Spurs (H) - Post-Match Thread

Spurs played pretty much the same game as nearly every other team has done this season. They scored an early goal which gave them confidence. We play the same way in every game which is why we are good at it and why we've win 3/4 titles. Pep believes in this style and let's be honest it is very successful. We have and will continue to lose the odd game. But have faith.

My observations us from Spurs game is that KDB offers dangerous balls into the box and is great on the break, but is better suited to when we are leading than when we a chasing. Foden is young and his best play for us was when he was consistently played on the left of the front three. Cancelo is starting to believe the hype about himself. Sterling is and always has been a hit or miss player. Mahrez was missed. Dias isn't perfect. Without space behind Walker has limited attacking threat. Silva and Gundog always work hard and rarely have a bad game (except when Gundog is asked to be the DM and he looks exposed) Laporte's distribution is suited to counter attacks and longer passes than Stone's controlled possession and movement forward. When we go searching for a goal too much against the low block Rodri gets sucked in leaving us exposed.
Pep will not change his methods and will not throw on a big man (Delap) at the end preferring to move Laporte upfront.

I dont always agree with Pep but his methods have won us more than any other City manager, and any other club in the same period so who the fuck am I to criticise.
 
Taken me until now to think about posting thoughts.
It reminded me of the Leicester second half-way too porous a defence.
After getting back into it with a late penalty wtf were we doing after it.
on another day that could have ended up with a repeat Leicester score line.
Gundog saw an excellent save - just three inches higher it was in. We hit the post too.
Way too much space between our back line and forwards and I missed Bernie in the centre of mid. A bit baffling when we have so many wide players.
Spurs took their chances well and we played to Kane’s strengths. They stacked the penalty box and forced us wide all game.
We’ve been spoilt by this team of ours. Defeats are inevitable it’s the manner that hurts.
 
Watched the full 90 back for my sins last night. The 343 caused us issues. Their new lad kept Len honest which meant he wasn’t stepping in as much. That left a 4v3 in midfield and a lot of graft was needed. It also meant that they had 3 bodies on the break and we couldn’t cope with that. They had several breakaway and probably should have scored more. If our passing is not totally on point we can be broke upon because our system commits so many people forward. Usually we are very tidy with the ball but not on Saturday. Meh
 
Being in block 101 I could see some times in the second half you could see Spurs were playing a 6 4 0 and sometimes a 7 3 0 and we got sucked into it. Shoud have settled for a point in add ed time instead of going for all 3
 
Protein Junkie said:
Taken me until now to think about posting thoughts.
It reminded me of the Leicester second half-way too porous a defence.
After getting back into it with a late penalty wtf were we doing after it.
on another day that could have ended up with a repeat Leicester score line.
Gundog saw an excellent save - just three inches higher it was in. We hit the post too.
Way too much space between our back line and forwards and I missed Bernie in the centre of mid. A bit baffling when we have so many wide players.
Spurs took their chances well and we played to Kane’s strengths. They stacked the penalty box and forced us wide all game.
We’ve been spoilt by this team of ours. Defeats are inevitable it’s the manner that hurts.
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That last sentence is a fitting end to the thread. It wont be, but it should....
 
So thought I would venture onto the thinly veiled hate site that is the Guardian, to see how they greeted our great failure. Well, the good news is, we’re shit, our defenders are slow, other teams should have no problem replicating this tactical plan and we will lose against the scum x 2 and others. Liverpool are great, of course, United have bounced back. Pep is a fraud and a flop. Of course no mention of the appalling cynical gamesmanship/cheating from Spurs, we deserve all we get.
 
Saturday’s match was the perfect storm for us. Playing against a team playing 3-4-3, sitting deep with good forwards should be a serious warning light. The fact that we conceded early was another huge issue and the fact that it was Spurs even more so.

For some reason conceding first causes us huge issues, it seems as though the game gets really frenetic and we lose control of the tempo of the match.

Going forward I wonder how many teams will adopt game plan and setup. Palace, Brighton and Wolves are the most likely to setup in a similar fashion though only Wolves have played 3 at the back recently.

Everton has become our biggest match of the season, a win of any sort, whether convincing, fluky or scraped will do. Anything less and Liverpool will be hugely galvanised.
 
blue ranger said:
Our best performances this season have been when Bernardo plays with Gundogan in midfield. I know it's bizarre as KDB is probably our best player but sometimes we don't retain the ball as well. Dias was definitely worse that Laporte yesterday but I'd be putting Dias and Stones together at Everton next week.

My main gripe from Saturday though was the fact that Delap never got onto the pitch. I don't know if he is good enough for City, but we just kept crossing into the box to small forwards. I found that bizarre.
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If there is one thing that drives me mad about Pep is he won't use academy players, unless the game is dead and a lot of the time not even then. I find this worse than his setting us up to lose in the CL.

What's he afraid of? That Delap is going to lose us the game? Well guess what Pep, take a look at the score.
 
There were times when Spurs were playing a high defensive line and all 20 outfield players were in the middle third of the pitch. However, not once did we play a chipped pass into the space behind for midfield runners to latch on to.
 
coolcity said:
Agree to a point (especially about the back probs, would give anything for a miracle cure right now), but I don't think we were that much off the pace and it's the media hype that sows the seeds. I try to disregard the post match hype because it all centres on a few seconds - a missed shot here, a goal conceded there - is all it takes for the media to make the difference between them saying something like "superb performance that you'd expect from the champions" to "masterplan from Kane" and so on.

In otherwords, without really changing anything on another day we'd have scored 2 more and they'd have scored 2 less. The way we play is always going to be vulnerable to the counter attack and the teams with better strikers are more likely to take advantage, so we're bound to lose the odd one here and there.

Again the media are hyping up the "title race back on" theme but it was never off, certainly not unless they think it's all down to one result. While we probably can't afford too many slip ups, I don't see Liverpool going through the rest of the season with a 100% record so I'm not overly concerned. Fact remains that to win the title, they still have to win their game in hand, beat us at the Etihad, match every other result we get, and better our goal difference. Not impossible but you'd be mad to take the bet.
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If Liverpool win every remaining game that'd be 18 on the bounce. In my opinion any team that wins 18 in a row deserves the title, and they could do that and still lose on goal difference. Liverpool have still got a few draws in them. One draw and all of a suddent we are back to 5. We can lose one more game and still have it in our own hands. Title race is on, though. Some proper big games at our place. This is what we pay out money to see. I'm well up for it now the disappointment from the weekend has faded a bit.
 
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We scored 2 goals and had a shit load of chances

The attack wasn't a problem, other than maybe trying too hard and giving the ball away for counters

He needs to read the riot act to that defence and midfield

lightyears away from the control we had last season and in the run up to Christmas

not having the players are tired either hardly played since Christmas period finished.

Actually think we missed Grealish alot, would have calmed things down
 
Flogging it a bit here but relying on physiques let alone lack of #9 skillsets the likes Bernie, Foden, Raz, Mahrez, Gundo, and Jesus have making runs or even occasionally being present in the box isn't worrying any semi competent defender. I'd like Delap to get a shot from the start in a game we're more heavily favored just to see the difference having a strong tall player up top would do to unlocking or at least unblocking defenses who are now forcing us to thread needles... Yes, we have plenty of adept threaders but on a day like the one v. Spurs... we left our specs at home.
 
Agree that Delap should have played part at some stage, especially with the crosses count being so high. The best hope for most crosses was that they would by-pass almost everyone and Bernardo comes in sniffing late to ghost one in-off. It got to a stage in the last 10 minutes where I wish Pep would have brought Stones on and played him upfront to cause some mayhem and distraction and nod a few in.
 
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