What are you guys on about, it's all about those magical European nights at the brand spanking new stadium hosting Lokomotiv Plovdiv. 
Spurs officially departed tonight
- Thread starter Fortitude
- Start date
Not sure what's your knowledge of BG football but Loko Pld have been mid table for quite a whileWhat are you guys on about, it's all about those magical European nights at the brand spanking new stadium hosting Lokomotiv Plovdiv.
Not much mate, I just recall Bolton under Sam Allardyce playing against them and thinking they had an awesome team name.Not sure what's your knowledge of BG football but Loko Pld have been mid table for quite a while
Interesting . Had no idea it may sound cool to anyone.Not much mate, I just recall Bolton under Sam Allardyce playing against them and thinking they had an awesome team name.
Spurs need Verthongen.
Is Poch tanking it to get to Real?
We've done well to win a few away games, but the performances have been utterly dire, and we've faltered nearly every time against genuine quality.
Liverpool, Inter, Barca were our 3 biggest games and were 3 defeats. PSV too was big and the pressure was on .. and we draw. Watford were in good form and again, we lose.
Winning away to the likes of Newcastle, Brighton, Huddersfield and West Ham is nice, but how many wins do these teams even have between them? Only West Ham are semi-decent and our keeper was MOTM in that game.
Our performances have been trash, we've ground out points against bottom feeders but our only impressive result was against United .. who have been terrible, especially at home.
The table is irrelevant this early on, I'm much more interested in performances and how we have played when it counts.
No, he's just not nearly as good as people think he is.
We might finally get 3 English teams in European semi-finals I wouldn't fancy us against either Arsenal or Spurs sadly.
I wouldn't fancy us against either Arsenal or Spurs sadly.Spurs are still an excellent side but this group missed its window of opportunity for winning a big trophy. Much like Arsenal, their golden chance was between 2014-2017 when City and United were both in down/transitional periods and Chelsea was good but also going through turmoil and generally there for the taking. Since then, the side has been stagnating or getting slightly worse while others around them - particularly City and Liverpool- have been getting much better.
Finding world class or near world class players is very hard for any club that can't just buy the finished article but doing so is largely the product of chance. No club can expect to find one of the world's best strikers in their own youth system with regularity. They also found a number of excellent to world class players on very cheap transfers in a four year time period - Vertonghen, Dembele, Eriksen, Alli, Alderweireld - and there isn't much indication in the broader history of the Levy ownership group that this level of success in the transfer market represents some kind of organizational advantage in the market over other clubs rather than having some lucky strikes clump together due to the vagaries of statistical chance.
They need to keep some parts of the core (Kane, Eriksen, Alli) and replace the others (Vertonghen, Alderweireld, Dembele) with players of similar quality. But this is going to be very very hard, as even players who signed new contracts can easily leave given player power in football and finding players with the quality of the latter three is not easy even if you have money to spend. And even if they pull all this off, they are likely not going to be good enough to compete with City for the next couple years.
The new stadium will help them in the future with revenues but competing at the top requires putting together a group of world class players and even with more revenue I think its likely that we won't see another Spurs squad this good - at least in terms of the quality of their first XI - for quite a while.
Finding world class or near world class players is very hard for any club that can't just buy the finished article but doing so is largely the product of chance. No club can expect to find one of the world's best strikers in their own youth system with regularity. They also found a number of excellent to world class players on very cheap transfers in a four year time period - Vertonghen, Dembele, Eriksen, Alli, Alderweireld - and there isn't much indication in the broader history of the Levy ownership group that this level of success in the transfer market represents some kind of organizational advantage in the market over other clubs rather than having some lucky strikes clump together due to the vagaries of statistical chance.
They need to keep some parts of the core (Kane, Eriksen, Alli) and replace the others (Vertonghen, Alderweireld, Dembele) with players of similar quality. But this is going to be very very hard, as even players who signed new contracts can easily leave given player power in football and finding players with the quality of the latter three is not easy even if you have money to spend. And even if they pull all this off, they are likely not going to be good enough to compete with City for the next couple years.
