Barclays U21 - Spurs 4-0 WBA

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Word from the other side is that Cabellos and Parrett (and ANO - possibly Luongo - he did not play today) are going on loan to Swindon, so don't know if they are in the team today.

Spurs lost their unbeaten run in this phase of the league last week to Wolves (3-4) , after being 2-0 and 3-2 up.

Anyways ...

Spurs :

1 Miles (GK) , 2 Fredericks, 4 Fryers, 5 Hall, 3 Byrne; 6 Bentaleb,
8 Huddlestone, 10 Carroll; 7 McEvoy, 9 Coulthirst, 11 Munns

Subs : 12 Veljkovic, 13 Vigouroux (GK) , 14 Galifuoco, 15 Stewart

WBA :

1 Daniels (GK) , 2 Francis, 3 Smart, 4 Birch, 5 Atkinson, 6 C Jones, 7 Roofe, 8 Allan, 9 Sawyers, 10 Adil Nabi, 11 Brown.

Subs :

13 Lewis (GK) , 12 McCalla, 16 Samir Nabi, 15 Barrow, 14 Wedderburn


Spurs : Munns, McEvoy, Munns, Coulthirst


Terrible weather today.
Very strong wind from the north, and the first 5 mins had horizontal snow. If WBA had conceded then (against the wind) , the ref might have called off the game. So hoof was out of the question (the WBA GK leathered the ball up and it actually boomeranged in the wind ) .

For the entire game, Spurs mastered the conditions perfectly.
The passing was fast and controlled.

Notable (see the preamble) was that Cabellos/Luongo/Parrett did not play today, so given they are the core of the U21 MF, we would get some questions asked of the MF.

Hudd was in the team for some match fitness I guess.
Apart from a couple of impressive pinging passes (given the conditions) , his main contribution was a set of slow and clumsy challenges (the ref had to have words with him at one point) .

Spurs in the first half were tidy and patient for a while.
Bentaleb was really bossing the MF in defence, and starting attacks. McEvoy was going past their LB all the time.
Then the chances began to come.
The first serious effort was a header against the bar by Hall from a cross from the left. The first goal came from some very swift passing by Hudd and Carroll that sent Munns in to score down the middle.

After 25 mins, WBA started to play some more attacking football, and started to work the left hand side more (thru their No. 7) .


Second half saw Hudd replaced by Veljkovic, and later on Carroll by Galifuoco. Even though Spurs were playing into the wind, they now took complete control of the game. Munns and Byrne started working the left far better. The second goal came from their efforts, and the cross went across the box and McEvoy scored at the right post. Spurs (Galifuoco in particular) were playing some great cross-field passes from right to left that Coulthirst was controlling well at chest height.

The third goal came from some silky smooth passing around the outside of the box, with Carroll delivering a pass into the middle and Munns racing on to score from it.

Although Coulthirst was getting onto those cross-field passes, his final product once he got the ball to ground was lacking (too slow) . But on the third occasion he got the ball down and hit a shot before the WBA defence closed him down. 4-0 to Spurs.

A very assured performance from the kids.
The passing was sharp, fast, and tidy.
Munns in particular showed excellent ball control in the conditions.
Coulthirst pressed their back four well in the 1st half, and is looking more complete as a player with his 2nd half display.
The plaudits go to Bentaleb. he got stuck in all game doing DM work. His control and passing to break up the threats and get attacks quickly going was excellent.