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The Squad

nayimfromthehalfwayline said:
Just reading over the transfer rumour thread (gave up last night at about 9) an stumbled across this:

JJetset nailed it

Ok here it is people.
Krasnic was off as he didnt want a loan. After i posted about Lazio it suddenly was back on again but unfortunately didnt happen.
Pienaar will now stay. [OK, got this one wrong bit it was last minute action so Ill forgive it - Harry said as much as well]
Saha (from leftfield) loan in also Ryan Nelson loan.
Bassong gone to Wolves on loan.
Pav has been sold (sorry Hottie).
Corluka loaned.

And then followed up later with this:
Here is his ITK for the summer:

Look at what we are doing short term and then salivate over the players we are trying to bring in.
Remy big bid went in today but got knocked back but is good for the summer
verthonghen- lined up
hazard is up to the player but we are in with a really really good shout
Leandro - on again off again every day

The last few windows have been excellent for clearing out and replacing players with cheaper and better players. We want to buy the next superstars not loan them.

If I were to give him credibility I would say it backs up the point I made above
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good point.

Looks like we are trying to build a solid base that could last us quite a few years.

assuming this all does to plan that is
 
nayimfromthehalfwayline said:
All in all I get the sense we are working towards a much better team by the start of the next season.
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The past 4 or so windows have seen us pass on upgrading our forward line drastically. VdV has been great, of course, but we've all been clamoring for someone to lead the line. For now, I'm over the most recent transfer window because we're currently third and we've been playing some gorgeous football, for the most part.

As for this summer, I think nayim is spot on here. There are so many different factors culminating when the season ends: Euro 2012, appointment of new England manager and the uncertainty of who our manager will be for next season, squad spaces that have just been cleared out to make way for new signings/perhaps some retiring players in the summer, more certainty about the direction the new stadium is heading (and its funding).

This summer will be a busy time indeed in terms of transfers. What I am still iffy about is whether Modric still would want to leave in the summer, even if we finish above Chelsea.

The two players I'd really like to see playing for Spurs next season are Vertonghen and Mateo Kovacic. I'm not too sure about which goalie we should go for, and as for forwards, I would love one big signing and one decent (for our high standards) striker to partner up with him.
 
It's all well and good looking at the future and all these great big plans for next season but why are people looking so far ahead when we haven't even achieved anything this season yet?

It's all well and good saying "oh yeah well we've cleared players out with the intention of buying all these world class talents in the summer" but what happens if it all goes tits up from now until the end of the season and we don't even make the champions league? Eden hazard will suddenly turn into James Morrison, Leandro and Remy will forgotten and in will come Kenywne Jones and some random foreigner and players like Bale and Luka will be saying "well thanks spurs but i'm off to play CL football and win titles". Letting go of good squad players and not bringing in replacements in a bad move no matter what way you want to twist it (especially with our dodgy injury record). I mean look what happened after the Wigan game ffs, 3 players already injured (one being Walker with his replacement shipped out).
 
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My problem with what we did yesterday is:
Gallas - injured?
King - permanently injured, can't wheel him out every week
Nelsen - not played since being injured
Dawson - returning from being injured
Kaboul - mercifully uninjured at the moment, but may need to fill in for Walker who's injured.

Maybe I'm being overly pessimistic, but this is Spurs, we've always got injuries. Bassong and Charlie at least offered us some cover across the back. It just seems an odd risk to take.

We're all looking to the summer and building from then, but I'm not quite done with this year yet, we've got a decent shout on two fronts still (being overly optimistic now probably). I'll be pretty tinkled if we slip back, or miss a great opportunity, because we're having to play Sandro or Thudd as a makeshift CB.
 
africanspurs said:
stellar post nayim, nice.

your reasoning is correct but i think there could be many right answers to this question and all of them be different

for instance, yes we have trimmed the squad and removed players that rarely featured but if you look at the squad, we are light in the wingers department. could we have done something about that? maybe. so right now we face liklehood of various 'wonky' formations (which i like but i feel its important we have two strikers in it)...where this season alot of our success has come due to the performances of our wingers

i think the main issue for me is that if we had a back to lennon and bale..it would take three injuries to eradicate our wing play. now its just two..and both players tend to have injury spell frequently if history is to point the way
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I dont disagree, it was an issue last summer and remains an issue now - we failed to capitalise on the opportunity. That said, Pienaar just didnt fit our idea of wing play at all, so we havent lost out - just havent improved. If you were to read the 'One player this window...' thread you will note I said I would go for Hoilett who represents more able cover to both wings than anyone in our squad.

