[iam_kramer]

Attack the poorest, Rashford, Lukaku and Mkhitaryan awful. Lloris has done naff all. Midfield poor too, Herrera was poor, Matic nothing great.

We have to win here, we can't keep dropping points when our title challengers (if we are even title challengers) are in such good for, we've got to keep pace.

 

[Loublaze]

Off the ball, yes on the ball very avg.

Both Bailly and Jones have been worse on the ball, giving it away in key areas and inviting attacks

 

[kouroux]

I cannot believe that Dim Sherwood is speaking the truth.

 

[frank lee madeer..]

Need to get at these , shoot me, but I'd rather lose going for the win, than lose going for the draw.

 

[DenisIrwin]

Really think Mata on for Mikhi is the right call here. I've got an idea that Jose's relationship with Mata is key to dressing room.

 

[prtk0811]

Mkh has a body strength of a kid.

 

[mu4c_20le]

Better than the Liverpool game...

No. We are at home... vs a spurs side without their best player

 

[podurban2]

We. Are. Shit.

 

[sunama]

We're absolutely awful when we play against the better sides.

You think that losing Pogba and Fellaini hasn't effected us?

 

[sammsky1]

Isn't the problem with this team so obvious?

The midfield.

We don't move the ball well from defence to attack. That's the job of the midfield.

We have not been lacking in desire. Ability is the problem, not tactics.

Not much Mou can do about given his best-attacking midfielders are injured and he is left with Herrera as his only option.

 

[WPMUFC]

IT'S THE MIDFIELD!!!

every pass is at a spurs defender or overshooting the strikers.

We've have like THREE attacks down the wing and they worked, yet we keep fecking it up and not going wide.

 

[AllezLesDiables]

Jones was diabolical in the first half

 

[Android1974]

What has happened to Mkhitaryan???

Unfortunately, he looks more and more like a Champions and Cup games player.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

What do you expect him to do when he is playing with zero midfield and an invisible number 10 in mkhi. He is feeding of scraps given by de gea and young.

It's true that he's been hamstrung to an extent as have all our forwards but even they've got to be able to show 2-3 moments of real quality. But agree that it's hard given how we're playing as a team.

 

[chb23]

If miki plays a few more games like he has done on recent form then I'm going to have to call him Rooney 2.0.

Stealing a wage and yet undroppable

 

[Janson]

I choose to because it's true.

You've got your games mixed up. That happened againstHuddlesfield.

Yeah sorry, I just realised this. Nevertheless, I think that's the main reason why he hasn't started today.

 

[Summit]

What has happened to Mkhitaryan???

He's worked out playing utter wank gets him game time. When he used to play well last season, he was benched for 3 games following...

 

[dove]

and 50% of people wouldn't want Ozil for free Mhitaryan is absolutely shocking and had like 2 good games during his time at the club.

 

[minoo-utd]

Jose has to remember that he is managing at O.T and has to play with some bravery and show some football. Wtf was that first half? Un fecking believable!

 

[Mal donaghy]

We are missing the spark , where has our spark gone ?
Please come back

 

[Random Task]

Really missing that creative spark in midfield, Miki has been awful yet again and needs replacing if he doesn't step it up a notch, Herrera hasn't been much better. There is a huge gap between midfield and attack which needs to be rectified as well. I like the formation, I think we look really solid defensively.

Spurs offered very little from an attacking perspective, faffing about with a few pretty touches around the box but nothing with any penetration. Bailly + Smalling have been brilliant, Jones less so.

Need to pick it up second half, Miki in particular is on borrowed time, far to many poor performances from him the last few weeks and today is just as bad. He needs to perform now.

 

[kouroux]

Again if Young is our best player (props to him), this is a huge concern. Our bes player cannot be a LB/LWB

 

[sammsky1]

Mourinho should replace mkhitariyan with Martial and let that front 3 run free.

 

[NoLogo]

Our 3 at the back just doesn’t work.

We work the ball forward so slowly, No pace on the passing and nobody bringing it forward when they have space.

We can’t get the ball forward into our strikers with any decent passes, it’s all lumping it.

We need either go 442 or 433 and get a defender off.

I said this before but to really play the 3 at the back well we need CBs who are better at passing and wingbacks who can actually create something over the wings.

It would also help to have a creative midfielder who doesn't get dispossessed within 5 seconds of receiving the ball.

 

[Sammyjunn]

We're absolutely awful when we play against the better sides.

I never thought we would.

But I believe that we are missing a couple of pieces but have the foundations.

I think the foundations are messed up, they arent bad but we need far more players with natural ability on the ball. Im not the biggest fan of the likes as Herrera, Valencia, Miki, Lukaku, Shaw, Darmian. And we need one CB who is really quality in build up.

