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***OMT - Tottenham Hotspur v Borussia Dortmund - first leg***

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Pirate55 said:
This was our watershed moment. We conspicuously failed to grasp the opportunity . Why?

The answer to me at least is simple.

We didn't strengthen in two key positions in January. The two positions where we don't have like for like cover.

CF and DM.

We have no effective cover for Kane or Dier.

As many foretold and warned, we have to effectively rejig our team without them. So it proved against BD. We had no cover for our defense and no spearhead for our attack. We looked impotent in attack and frail in defense which a great BD team ruthlessly exploited to show how thin our squad really is.

Forget talk of the title. If we can get top three that would be a great achievement this season IMO.
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I don't think that a back up striker and defensive midfielder would have changed the result last night
 
Poch absolutely has my support steff that will never change and you're right we don't know the condition of the players except perhaps Lamela who was subbed for tactical reasons on Sat. But I can still be angry at yesterday and I still maintain it was folly at the start of the season to think we could use Chadli and Son as cover for Kane rather than an out and out striker. That we have got away with Kane not sustaining serious injury so far has not changed my view.
 
milo said:
I don't think that a back up striker and defensive midfielder would have changed the result last night
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Maybe not, but I really don't think we can get away with it for too much longer. Even the likes of Everton and Stoke will have big money to spend, not to mention United and possibly West Ham too. Trying to maintain with one recognised striker is short sighted IMO. We don't need wholesale changes, just a couple of additions here and there to bolster the squad.
 
Jurgen the German said:
Maybe not, but I really don't think we can get away with it for too much longer. Even the likes of Everton and Stoke will have big money to spend, not to mention United and possibly West Ham too. Trying to maintain with one recognised striker is short sighted IMO. We don't need wholesale changes, just a couple of additions here and there to bolster the squad.
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I think that we'll see that in the summer.
 
The "it's all about glory" people must remember it takes time. We have see great improvement so far this season but as we saw last night we are still some way off the top teams in Europe.

COYS
 
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thfcsteff said:
In the spirit of discussion my friend...I would wager that playing strong teams in the group stages was more like playing only a couple of 'fringe' player each time so as they could get up to speed with real time matches and experience. Fold them in gradually around established quality. Without EL this season, I doubt Tripper and Davies would've been able ready for so much rotation in the Prem from early winter on, Onuha wouldn't have been an option, Wimmer wouldn't have even had a couple of games before stepping in and up.
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That sounds on the money.

thfcsteff said:
I believe he will by who he wants as a backup forward player in the summer, and I don't think he can be blamed for giving Carroll and Mason a shot. Personally? Mason and Bentaleb all day, but sometimes mate, sometimes that meritocracy is more important in the long run to preserve squad unity and fairness..
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I've definitely seen evidence of that meritocracy approach over the season and I'm fully behind it, even if sometimes its to our detriment, e.g. starting Carroll against Saudi Sportswashing Machine after a stellar performance v Monaco. Longer term it reaped benefits as Carroll performed well over the Xmas period. But this time I have to say it was really pushing the boat out - I have to question it a little as it was sending us like lambs to the slaughter in my opinion.

thfcsteff said:
Finally, after two very hard games against West Ham and the goons, we have absolutely NO idea who was carrying knocks/in need of treatment/a rest, etc. I will tell you that us lay people could see Dier was absolutely knackered on Saturday, that Rose was carrying a knock, that Kane needed a breather, that Dembele is coming off an injury and might have risked rein jury trying to go 90 today and Alli too (suspended of course but would surely have been rested anyway).
..
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Again that all makes sense. When put like that you can almost see how we ended up with that starting line-up. I would question why Poch decided to fly out those members of the squad. We could've rested them completely by leaving them at home. I suppose had we done that it could've turned into a complete mauling by 5 or 6...
 
StephenH said:
The "it's all about glory" people must remember it takes time. We have see great improvement so far this season but as we saw last night we are still some way off the top teams in Europe.

COYS
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As a first XI i dont think we are, what we say was that against a good european side, some of those within our squad are not quite up to standard
 
NaijaSpurs said:
So next Thursday we have to play a full strength team, we need to be relentless. Whatever happens we strive to beat them at the Lane, and if we get knocked out we go out like warriors and are carried out on our shields.

At least let Dortmund know what it is like to play against the Great Tottenham Hotspur
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Well that is the least likely thing to happen. I can see a few debuts actually.
 
I still don't see why a change (ish) team couldn't allow for progression in this tie and still keep us fresh for the league.

Admittedly Dortmund away is extremely difficult at the best of times but we should have had a clear penalty at 1-0. Their player was constantly holding onto son (albeit relatively lightly) and then took him out from behind for good measure. The official simply bottled it and decided to ignore the entire incident and just give a goal kick. Criminal decision imo.

Personally I couldn't understand how or why benteleb did not start when the decision had clearly been taken to change much of the midfield. Yes he is not a natural holder but his extra presence deep in midfield would have been better than onamah imo (although I am a big onamah fan) and if we're in the business of resting players I would have thought lamela in for eriksen, plus he presses like a demon.

Those two additional changes coupled with that criminal decision from the 'referee' and we come out 2-1 behind at worst in my view.
 
I wouldn't have put it past the board that they said to Pot do what you like in the EL but just don't screw up finishing in the top 3 this season. 9 league games now and each one is huge.
 
milo said:
I think that we'll see that in the summer.
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A fair few of us said that last summer ...and again in January.