One thing not discussed here though is alternative strategies, we have this season seen Redknapp employ 352 to play with width and 433 quite regularly (a formation where the likes of Kranjcar, Saha, VDV, Defoe... can operate well) so there are options. Our squad can adapt to these comfortably.



africanspurs said:
Then there is the defender area......charlie? i'm actually very dissapointed with that and can only assume that its something that happened behind the scenes where he let them know he was very unhappy and they did him a service and let him leave. but we have no back up now for walker that will still leave us with enough CB coverage to overcome injuries to king , gallas, or dawson. kaboul would now be the makeshift RB cover.

the only plus side is that charlie never really featured so intangibles and training aside it would be hard to quantify how much he has helped us this season if you get my meaning.

bassong? he actually got used a significant amount of times for the last orders at the bar type player, in which case it means his position was infact needed. he was young athletic and dirty when he needed to be. good CB cover.....we've replaced him with nelsen, an experienced CB.......i know nothing of him to give a true opinion. he could be a good defender in our team and system , who knows.......

but to get rid of two defenders that were young and in their prime respectively, that could come in and do a job to uefa qualification and even Cl level (yes charlie and bassong DID get us top 4 AND set records people) and replace them only with one ageing player? its dicey but i'll back harry's play
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Corluka was one of my favourite players, on a personal level Im very disappointed he has gone. Big fan of his. That said, he simply hasnt got games, has he?

In his absence the likes of Kaboul and Livermore can do credible jobs, and have in fact been preferred to him already this season.

I like Bassong, I think he has great potential and was fabulous in our 4th finish season. That said, since then his lack of game time has shown him to look shaky and unsure when he has had appearances.

I would hope Nelsens "old head" and experience will prove him to be a more reliable back up (and he is only back up after all) for the next few months.

africanspurs said:
up front? i am more than happy with what we did there

all in all this window coudl definately have been better....but i am not really upset by it. i feel this is a reality we were always going to have to deal with. i dont have my head in the clouds thinking that EVERYONE in our squad needs to be top 4 quality. quite frankly thats flimflam. but i did hope we could keep the squad we had , get rid of the waste men and replace them with good value players
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Which is more or less what we have done IMO.

Slight aside to that, looking at next season - what potential!

Nelsen makes way and the young, exciting, quality Caulker comes in to start to make his way to the team.

Walker is supported (and pushed) by Naughton who has so far (and rather quietly) had a fantastic season at Norwich. He offers similar attributes to Walker, so should Walke rbe out - we are still flying.

We will have room in the squad to look at top quality forwards. Take the Remy bid as an example, a promising up and coming player who offers class and versatility up front.

Attempts to get Krasic. Not a player I know well myself, but based on reputation a real talent. Even tenuous links to Hazard.

If these are the sort of targets we are building toward introducing to the squad then I am delighted.

We will have class and full on flexibility - total football like!
 
Kingdawson said:
Good thread AS. Ok i look at it like this...................

1) Saha in and Pav out = A 6.5-7 out of 10 for me. I'm a fan of Saha but i pray his fitness will be good these next few months. Pav is a nothing player and we'll lose absolutely nothing with his departure imo so yeah i'm mildly happy with this one.

2) Corluka out = 3 out of 10 for me. Poor decsion to let a player go when we do not have another natural rb in the squad. Charlie will always be a class rb in my eyes and i hope he tears the German League up. The reason it even gets a 3 is because i'm also happy with either Kaboul or Gallas playing there.

