L’Arse 5-2 Spurs: Sitting Deep and the Crouch Reboot
Awkward. Maybe we should begin at the beginning…
The Glorious First Five Minutes
Ah, ‘twas a pleasure to be a Tottenham fan. Our heroes produced some ovely stuff. Swift, slick passing; patient but pacey; sideways if necessary but probing forward whenever opportunity even threatened to knock. L’Arse struggled to focus upon the little leather orb, and the whole thing was crowned with a delightfully typical Tottenham goal, albeit aided by quite extraordinarily inept defending.
Alas, what followed was downright blasted awful.
The Crouch Approach
Having spent all season passing the bejesus out of opponents, our heroes hit on the dubious tactic this afternoon of eschewing pretty passing for a slightly less refined approach of smacking the ball heavenwards towards Saha and Adebayor, and hoping that by hook, crook, chest or gangly limb the ball would somehow or other stick there. There was something eerily Crouch-esque about the whole thing, evoking painful memories of unpleasant hoicks that pybassed our midfield and ruled out any opportunity for us to play our natural passing game on the green stuff.
Further woe was to be had by the collective decision of the midfield to station themselves Alamo-style some 10-15 yards ahead of their own penalty area and wait for l’Arse to attack. The rationale was presumably to allow for counter-attack revelry, but the effect was instead to invite relentless pressure upon poor old Friedel and his worryingly popular net. Every time we cleared to halfway, l’Arse were able to amble forward at will into the final third, and catastrophe duly ensued.
More Grumbles
Curiously, the sending-off of Parker in the dying embers was a darned sight harder to swallow here at AANP Towers than any of the unabated awfulness that had preceded it. United at home next week are beatable, but sans Parker it becomes a lot less likely. (On which note, Sandro looked every inch a man who hasn’t played in a month or two, all misplaced passes and niggly fouls.)
The “winning” of the penalty by Bale was also disappointing. If ultra slow-mo, zoomed in replays prove there was contact I’ll happily retract – but to this disgruntled viewer it appeared that Bale took a dive, which would be cheating, and not for the first time. Not at this club, please. Bale in particular is comfortably good enough to excel by fair means rather than foul. On a brighter note, the handsome young Welshman’s turn of pace in the first place was outstanding, matching the excellence of the pass from Modric.
Returning however to the grisly business of head-shaking and repeated tutting, the initial team selection seemed at the time a tad curious, and in hindsight fairly ill-judged. Saha upfront instead of VDV was a bold call, particularly away from home, but was understandable to a degree, in terms of giving the centre-backs all manner of complexities (and a goal within five minutes provided a degree of vindication). The selection of Kranjcar ahead of Lennon will require a little more explanation in order to placate the teeth-gnashers of AANP Towers, particularly if the plan really was to play swiftly on the counter-attack.
Punters Across The Nation Stare Quizzically At Their “’Arry for England” Placards
Silver lining? A 0-0 against Stevenage followed by a thrashing in our local derby – from 2-0 up, and despite two significant half-time managerial changes – have probably done as much to slow down ‘Arry’s charge towards England management as anything else will all season. In truth however, this is no sort of positive at all (and nor is it likely to make the slightest difference to the summer’s managerial moves).
Despite all this, there is no particular need to panic. Play this way every week and I’ll happily send out the memo that the time is ripe for every man and his dog in the N17 area to scuttle around like headless chickens. However, resume normal service next week, and continue until the end of the season, and this whole episode could have attached to it a post-it note marked “Blip”. An unsightly mess for sure, but this lot can and do perform a whole lot better each week.
February 26th, 2012 at 5:06 pm
The best Spurs team in living memory.
The worst Arsenal team anyone can remember - and Arsenal still put five past the poor old Spurs.
I’m a neutral, but you Spurs fans need to get over yourselves. One good run in the league doesn’t make you a great team over night.
If I were you I’d be seriously worried about an implosion now.
