could kid themselves a draw - until the 94th minute.
The one part of our side with a ready made excuse for playing bad was our defence. Dawson pulled out late, King is out for months again, and all three left backs are injured. So Stalteri played out of position, Gardner and Kaboul filled the gaps in the middle, and Chimbonda was our only first teamer.
That being the case they played pretty well. They held their line, were rarely caught out, and they seemed fairly comfortable through most of the game.
Sadly the same was not true of the rest of the team.
With Berbatov and Keane up front we should have little trouble scoring. Berbatov is brilliant and Keane was the Prem’s most prolific striker last season when minutes on the pitch were considered.
So all our midfield had to do was lay on a couple of half chances and protect the defence. Instead they played dozens of sloppy passes to Sunderland players, failed to track back, and made very little progress across the whole pitch.
We lacked composure, we lacked pace, we lacked momentum in attack, we lacked even a basic knowledge of what was expected in each position, and we lacked invention.
Berbatov and Keane, and later on Bent and Defoe, should need only a handful of half chances to score at least one goal. Yet none of them got a sniff. Not one single half chance was created for the ‘best’ strike force in the country.
Were I Berbatov, Keane and Defoe, I’d hand in a transfer request after this disgraceful lack of service from midfield. Bent can’t do likewise having only just moved clubs. It is either that or pull a regular Messi and beat seven men on their own.
For all of this there is no excuse. No gelling or integrating was needed. No key players have been lost. No foreign star has to settle, and no new manager has to impose his will.
We were rubbish away from home last season. And it seems we are rubbish this season too.
We may go on to beat Everton and Derby in the next two games, but both are at home so doing so will mean little. If we lose we have gone backwards, but winning won’t fix our away woes.
Against a mediocre side we would have been massacred today. Away to Sunderland the 1-0 result looks close. It was not. We finally drew a save from the keeper 85 minutes when substitute Huddlestone whacked a hopeful 30 yard shot in his direction.
So I plead with Spurs to refund Spurs fans their tickets for this shambles of a match, and promise to do likewise until we fix our away form. Because half our matches this season are away from home. And we can’t be writing off 57 points and still hope to progress.
Will Tottenham’s away form cost them a European place? Share your views by leaving a comment below.
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9 comments for “Fans deserve a refund”
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30 million………..cant kick goals!
weak defence by admission …….where was rocha?
Ist game of the new promising season was gutless, insipid and reeks of another year full of excuses………I’m bloody tired of them!
Yes you are very right. It was a total waste of money i flew up on friday looking forward to a great game of football. Spurs played rubbish £40 million pound spent on what? I fully agree the fans who traveled all that way to see players who get so much money per week playing like a pub team.
I hear, feel and share your pain; as I had the joy of taking my partner of eight months watch and support her new team. We were made to look like muppets in the pub, with some Tottenham supporters taking their shirts off and throwing at the screen. I must admit I was one of them:
However here are a few points I’d like to make.
The obvious problem is where your article highlighted and that’s the midfield.
There was so little productivity and for me personally I still feel it lacks balance. I would have liked to see maybe taraabat or Boateng included in the squad to give that little bit of creativity and dimension. Also the transfer deadline is coming to an end in about 18 days and I’m hoping we can find a decent left sided winger or midfield to give that balance the team so desperately needs.
What I did like about Darren Bent is that with his inclusion into the team we really stretched the play of oppositions with his pace. However in the Sunderland game there were quite a lot of heavily lofted balls over the top which were picked out by the two sunderland center backs with complete ease, rather than probing and progressive balls to feet which would allow players like Berbatov and Keane to thrive.
The Godfather is no fool, he’ll see this and we’ll be better next game. Kaboul was immense in defence and that for me is so promising. Lennon to return, Bale and the inclusion of some of our midfield signings should hopefully make a difference.
Martin Jol is blaming his midfielders and forwards. I think it’s time Martin took a long lingering look in his bedroom mirror to find the real culprit. He’s a nice man, but out of his depth at this level. Policy of buying unproven and young English talent is quixotic but daft. And his assistant Hughton is useless, as we Irish learned when he was assistant in the Irish senior management job.
I whole-heartedly agree with you here. I too didn’t make it up north but I’m travelling 3 hours to see them Tuesday and am confident of a result. We were bullied out the game by a lesser side, did nothing in the midfield - again, hit long balls up to the strikers which were plucked from the air by their awesome centre back and looked confused with what to do with the ball!
Positives were however, Kaboul didn’t play too bad, Jenas passed the ball forwards a couple of times and all our strikers got a run out - that’s it!
I’m hoping for a lot lot better Tuesday night lads…
I have to say, when i saw the team prior to kick off i feared the worse, I’m not a jenas fan at all, it’s all well & good being a box to box player, but if there is no finished product at the end then whats the point, every time he got the ball it was either sidewards or to a sunderland player, i just cant understand why jol sticks with him week in week out, I think the Hudd should be given a solid run in the team along with Taarebet (sorry for the spelling)Kaboul looks a class act & once he gets used to the pace of the prem he will be hard to drop i think, Why did’nt routledge get a run ?please dont let this be another season when we all scratch our heads at jols tactics i thought he learnt his lesson from last season.
If we cannot even secure a win against a vewly-promoted team, who else can we earn points from? We have no lack of players with good abilities. Yet, we cannot deliver the results. Must be a problem with our team lacking that winning mentality….. Do we have a psychologist in our team set up?
I think Jol should drop jenas. he doesnt do much if we are being honest and he is probably one of the first names to be named on that team sheet, why I do not know because he is an average player who is so predictble. He does score goals and you cant argue with that but on the whole he does little else. Jol needs to play malbranque in the middle or someone more creative. Oh and a left mid.
After all the media hype and spending, its the same old story! To see Gardner in the lineup was most discouraging and the longer the match went on, the more I felt that Sunderland will nick it, and so they did! Finishing in top 4? Keep persisting with Gardner and we’ll be fighting relegation! MJ- the midfield doesn’t exist! So buck up before we find ourselves at least 15 points behind the top 4 after a handful of games!