There has been quite a bit of hysteria since Sunday, a lot of talk about how average the squad is. Harking back to a few years ago. While true, we did have some excellent players such as Bale, Modric and Van Der Vaart, people forget we have also had the likes of Hutton, Palacios, Bassong, Crouch, Pav, Gomes, Friedel, Parker, Defoe, Keane (the PSM years) making regular appearances. What we did have over those years was a team set up to be balanced, with width and pace. Not necessarily the best players.
In my opinion the squad is good, but huge errors have been made by AVB, Sherwood, and now Poch.
The push for a narrow attacking unit - while in itself not a bad thing, heavily reliant on quality and pace in wide areas from the back.
I made my first article for a year last week, have a read, see what you think. For me, this is the reason we struggle. I'm not having it that all our players are average.
In a nutshell, until Walker is back, then we need to get that pace and width from elsewhere, as neither Dier or Naughton will provide it. It will upset a lot of people, but Aaron Lennon is the immediate choice. Unfussy, unfashionable and English. Like Dawson and Huddlestone before him.
The players aren't average. The system is
posted on 9/1/15
The system hasn't changed.
He's dropped Ade, Capoue, and Dembele from the first team and we improved.
I can't believe you bumped this one
posted on 9/1/15
And Kaboul.. I could've sworn we played 4231 with inverted wingers when we beat Chelsea.
posted on 9/1/15
system hasn't changed, and if it has, its been very slight.
different is now poch has players buying into the system and making it work.
posted on 12/1/15
different is now poch has players buying into the system and making it work.
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If Saturday shows you how much its working, i'd rather go back to it being broken thanks .
posted on 12/1/15
100
posted on 12/1/15
Townsend was never an inverted winger v Chelsea
Did you even watch the game Bales?
posted on 12/1/15
LukaCorluka
I've never said Lennon is the saviour
What I did say was with Naughton or Dier at right back you need a good winger in front of him, and Lennon is the natural choice
I said I prefer one winger to play at all times, to stretch teams, not make us too narrow up top
Would you say I'm wrong looking at our best performances this season?
posted on 12/1/15
comment by Chicken - Mr Consistent✔ (U1043)
posted 55 minutes ago
different is now poch has players buying into the system and making it work.
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If Saturday shows you how much its working, i'd rather go back to it being broken thanks.
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one defeat and you piping up already.
mason and bentaleb are a big miss in cm... and in general it was just a poor poor performance and bottle job, regardless of system.
posted on 12/1/15
HRH,
No i don't think you're wrong in wanting to play with more width
I just thought you were wrong to think the system should change so Azza can play as a winger again and in the process displace 1+ of Chadli, Eriksen, Lamela or even Townsend.
Walker being back has helped a lot tbh
posted on 13/1/15
Chronic
one defeat and you piping up already.
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Isn’t it more a case of one good performance since how long, and you piped up in the first place?
Apart from the Chelsea game, I think the only times I have been content with the performance (not confusing results with actual performance) was against Newcastle in the cup and QPR at home.
And we can’t blame it on players missing – most clubs have their injury concerns and ACoN issues.