The new stadium will help them in the future with revenues but competing at the top requires putting together a group of world class players and even with more revenue I think its likely that we won't see another Spurs squad this good - at least in terms of the quality of their first XI - for quite a while.
Last edited:
All that being said though, we have been fecked in the injury department.
And on the big occasions against top quality sides, missing a few of your key players at once can make it very difficult to compete.
And on the big occasions against top quality sides, missing a few of your key players at once can make it very difficult to compete.
Another reason why I think you are being a bit harsh - we have had rotten luck with injuries as you say but are still managing to get the results. We would need to be at full strength and in good form to beat the top teams we have come against and simply have not been in that position unfortunately so we have slipped up.
I'm just being honest to be fair. I don't think we've been a disaster this season by any means (we're clearly keeping up with the rest of the pack) but I can't pretend to be impressed, and I do think the whole 'best start to a pl season ever' is very deceptive, that's just how I see it.
Our injury issues shouldn't have led us to losing after taking the lead against both Inter and Watford, nor should it have led to us failing to win tonight. Barcelona & Liverpool? I'll give those games a pass, two quality sides in games where we were missing several key men. Had we won those three (Inter, Watford, PSV) we would be looking at an excellent season, and like I said you can't blame injuries for those results.
Maybe I am being harsh, but it just feels like we've completely thrown the CL away, which is a huge disappointment given how we did last season (Yes, we lost to Juve .. but I still was extremely proud of the team against a very experienced, top European team who have reached 2 finals in recent years) and feels like a step back. We should be learning from these experiences, but we're not. We keep making the same mistakes, keep throwing away games from comfortable positions, it's not fecking acceptable.
The fact we've had our best start ever and yet aren't even in the top four tells me that it's a misleading fact. The top sides this season are dispatching with the bottom half sides with ease, the difference will come from the big occasions and I've hardly been encouraged by us so far. Yes, I do expect us to improve when players come back and we hit our stride, but if performances don't start picking up soon I think supporters are right to be worried. Points may be coming at the moment, but how long can we go on performing poorly but still getting results? We are continually getting exposed by sides who have an ounce of quality.
I am really disappointed with Kane despite scoring today. He is playing well below his reputation, and I am beginning to question if he is not overrated. A World Cup top scorer should be enjoying a stream of bids for him, but I can't see that happening with Kane on current performances.
Tottenham has an ability to throw away matches that never cease to astonish me, their matches are so often accidents waiting to happen. Today it was a joke, they managed to throw away the match and most importantly the qualification because of the moronic plays of eriksen and the half wit french keeper they have. What annoys me the most is that they most likely gifted the qualification to Inter
I remember posters saying we need Toby because none of our CBs can handle pressing. He couldnt handle it tonight. In fact I cant remember the last time one of our CBs was tackled by someone pressing them resulting in a goal like that. Very poor
3 penalties, a deflection that he knew nothing about and a tap in from 3 yards after his team mates shot was pushed into his path. These made up 5 of his 6 goals. He wasn’t great at the WC at all. Average at best.
The worst golden boot win in WC history.
No he is coming to United says Mr R. Cafe
Was it Torres in a recent tournament who won the golden boot by scoring 5 goals, but 4 of them were against San Marino or something like that
Edit: 2013 confed cup. 4 goals out of his 5 total came in a 10-0 win over Tahiti.
He's had a poor start to the season but anybody questioning whether he's overrated on the back of that is being extremely premature. He's proven season after season how good he is, and even this season has scored a few/had a couple of excellent games.
Players, even the best, go through bad periods. I agree that his performances right now are not great, but I'm 99% sure it will click for him eventually. The whole team is lacklustre at the moment. He still has five league goals (only 2 behind top scorer) and I think being productive when clearly not being on form is a pretty good sign of a top player.
He always seems to have a clanger in him.
Pochettino should try and get them to finish bottom and avoid the Europa League and just concentrate on the League.
7 in 11 and that's a poor start to the season. I wouldn't worry too much.
Torres Golden Boot in the 2012 Euros was pretty bad too.Was it Torres in a recent tournament who won the golden boot by scoring 5 goals, but 4 of them were against San Marino or something like that
Edit: 2013 confed cup. 4 goals out of his 5 total came in a 10-0 win over Tahiti.