3) Pienaar leaving = 1 out of 10. Lamest decision ever. We pick up injuries regularly (especially in midfield) and are now down to the bare bones and whats more it was so so unnecessary. We now have no player in the squad that can play on either wing and is very good defensively to call from the bench if we're leading. We now have to rely on Giovani Dos Santos, a player that Arry has stated time and time again that his heads not in it and he really has to move on. He's the only player on the bench that provides genuine pace down the wings (even though it's painfully obvious he can't play on the wing in a 4-4-2). In a 4-3-3 though? hmmmm well theres hope.

4) Bassong out and Nelson in = 4-10. More unhappy then happy for sure. We're relying on a player thats injury record is seriously bad. I rated Bassong and tbh i rate Nelson VERY highly when fit. He's very smart and doesn't suffer from lapses of concentration BUT CAN HE STAY FIT?
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Okay , i see you're not happy in what went on. It all depends how you want to swallow the news. i agree though that the bassong and charlie departures were less than ideal, they were bad moves if i were to be honest BUT if nelsen is indeed a good player to have playing next to a game changer then we wont have lost out that much cause kaboul can 'do a job' there. ledley king and dawson have a knack of making good partnerships with clever / experienced players. so nelsen could work out.

a stretch but it is a possibility

i'm actually not going to lose too much sleep over pienaar. which is sadly very hypocritical of me cause i value all round contribution above moments of genious...but i genuinely feel better than niko is going to be coming on the pitch more now that pienaar isnt here. the bad thing is that like you say..we now have no winger that can offer good defensive cover.
 
Kingdawson said:
It's all well and good looking at the future and all these great big plans for next season but why are people looking so far ahead when we haven't even achieved anything this season yet?

It's all well and good saying "oh yeah well we've cleared players out with the intention of buying all these world class talents in the summer" but what happens if it all goes tits up from now until the end of the season and we don't even make the champions league? Eden hazard will suddenly turn into James Morrison, Leandro and Remy will forgotten and in will come Kenywne Jones and some random foreigner and players like Bale and Luka will be saying "well thanks spurs but i'm off to play CL football and win titles". Letting go of good squad players and not bringing in replacements in a bad move no matter what way you want to twist it (especially with our dodgy injury record). I mean look what happened after the Wigan game ffs, 3 players already injured (one being Walker with his replacement shipped out).
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I think it depends purely on whether or not you are Mr Glass Half empty or Mr Half full.

At this point I suggest you are the former. I suspect you had built yourself up for fireworks and this is the inevitable bump back to reality leaving you down in the dumps.

IMO we certainly arent weaker. And the moves suggest strategy, something Ive longed to see here in a long time.
 
nayimfromthehalfwayline said:
I think it depends purely on whether or not you are Mr Glass Half empty or Mr Half full.

At this point I suggest you are the former. I suspect you had built yourself up for fireworks and this is the inevitable bump back to reality leaving you down in the dumps.

IMO we certainly arent weaker. And the moves suggest strategy, something Ive longed to see here in a long time.
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Generally i'm a "Glass half full" type of person but on this occasion i simply cannot be. If we had swapped Saha for Pav and nothing else i would have been happy, hell if we had done no business i would have been ok with it and would have spun it positively but i can't on this occasion. Tbh i think i would have found a way to spin it positively if we had done everything we did do but kept Pienaar.
 
Our first 11 is as good as any in the Premier League, better than most.
Only weaknesses I see in the squad are at right back with no recognised back up for Walker and up front.
Looking forward to the summer we have more than enough in defence and midfield, with Naughton having a great season at Norwich (playing really well at both right and left back), and Caulker do so well at centre back for Swansea.
In midfield I think we have the best list of of players in the league. Bale, Modric, Parker, Sandro, Huddlestone, VDV & Lennon are world class, backed up on occasions by Kranky and Livermore.
It's up front that we have problems, we'll most likely not keep Ade, so we're left with Defoe and Kane. If we're going to have a proper go at the CL we have to strengthen, which will mean spending a lot of cash on at least two strikers.