The squad is unbalanced. We let Capoue, Stambouli, Townsend, Prichard and Fazio go. We needed to buy a CF and DM to address key areas of weakness.

They may or may not have made a difference last night ( we will never know ) but they would make a significant difference in keeping key players fresh for the whole season and maintaining our competitiveness.
 
Bedfordspurs said:
Whilst I get the logic the issue I have is the points we have already dropped from playing in this tournament could be the ones that cost us the league!!! Games like Swansea away and poocastle and chelsea at home - that's 8 points dropped against poor sides after Europa straight away

Why play in the tournament to lose those league points and then give it up when it gets hard
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I am guessing that, earlier in the season, Poch gave the Europa almost as much priority as the league. He probably didn't assume that we'd be in the title race at the business end of the season. So then the Europa resumes, knockout stage away to Fiorentina - he picks pretty much the same XI he did last night. Because by the time the Europa League started again in February, it was clear that we are in the hunt for the league and Poch has decided to prioritise.

Before losing to Newcatle at home, we had our last group game against Monaco. Starting XI was:
-----------lloris
trippier---toby----wimmer---davies
--------dier-----carroll
---lamela-----onomah----njie
------------son

Dier was subbed just before half-time and Bentaleb came on, Lamela played for 60 mins, Chadli came on. Barely any difference in quality between this team and the ones that started v Fiorentina away or Dortmund away, except that we used Dier for 40 odd minutes against Monaco.

The team that started v Saudi Sportswashing Machine at home (changes in bold):

----------lloris
walker----toby---vert---rose
--------dier----carroll
lamela-----alli-----eriksen
-----------kane

After his good performance v Monaco, Poch rewarded Carroll with a start and, to be fair, we were winning 1-0 when he went off. It was a bad day at the office, but hard to blame the Europa for this one. 6 changes and we were 3-0 up by half-time, so for 45 mins the Monaco game was a glorified kickabout.

You have a point about the Qarabag away game, with Chelsea afterwards. Perhaps this was the game that made Poch decide to rotate more for Europa games and prioritise the league?
 
the dza said:
I am guessing that, earlier in the season, Poch gave the Europa almost as much priority as the league. He probably didn't assume that we'd be in the title race at the business end of the season. So then the Europa resumes, knockout stage away to Fiorentina - he picks pretty much the same XI he did last night. Because by the time the Europa League started again in February, it was clear that we are in the hunt for the league and Poch has decided to prioritise.

Before losing to Newcatle at home, we had our last group game against Monaco. Starting XI was:
-----------lloris
trippier---toby----wimmer---davies
--------dier-----carroll
---lamela-----onomah----njie
------------son

Dier was subbed just before half-time and Bentaleb came on, Lamela played for 60 mins, Chadli came on. Barely any difference in quality between this team and the ones that started v Fiorentina away or Dortmund away, except that we used Dier for 40 odd minutes against Monaco.

The team that started v Saudi Sportswashing Machine at home (changes in bold):

----------lloris
walker----toby---vert---rose
--------dier----carroll
lamela-----alli-----eriksen
-----------kane

After his good performance v Monaco, Poch rewarded Carroll with a start and, to be fair, we were winning 1-0 when he went off. It was a bad day at the office, but hard to blame the Europa for this one. 6 changes and we were 3-0 up by half-time, so for 45 mins the Monaco game was a glorified kickabout.

You have a point about the Qarabag away game, with Chelsea afterwards. Perhaps this was the game that made Poch decide to rotate more for Europa games and prioritise the league?
Click to expand...

You have to look at the results consistently over the years after Europa

It costs us time and time again and there is no logic. We rest players and still don't get a good result next game. We play at home in Europe and still lose to Saudi Sportswashing Machine who can't buy a win. It's a trance phenomenon but Temas that play in Europa and the EPL suffer afterwards in the league

We have to decide to go for it or not. It effects too many other things of importance
 
I'll be glad when this seasons over, it's been a disaster. The Chairman is mad, the manager is useless and the players are rubbish. I'm entitled to much better than this and I need more toys to throw out of my pram.
 
On reflection on last night i think it's clear that Poch is being very pragmatic from our season's point of view: i don't think anybody in their wildest dreams would have imagined that with 9 games to go we'd be 2nd in the table and 5 points off the top. Unbelievable achievement thus far and that has to be applauded.

I think he has seen where we are and is looking to preserve it so we don't have to play the Thursday-Sunday routine next season. We are just as close to Arsenal and Emirates Marketing Project as we are to Leicester and i think he realises (after twice not going top when given the chance in 4 days) that this squad is not up to winning the league and if we're not careful we could fall outside the top 3. I think that is what he is looking to preserve (not a title challenge; we're clearly not quite capable of that yet, esp given ours and our rival's fixtures).

In that context, i think his selection (whilst frustrating) was fair enough.
We need to solidify a top 3 finish so we can really have the best chance to buy one or two playrs that he wants and needs. In fact, it wouldn't surprise if the board have made assurances to him that if he achieves top 3 then they will effectively guarantee him that they'l bring in one or two long-term targets.

If that means we go back to a game a week, so be it.
COYS
 
Did you see the Dortmund players celebrating with the fans after the game? If a Europa League game can matter to them with their recent success then it can certainly matter to us!

I think the format has to change though, no more of this Thursday night gonads. Put it back to the old UEFA Cup format, and play the games on a Tuesday/Wednesday on a seperate week to the Champions League. Why can't they do this?
 
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