I really hoped that Holtby would become important under Poch, alongside Eriksen. But when a third straight manager drops him, you have to think maybe there's more to it than we can see.
And if I remember correctly he was coming from Schalke on a free because they weren't going to resign him. We paid a fee because we needed to get him in January because we had major injury problems in midfield.
Did you really just say that you hope a human being has a major injury: "breaks down quick"? Wow... wonder what people say about you.
Yes, something isn't right about the pattern here for him. He looks skilled and bright on the pitch usually. There must be some issue in the locker room or training ground that managers get sick of dealing with. Something like: always late, always texting, always jawing, etc. Eventually, unless you are a shining star that pulls the entire team up the table, managers figure they can get someone equally good that they don't have to continually battle over trivialities. Hopefully, he can figure it out and have the career that his skills suggest he should have.
Southampton did a fair bit of business on deadline day. they'll still be a tough fixture this season, I think
Sad Sandro is gone. I think the balance within the team is there. With the departures that have left I really hope that we bring through more youngsters if we have too. For some reason on sporting life the guy from Montpelier hasn't been confirmed. We have made a good good profit, but on NBCSN it says that he has signed for 8 mil. Anyone know how much we got for Sandro. Glad we are sticking with the 3 strikers we have as I think they can do the job. My god, Man U has spent so much.
I'm really happy we have got more defenders in because obviously it should become our staple because it will allow us to be more balanced and I think Poch is smart enough to realize that we needed balance all throughout the team desperately. I will say that the only way we are getting CL is probably by winning the EL. Teams that are going for the top four have strengthen so much it's crazy. Benjamin Stambouli is a beast of a man. I like the way our midfield is physically imposing and has a bit of skill to go along with it. Would like to see Nabil move higher up the pitch as he just doesn't have the long range passing we need. ** Did we let BAE go yet or is he still on the team? Benjamin Stambouli looks beast. http://www.tottenhamhotspur.com/spurs-tv/interviews/benji-stambouli-–-first-interview/
Whatever. One of these new signings better be able to kill it on social media, that's all I care about.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think it was the opposite. He wasn't going to re-sign, so they moved him before he went on a bosman.
What kills me is that time and time again, there doesn't seem to be a plan B. This wasn't so prevalent this year, as the club did a good job to quickly move on from Musacchio and Schneiderlin with Fazio and Stambouli respectively, but it reared its head again with Jay Rodriguez. How long were Spurs linked with him and how many other WF targets were we linked with besides Remy?
Maybe at a certain point we felt that Townsend and Lennon with Chadli and Lamela could carry the load. We also have some young dudes who could be tried out and I think that is what Poch is all about in trying to bleed through the youngsters. I have no prob with that. My real worry at the moment is if Eriksen goes down. We don't have a guy who is a legit AMC who can make plays at the next attacking midfield level. Can Paulinho?? I'm not overly convinced, but time will tell.
So far Eriksen has been pretty damn ineffective imo so it doesn't seem to affect us that much. My biggest worry is if Fazio doesn't cut it since Kaboul has costed us many nerve wrecking moments and I don't think Dier is able to perform at a consistent level just yet.
Paulinho seriously lacks the vision and creativity to play that position. He's a hard working B2B player who gets in good positions. In the EL game last week, there was one point where he received the ball in the attacking third with tons of room to turn and make a run towards the box, or make an attacking pass, but instead he just passed back to the LB without even considering his other options. I missed the Liverpool game, so I don't know what position he was played in that game, but so far I don't like that he's still being played at LW with Lamela in the middle.
With no attacking players signed, I hope Poch really have a plan to get our poor goal ratio midfielders and strikers to start scoring consistently.
Dier at RB is going to be a stretch, but at CB I really think he has the mental stability to learn from a mistake and have a stark improvement. I think the kid is going to be an absolute star for us and in general and I think he and Vertonghan at the back is the best pairing to be honest. Fazio is on the slow side to so I hear and frankly not having seen him I'm not exactly sure what kind of production he will have. At the moment we need Walker back and to put Dier alongside Jan and give Lloris the armband. The other thing that comes to mind is Poch's system. To me with the signing of another big lad in the midfield in Benji what I can see is that Poch wants to win the ball back quickly and go straight on the attack and for that kind of gameplan a playmaker isn't overly needed, but is nice to have out there. Quick pacey wingers and a physical striker such as Ade is needed and I think Soldado would thrive in this system as he can pick a pass. Still hitting quickly on the break and winning the ball back quickly seems to be what we are trying to do so I hope we can get that done with the people we have on board.
Holtby had already signed a pre-contract and was coming in July on a free. When Sandro went down for the season Spurs paid a transfer fee to get him earlier. http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2013/jan/29/lewis-holtby-tottenham-hotspur Interesting to see just how much expectation there was around Lewis - "deal of the century"
Regarding Lewis Holtby, while it was a small sample size, the fact is he could not hold down a regular first team place for the second worst club in the league last season.
But Felix Magath is 1 of the most crazy manager out there. In the 1st few games of this season, he has always change at least half of his team for every game.
Rodriguez was the plan A, Welbeck on loan was the Plan B, although Remy earlier in the summer was a top target as well. The big mistake was the club leaving it too late to move on the Southampton targets, should have been straight in there before they sold too many. Overall it was a decent window, just could have been a great one if we'd picked up another good attacking player.