The side we currently have is certainly capable of winning the league, as long as we keep our front line strikers fit and in form.
 
nayimfromthehalfwayline said:
Why? Pienaar has made negligible impact since he joined. Its not like Bale left!
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I guess i rated him more then many on here. I said on the previous post that he was the only defensively solid 'wing or wide' midfielder that we had on the bench. Now we don't have that type of option to bring on from the bench should we need to. I also don't trust Gio (especially if we're playing a 4-4-2 as we might as well play with 10 men) so it's basically a choice of Lennon, Bale and Niko for those 2 spots.
 
papaspur said:
The past 4 or so windows have seen us pass on upgrading our forward line drastically. VdV has been great, of course, but we've all been clamoring for someone to lead the line. For now, I'm over the most recent transfer window because we're currently third and we've been playing some gorgeous football, for the most part.
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I just do not think that the players have been there to sign during those windows. Have any of our close rivals (apart from Emirates Marketing Project who we cannot compete in the transfer market with) improved their front line during that time?
 
Thing this whilst the squad looks good on paper, its aging and very injury prone.


GK
Friedel
Cudicini
Gomes

Defence
Walker - injured
Kaboul
Gallas - injury prone
King - injury prone
NELSEN - very injury prone and injured
Dawson - not the best of seasons for injuries
Assou Ekotto
Rose

Midfield
Huddlestone - recently injury prone
Parker
Modric
Sandro - a few long term niggles
Livermore
Kranjcar
Bale
Lennon - injury prone and injured
VDV - injury prone and injured

Forwards
Adebayor
Defoe - injured
SAHA - injury prone
Dos Santos - cannot be bothered an dwants to leave.

Kaboul is our only CB who seems to have had no fitness issues this season; the only one we can consistently rely on to not have long term niggles. We could potentially have Gallas, King and Nelsen all out or unfit.


Right now in midfield we have 6 people available to fit 5 spots (3cms and 2 Am/WF). However our game changes a lot if we have no pace available.

Up front we have 2 strikers and dos Santos fit to fit one spot. 2 of them can retain the ball in the air well; when we cannot do this it impacts our game a lot.


So realistically we are down to the bare bones carrying so many injury prone/oldish players.
 
Kingdawson said:
I guess i rated him more then many on here. I said on the previous post that he was the only defensively solid 'wing or wide' midfielder that we had on the bench. Now we don't have that type of option to bring on from the bench should we need to. I also don't trust Gio (especially if we're playing a 4-4-2 as we might as well play with 10 men) so it's basically a choice of Lennon, Bale and Niko for those 2 spots.
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Plus Rose and possibly Livermore
 
Kingdawson said:
I guess i rated him more then many on here. I said on the previous post that he was the only defensively solid 'wing or wide' midfielder that we had on the bench. Now we don't have that type of option to bring on from the bench should we need to. I also don't trust Gio (especially if we're playing a 4-4-2 as we might as well play with 10 men) so it's basically a choice of Lennon, Bale and Niko for those 2 spots.
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Without meaning to sound funny, Im not sure it matters how much you rate him. Look at how has (not) been used.

Pienaar has (2 games aside) made NO impact to our team. Redknapp hasnt used him at all and clearly doesnt want to.

On that basis alone, we havent lost out - because its more than likely Pienaar was simply not going to play regardless.

Look at Redknapps comment last night, Pienaar was going because Krasic was coming in (incidentally not a defensive type winger to my knowledge), then Pienaar wasnt going because Krasic deal was off. Then Pienaar went anyway. I think it was just never going to happen for him here.

All of that said, as I pointed out above - we have tactical changes to compensate as well. A midfield 3 from Modric, Huddlestone, Parker, Sandro, Livermore can cope with just about anything IMO with an attacking three from Adebayor, Defoe, Saha, VDV, Dos Santos, Kranjcar to do the business...
 
As much as we need cover, we could do with some impact players on the bench. Think that's were Krasic comes in.
 
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