February 26th, 2012 at 5:28 pm
Exactly not even 1 good season yet because there’s still so much points at stake.I believe arsenal will finish above you lot. Worse arsenal team ever just smashed beat spurs team ever!
February 26th, 2012 at 5:39 pm
i intermittently watch your games, you play really good, but today after two goals of yours i saw arse laughing on your puzzled face….what was it????
February 26th, 2012 at 5:42 pm
btw congrats to arse…you didnt put your legacy in shame…and tottenhams you need to do hell of a hardwork if you dont wanna tumble down the same lane of yours…
February 26th, 2012 at 5:52 pm
Wait for this! What does Portsmouth and West Ham have in common?? They have all gone under after being managed by ‘Arry.
I am not really surprised that Spurs are competing for players in the transfer mkt with the likes of City and Chelsea coz that’s what ‘Arry does…..Leave you in a deep mess!
February 26th, 2012 at 6:18 pm
Noggin - you have a point but this defeat was largely due to harrys tactics. You cannot play 4 4 2 against arsenal where 3 of your 4 midfielders are attacking, and 1 of those 3 does not have pace orm, great movement or passing (kranjaer). he then puts 2 unfit players on. Would rather have had Lennon and Livermore playing, and bale needs to stick wide left.
February 26th, 2012 at 6:43 pm
Well that’s a derby for you. Interesting that all the pre match talk about Spurs being better for the first time ignored the recent results between them where Spurs did much better than Arsenak despite Arsenal being deemed the better side. Derbies are like this, and despite the result today, it is still obvious that only RVP from today’s Arsenak team would get in the current Spurs team. As an example - Walcott is considered a waste of space by’most Arsenal supporters but he scores two! The fill season table will really tell us who is best.
February 26th, 2012 at 6:58 pm
Having seen the replays, someone needs to tell Bale to STOP DIVING AND FEIGNING INJURY! He’s becoming an embarrassement to us. Oh yeah, and he was shit today and has to stop believing the hype! Someone wants to offer £50m - sell sell sell. He’s a 10 good games a season man. F***ing sickenting day. No guts and a genuine belief we could just turn up and swagger our way thru it.
February 26th, 2012 at 7:08 pm
The team that wanted it more, took the prize.. was a little dubious about the starting line-up:
Saha for me cannot get a start before Vdv and Defoe. The two up front is what cost us, as thru out the season the team has been adapting to the one up top and then don’t u know it, one good game against Newcastle reserves and we abandon what has gotten us thru so far.
Bale gets on my nervous ..wht the fu** is he doing in the middle of the park, hes a galloping horse with a mighty hoof, ‘thats it! ‘.. how many games does the manager need to see this, im just a ‘normal guy’ and see this asplain as day..no lennon and Kranjcar is a fill in player at best..
to be fair they went for it, we never..
Ledley - is not the same man
coyfs
February 26th, 2012 at 9:15 pm
What time is it?
Oh yeah, Five to….
February 26th, 2012 at 9:26 pm
spurs where awful, and that “diving diva” bale needs to get his head streight, i used to like him, but he is sutch a cheat!!! should have had a yellow-card for diving, and that was no penalty. arsenal was far better, and if this is all that spurs have against top teams, with 12 games to go, they will strugle to get into top 4. after x-mas spurs has not been that good, 4 victories out of 10 games is awful. and lately we are starting to take an early lead, than defending and going for counter atacking? why? and long ball up to ade? it is like crouch never left. congrats to arsenal, they where deserved winners by far. and to all the spurs fans, please stop telling everybody about how good our side is, and how mutch we are going to win, and how easy it will be.than we get demolished, will you people never learn???? there are some of us out there who get embarresed by that.i am a spurs fan, but that doesnt mean i have to be an idiot!!!
February 29th, 2012 at 6:35 pm
Remarkably balanced and indeed humorously reflective stuff.
We know that form goes out the window in derby games but not to that extent.
Noggin has a point or two and Arsenal have three.
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