He usually starts slow too
Yeah i know. I hope we don't sign him, as I can totally see that going the Schneiderlin way if we do. Has had a couple of great seasons, but around those seasons he hasn't been that great. He isn't a natural defender to me, and his physical attributes or even his composure and passing isn't so good it carries him through bad form very well, imo. Good defender tho, but its that thing of people making players out to be what they want them to be when they probably aren't just that, until he is in our team then they turn on him.
I think he just has some big holes in his game compared to the other CBs around and of course his form has been bad for a couple of seasons. I doubt what happened last night would be happening every week if we signed him, but yeah its not a good sign when he messes up what posters are suggesting he'd bring to the team. When you're messing up on whats considered your strong point, your weak points are going to be extremely annoying.Yeah i know. I hope we don't sign him, as I can totally see that going the Schneiderlin way if we do. Has had a couple of great seasons, but around those seasons he hasn't been that great. He isn't a natural defender to me, and his physical attributes or even his composure and passing isn't so good it carries him through bad form very well, imo. Good defender tho, but its that thing of people making players out to be what they want them to be when they probably aren't just that, until he is in our team then they turn on him.
Milan Baros won it at Euro 2004 with a whopping 5 goals.Was it Torres in a recent tournament who won the golden boot by scoring 5 goals, but 4 of them were against San Marino or something like that
Edit: 2013 confed cup. 4 goals out of his 5 total came in a 10-0 win over Tahiti.
Was it Torres in a recent tournament who won the golden boot by scoring 5 goals, but 4 of them were against San Marino or something like that
Edit: 2013 confed cup. 4 goals out of his 5 total came in a 10-0 win over Tahiti.
what a way to win the Golden Boot. By hammering the worst team in the tournament 10-0.He is a good player and for a decent price I would take him but reading the caf you would think that he is Beckenbauer and Baresi rolled into one player.
Well reading CAF you would think many CBs who plays for different teams are Beckenbauer and Baresi rolled into one player.
Spurs have changed the way they play too with Moura being more involved up front so Kane isn't getting into the box as much or getting on the ball as much as he used to. Similar to when he was dropping deep at the World Cup, it just affects his performances and reduces his threat.
It's noticeable too that's he's dropping much deeper. Waste if you ask me, if you have a goalscorer like Kane, do everything you can to build the team around him.
Great plan. So they can finish 4th this season? And then fail again in CL next season?
I hate modern football.
Yeah absolutely feck that.
I would much, much rather win the Europa League than get top four. We need a trophy, the competition is no longer a joke and has seen some decent sides win it recently, with some solid sides competing. Let's give it a go ffs.
Of course, the fact it's stronger makes it much more difficult to win, and we would not be favourites. But let's at least give it a go and give the fans something to be excited about this season, because quite honestly with us already messing up the CL and the chances of a title challenge being nil, this season could very quickly become a damp squib where getting fourth is our only target.
If we qualify and Pochettino doesn't take it seriously, I'll be disgusted. We are not above the competition by any stretch of the imagination.
My one concern with us trying to poach him off you guys. Considering the lack of trophies he's picked some awful teams in the domestic cups rather than try and win them, smaller squad or not.
Quadruple gone
Serves that penny pinching scrote Levy right.
Failure to invest in the summer left them with a paper-thin squad and they'll continue to pay the price until the end of the season. Even if the new stadium has a cheese room, who gives a feck if they crumble at the first sign of pressure/ injuries.
Alderweireld and Eriksen running down their contracts doesn't bode well for them either. That's at least £100 million+ of talent they'll have to replace.
Spurs will always be an 'almost' team.
Failure to invest in the summer left them with a paper-thin squad and they'll continue to pay the price until the end of the season. Even if the new stadium has a cheese room, who gives a feck if they crumble at the first sign of pressure/ injuries.
Alderweireld and Eriksen running down their contracts doesn't bode well for them either. That's at least £100 million+ of talent they'll have to replace.
Spurs will always be an 'almost' team.
Spurs bottle it again.
Losing on penalties is bottling it now?