 

[Sara125]

Genuinely scared for what’s in store for us when we play city both at home and theirs if this is what the team are serving up, might as well just give them the 6 points now and call it a day

 

[AgentP]

Very good first half overall in my opinion.
Spurs have mostly had long-distance shooting on De Gea, so defensively we've looked good... Apart from Jones who looks shaky as feck, but 3cbs with Matic helps on covering when needed.
Herrera is a bit lackluster in his tracking-back.
Seen a few situations where he's been jogging back when the ball-carrier is just a short running distance away and don't have others pressing him.


Offensively Mkhitaryan is a lot of hit & miss, seems to struggle with accuracy in his passing, but he's at least having a few good picks, so hopefully he'll manage to get his accuracy up in the second half.

We didn't have a single shot on target.

 

[podurban2]

Again if Young is our best player (props to him), this is a huge concern. Our bes player cannot be a LB/LWB

Who should be nowhere near our best player.

 

[kr0nix]

Isn't the problem with this team so obvious?

The midfield.

We don't move the ball well from defence to attack. That's the job of the midfield.

We have not been lacking in desire. Ability is the problem, not tactics.

It's not just that. Notice that Aurier and Davies push up higher when Spurs are in possession compared to Young and Valencia.
Without options on the ball for the midfielders they are having to thread the perfect pass to Mkhi/Rashford/Lukaku every time which is easy for Spurs to defend against.

 

[An Irish Red]

You think that losing Pogba and Fellaini hasn't effected us?

It definitely has. I think we have bigger problems than they can solve however.

 

[sammsky1]

Really missing that creative spark in midfield, Miki has been awful yet again and needs replacing, Herrera hasn't been much better. There is a huge gap between midfield and attack which needs to be rectified as well. I like the formation, I think we look really solid defensively.

Spurs offered very little from an attacking perspective, faffing about with a few pretty touches around the box but nothing with any penetration. Bailly + Smalling have been brilliant, Jones less so.

Need to pick it up second half, Miki in particular is on borrowed time, far to many poor performances from him the last few weeks and today is just as bad. He needs to perform now.

We are basically playing with 9 players when attacking, hence been very ineffective.

 

[serghei]

Pretty much the same from both sides. They have more shots cause they shot from 40 yards out a few times. A lot of nothing and worrying about stopping the other.

Bring martial on since hes the only one who can do something from nothing here. Not sure what point Miki has in this game. If youre going for these tactics, you want players who can go past people on their own up top. Martial is the only one we have who can do that so has to go on.

Except you play at home, and any title winning campaign involves winning the home games against your main competitors. You need to win more than Tottenham does today. A draw favors them.

 

[Sandikan]

Mourinho should replace mkhitariyan with Martial and let that front 3 run free.

It probably can't be any worse than today, but with the 3 we'd basically be relying on them to pick it up and run with and create something out of nothing.

At least Mik has the potential to create

 

[Random Task]

We are missing the spark , where has our spark gone ?
Please come back

Pogba and Fellaini. Upon their return we will be a different animal.

 

[Tincanalley]

Can't fault the effort level of the players. Top notch. Spurs just look a bit more well-oiled than us, without really threatening. Not a classic match, but I'll gladly take a backs-to-the-wall 1-0 in the second half.

Did you get lost in the sensible thread, fall through a trapdoor and find yourself in the match-day thread? And what am I doing here? To quote another lost soul, did I get drunk for this?

 

[choiboyx012]

This isn't the same spurs side we used to toy with for the past decade. even without kane their 11 can square up quality-wise with us. Our midfield is fine bar mkhitaryan. It's been little battles on different areas of the pitch without any major chances created for either side. Their defense record is as good as ours so not surprised they're keeping lukaku and rashford quiet

 

[sunama]

Overreaction as per usual in here, feck me.

Indeed.
I think we are doing fine. The game is pretty balanced, with Spurs slightly better.
Reading this forum, you'd think we are losing 3-0.

 

[Dorian Gray]

We are missing the spark , where has our spark gone ?
Please come back

It will come back when you play against lesser teams. Don't worry.

 

[Triple.Threat]

For all Miki's pace he seems to be where chances to counter die.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

Isn't the problem with this team so obvious?

The midfield.

We don't move the ball well from defence to attack. That's the job of the midfield.

We have not been lacking in desire. Ability is the problem, not tactics.

Matic and Herrera do not lack ability. Bang average teams are able to transition better from defence to attack, whereas we've got a guy who started for teams who won the league and another who played in a Spanish team who played cracking attacking football. Why do we need Modric, Pogba and Veratti to even be functional in midfield?