TheDouble you can move this into the official match day thread when you make it. Kickoff is at 3pm today. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/3207153.stm I reckon we should go with the 4-3-3 shape we ended the game with against West Ham. We can get away with it at home and against a Bolton team who are missing a lot of defenders and don't have a lot of pace up front to counter attack us with. Although with Keano having played quite a bit over the past week, I'm not sure of his condition to play in this game. But saying that, this could be a chance for Yeates to make his mark.
Tottenham 0 - Bolton 1 They were much the better team and deserved the win. We were awful. This result has been coming, aside from the Everton game we've been pretty poor in virtually all our matches under Pleat. It was only a matter of time before we hit such a low that we would be beaten rather than stealing a win or a draw. Just a shame it was at home and against a Bolton team devastated by injuries, plus they completely dominated, that's a real low. I really do worry for us in the upcoming game against A*senal. Unless we play five times better than we have been, we will be destroyed. PS: Poyet and Anderton were in midfield again. King played centrally which pushed Anderton wide right where he doesn't have the legs to do anything anyway. ****'s sake.
I'm way to depressed to do anything of the sort. Sorry. I'm sorry I didn't have it up earlier, I thought the game was on Sunday. Oh great, our next fixture is an "easy" win at Highbury. Fuck, we really needed this win.
Just read the players ratings out of 10 on Teletext. No player got more then 5. actually, only one player got 5 and that was Konchesky. anderton got 3. Why can't Pleat see what thousands of us can see, that Anderton and Poyet just aren't up to it any more? Lets face it, we've been playing pretty crap for the past few weeks, stealing wins and draws. Hopefully this loss against the cackness of Bolton will shake Pleat up and he'll do what he needs to do. Namely get rid of players who just can't hack it any more.
Doherty is another one who shouldn't be played unless it's an emergency, he's not done badly, but neither has he shown any Premiership quality. He's a Division 1 player. I'm very disappointed that Pleat opted to chuck Ledley King into midfield again ahead of Mabizela. I'd be much happier seeing Mabizela in midfield, with King in defence with Richards. The Doc should be on the bench, if even that, I'd be tempted to go with calling up Ronnie Henry from the reserves ahead of him. We were missing Redknapp, Davies (who I think will be a big plus now that he'll be able to play his natural right wing position), and of course King Kanoute. But then Bolton were completely stripped in defence, they were there for the taking.
[sarcasm]c'mon tottenham board of directors, pleat has been given time, but the results have been in steady decline, sack him and bring in someone who can garner success[/sarcasm] serioulsy though, would the results of the past 5 matches really have been that different had glenn still been in charge? like pleaty said, he'd rather be lucky than good, and really glenn had just been unlucky for the first couple of weeks.
IMHO, we have a lot of talent this year. Our back 4 have skill, but lack durability (the trio of Richards, King and Ziege have missed more games than they've played), and our midfield is sporadic at best. Redknapp held the team together, but needed an energetic partner like Ricketts to make it work. We have had no continuity and no real spirit. When Davies isn't injured, he's focusing on his Welsh team. Dalmat has shown flashes, but hasn't adjusted yet. Frankly, adding the right coach could really galvanize this team. It's early, but look at the injuries: Richards King Ziege Redknapp Anderton Poyet Davies Kanoute Keane Postiga Arguably, 7 of those are starters. But, it is absolutely no surprised that any of them are injured except possibly Davies and Keane. The rest are ALL injury-prone players. This was my concern before the season with keeping Redknapp, Ziege and King while adding Kanoute. But, how long has it been since we've lost these fixtures, Home to: Fulham, Southampton and Bolton; and Away to: Birmingham City. Only Southampton is in any way understandable. Teams that cannot count on grabbing 3 points against inferior talent (and yes I consider Fulham's talent to be inferior), are going nowhere. The next manager will enter a pretty good situation. Clearly underperforming team with lots of talent and without a bad attitude, supportive ownership, and a ton of loyal fans. But unless the underperformance ends, things may be on the brink of serious erosion. Our performance against Bolton was unacceptable. -Digital
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/sport/football/articles/7497365?source=Daily This is typical. Jay-Jay would have been a perfect fit for us - outrageous skills, great flair, occasionally injury prone and scared of tackling. He has Spurs written all over him I wonder why Hodd said no when he was looking for a playmaker? Did he view Jay-Jay's skills as a threat on the training ground? Oh well, nice to know that a player as gifted as Jay-Jay wanted to sign for us. Our stylish reputation lives on, despite our crappy recent football.
Are you seriously suggesting that Hodd was merely unlucky from January til the end of last season? Hodd was a joke manager. His greatest achievement was getting rid of all the dross like Sherwood, old man Sheri,& Thatcher, etc. A big disappointment in my view was failing to ditch Dazza. Dazza has ruined any good feelings Spurs fans had for him by not leaving when we were tolerant of him. He's so crap it makes my eyes bleed to watch him.