Chadli – All Action, No Plot

Such is life I suppose, but AANP is remarkably sanguine about the Late Own-Goal Fiasco. Mellowing with age, no doubt.

Dembele > Bentaleb

Pre kick-off, hearty roars of approval could be heard to resonate from every corner of the globe, as news filtered through that Bentaleb had been jettisoned and Dembele selected in his stead. No doubt a startled and dismayed Bentaleb instinctively looked sideways and backwards and backwards and sideways for explanations when the news was broken to him, but Sunderland away was no time for such unproductive ambling. All the possession in the world is of little use if we get nowhere near the opposition net, and while Bentaleb would presumably react to such a sentiment by slamming his hands on his ears and howling in dismay, Dembele dithers not. Straight from kick-off the chest was puffed out, opponents bounced off him and every time he received possession he looked to drive forward, and a positive tone was duly struck.

The Attacking Triumverate

Matters were also helped no end by the attacking triumvirate of Chadli, Eriksen and Lamela. Where two weeks ago Chadli and Eriksen in particular flittered around with all the menace and intent of a pair of particularly absent-minded butterflies, yesterday the two of them and Lamela brought with them bucketloads of brio and gusto, and proceeded to slosh it all around the park with gay abaondon.

If there were a pocket of space in between Sunderland’s defence and midfield one or more of that lot were popping up in it, and if there were a cute, eye-of-the-needle pass in the vicinity you could bet every last penny plus a couple of stamps that the aforementioned would be trying their darnedest to deliver it.

Frankly, everything went swimmingly from start, through the middle, via a couple of sub-plots and just about all the way until finale. But dash it all, instead of running riot and popping away the six or so goals we more or less merited, things went vaguely awry each time at the final hurdle. The ball would ping off the woodwork, or splat against the chest of that gormless goalkeeper without him even realising. A last-ditch tackle here, a narrow miss there, and before you knew it we had conceded a bally own goal of all things, and were left wandering off at the final whistle scratching our heads in bewilderment.

The Exciting World Of Vlad Chiriches

Presumably Master Vertonghen had a stubbed toe or man-flu or some other such malady, to explain his absence from the entire squad. As a result, young Chiriches bounded up to the plate, and promptly convinced himself yet again that this was a school playground and his name was Pele. Paying scant attention to the basic principles of defending the lad simply could not prevent himself from trying to dribble past everyone in sight every time he touched the ball. Here is a bean who no doubt grew up watching and re-watching that Saudi lad from World Cup ’94 who picked up the ball in his own half and ran the length of the pitch before scoring. The law of averages suggests that one day Chiriches will do the same, and I rather hope we stick with him because in the medium-term a ball-playing centre-back is not to be sniffed at. But at present the chap ought to have the word ‘CALAMITY’ written across the back of his shirt, because his penchant for dribbling into trouble is as predictable as it is hilarious.

Chins Up, What?

Back to the grand scheme of things, and disappointment aside I that in the marathon that is The Pochettino Era this represented another vaguely successful outing. Two points dropped no doubt, but given that we will regularly face teams looking to sit back and stifle the dickens out of us, the performance was encouraging. Sideways passes and meaningless possession can go boil their own heads, for there was creativity by the sackful here.

Shameless Plug Alert – AANP’s own book, Spurs’ Cult Heroes, continues to retail at Amazon and Waterstones, hint hint.

I would imagine that unborn children leapt in their mothers’ wombs on Sunday, given that we managed to produce our slickest display since ‘Arry was last at the Lane. One could barely move for an interchange of cunning short passes between our heroes that had the QPR players spinning in circles and crashing into each other – the third goal in particular being notable for being the first in history to be preceded by literally a million uninterrupted passes.

This interplay was largely facilitated by the manner in which our heroes buzzed around off the ball like a swarm of particularly indignant white-clad bees. So often the scourge of Tottenham teams in the last couple of seasons, when possession has swung drearily from right to left and back again, due to all and sundry standing idly – and statically – by with fingers up nostrils and hands on hips, this time off-the-ball movement abounded.

Every bit as pleasing as this was the almost demented fashion in which our lot beavered away when QPR were in possession. Sycophantic fawning toward the new manager it may have been, but Messrs Lamela and Eriksen, hardly renowned as the brawn-laden, ball-winning terriers of the team, seemed absolutely demented in their pursuit of QPR ankles at which to snap – one such Eriksen challenge pilfering possession and setting in motion our opening goal.

As well as off-the-ball movement, another wrong of previous seasons that was promptly righted was popping away a goal bright and early. Last year our lot seemed to think it against the rules of the thing, but on Sunday early domination was duly turned into an opening goal at the ungodly hour of ten minutes past kick-off. On top of which, they then flicked the switch to ‘Clinical’ and turned dominance into so many goals that the thing was over by half-time. Where will it all end?

Elsewhere on the pitch

Lamela quite rightly earned himself the drool of a thousand seasoned observers, finally starting to resemble the hero of all those Youtube clips we pored over last summer. The lad also seems to have mastered the curious art of sporting four different hairstyles simultaneously, but young people will do such things.

Young Master Chadli took his chances with aplomb, or indeed several plombs, and there were further reasons, at both ends of the pitch, to muse that Daws-out-Dier-in will prove one of the niftier pieces of transfer legerdemain that the N17 Brains Trust ever produce.

Most sensationally however, AANP has considered issuing a grovelling apology to one D. Rose Esquire. While it would be stretching things a mite to suggest that he has morphed into one of the elite, his pirouette and delicious pass for Adebayor’s goal had me positively purring. Do that week in, week out from now until next May and I may well revise my opinion of the uncontrollably-limbed scamp.

Disproving the usual disclaimers

Of course, this being Tottenham and I being a follower, I had barely pootled along to the train station before all manner of gloomy caveats and disclaimers had sprung to mind – but then such dreary pessimism is what makes us Spurs fans so adorable, no? Thus did I muse that this was only QPR, and the season is but two games old, and we will probably have gone to rack and ruin by Christmas – but a voice seemed to whisper in my ear “Au contraire, AANP, not so.” And a dashed good point this imaginary friend made, for last season I bally well lost count of the number of times we dominated possession against second-rate opposition, looked a tad bereft of creativity and had our pockets picked by some bundled set-piece nonsense. So if this season our lot turn over two lowly teams, good on them. Six fewer points to worry about come May, and I dare say at least one of the (likely) Top Five will drop points at home to QPR at some point.

On top of all of which, our heroes sit pretty atop the tree. Absolutely spiffing stuff.

Shameless Plug Alert – AANP’s own book, Spurs’ Cult Heroes, continues to retail at Amazon and Waterstones, hint hint.