Tag: Fraser Forster

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Spurs match reports

Everton 2-2 Spurs: Five Tottenham Talking Points

1. That Late Equaliser

Nothing quite wrenches the gut like conceding an added-time equaliser, what? If you don’t mind a remarkably early tangent, one of the oddities of such things is the change in narrative it brings about, with the great and good effortlessly swivelling from a narrative of Spurs showing spirit to grind out a win to, one set-piece later, Spurs’ lack of game management in one of their worst showings of the season.

Back to the wrenched gut, and when all concerned adopted their positions for that final free-kick, AANP would gladly have directed all three wishes from the nearest genie towards a Tottenham head getting to the ball first. Picture my delight then, when, upon delivery of the f.k., the head that rose to prominence belonged to one of our own, Cristian Romero taking a spot of initiative. It was high-fives all round at AANP Towers, Everton having seemingly been denied and the danger averted.

Alas, to my considerable consternation it quickly became evident that this was but the first element in a quite horrific two-parter. Romero’s part having been played well enough, the immediate sequel somehow saw the Everton laddie Branthwaite and poor old Vicario drawn together in close-quarter combat, with nary another soul in sight.

The mood at AANP Towers swiftly darkened. Vicario is a man of many goalkeeping (and, indeed, outfield) talents, the strings to his bow being rich and plentiful; but standing up to some brutish lump in a duel to the death is not amongst them. Vicario, already back-pedalling was duly flattened, as that Branthwaite creature skirted over the finer points and simply bundled into the net the ball, goalkeeper, self and anything else that happened to catch his eye. In neatly appropriate fashion, Vicario sustained a blow to the gut in the process.

So no blame attached to Romero; and while Vicario might have offered a bit more resistance (as shall be explored below) the damage by that point seemed already done. As such, the initial reaction was simply to bemoan the rotten luck of the ball looping so invitingly to an Everton head.

But a little further investigation revealed that in fact there were culprits galore dotted about the place.

The dashed free-kick in the first place. Review the footage and one notes Richarlison losing possession in his own half in the first place, which was unimpressive but I suppose not, at that stage terminal. Next, and after a spot of this and that amongst the principals, the responsibility for matters fell upon Kulusevski.

Having lost a 50-50, which was excusable enough, rather than try something constructive to redeem the situation, or indeed simply put his head down and chase back, Kulusevski took an unsubtle swipe at the legs of the Everton man from behind. It was comfortably the most knuckle-headed option on offer, being both utterly unnecessary whilst also presenting a free-kick in prime position to a side whose only threat had been from set-pieces.

Nor did the ignominy end there. The headlines of that second goal may by now be familiar to all – Romero, Branthwaite, et cetera – but there comes a time in a man’s life when he must pause and ask himself precisely why it was that Branthwaite was left unchallenged in the six-yard box at the depth.

The guilty party, rather regrettably, given his contributions in other areas, was Richarlison. Attached to Branthwaite at the moment of delivery, he retained an observer’s interest in events as they unfolded, his beady eye remaining on the ball throughout. The crux of the thing, however, was that Richarlison’s presence ought to have been in the capacity of a participant rather than an observer, and in this respect he erred pretty sensationally. Once the ball was airborne, the chap simply stopped moving. Branthwaite jostled his way into prime position, whether in hope, expectation or whatever else; but behind him, Richarlison was making it pretty clear that his race was won. ‘If anyone is going to stop that chap’, he seemed to intimate, ‘it dashed well won’t be me.’

2. Richarlison’s Happier Moments (Or What Ought To Have Been Happier Moments) – Part One

As mentioned, a shame that the trail of evidence can be traced back to Richarlison for that one, because in other respects he looked a man in the form of his life.

Now a cynic might suggest that his first goal didn’t amount to much, perhaps pointing out that he simply stood in one spot and had the ball fed to him on a plate, leaving him with a To-Do list that contained little more than to stand on one leg and swing with the other. Not necessarily untruths I suppose, but this in itself seemed to illustrate the fellow’s brimming confidence. The nous to stand in one spot, for a start, was indicative of a striker who knows he is on a bit of a roll, rather than trying too hard to be in all places at once.

And even the finish, whilst low on technical requirements such as first touch, the side-stepping of defenders or the deceiving of the goalkeeper, was nevertheless a bit of a triumph of slick technique. After all, who amongst us hasn’t witnessed this very same man at the vital moment tripping over real or imaginary obstacles, or thumping the ball everywhere except within the frame of the goal? To see him simply slap the ball first-time into the net, without pausing to dwell on any of the ways in which the operation might go wrong, was mightily pleasing.

An honorary mention to those involved in the build-up to that first goal, the neat, quick passing of that move summing up our approach in those glorious first ten minutes or so, before we spent the remainder of the half struggling to control proceedings. Hojbjerg (whose contributions typically swung wildly between Decent and Rotten), Udogie and Werner all made smart choices in possession out on the left before Richarlison applied the coup de grâce, and at that stage I must confess that I topped up the lunchtime bourbon in rather self-satisfied fashion. The early signs were pretty promising.

3. Richarlison’s Happier Moments (Or What Ought To Have Been Happier Moments) – Part Two

By the time Richarlison’s second goal rolled around, the atmosphere had shifted somewhat, from heady optimism to something considerable sterner, our heroes struggling to demonstrate any semblance of control when in possession in our own half. But out of the blue they chiselled another delightful goal, and while Richarlison again made a point of showing the world that he was a changed man in front of goal, the build-up once more merited acclaim.

Maddison in particular emerged with credit from that second goal. In truth, it was a bit tricky to follow in its entirety quite what sorcery he produced, the naked eye being rather unfairly limited to seeing these things in real-time, but the headlines seemed to be that having received the ball in a bit of a pickle, circumstances not really being at their optimum – ball stuck under his feet, defenders poking their noses into his business – by the time he had finished conducting his affairs the ball was neatly rolling into the path of Richarlison to spit on his hands and get down to business.

Not that the end result was a tap-in for R9. The pouty Brazilian still had a fair amount of legwork to get through before he could go reaping the harvest, but again it was indicative of the mood of the young fish that he didn’t pause to fret and over-think, nor rush into his shot and hit any one of the various blue-shirted bounders scattered between him and the goal.

To his credit, Richarlison had the presence of mind to open up his body a tad, in the split-second or so in which the opportunity presented itself, this allowing a route to the top corner to present itself where previously there had been only Everton limbs. Moreover, the chap then nailed the pretty testing combination of placement and power, managing to sidefoot his shoot such that it dripped with accuracy, whilst also shoving enough heft behind it that it flew in at a decent rate of knots.

It’s taken some time, but the young nib is now marauding about the place like a bona fide finisher, which, for all his earnest endeavour and essential contributions in other areas (holding up the ball, effecting the high press etc) is really the meat and drink of the role.

All that said, it did rather irritate to see him making such a song and dance of not making a song and dance about scoring. This trend for refusing to celebrate goals against one’s former employer is one of those maddening modern fads that AANP would punish with a good thrashing if I ever came to power, but I suppose we’re stuck with it for now, so I can do little more than point out that in trying so hard not to upset his former fan-base, he’s rather irked at least one member of his current fan-base. I trust he will toss and turn and lose a goodish amount of sleep puzzling over that one in the coming nights.

4. Van de Ven

The other notable contributor de jour was young Micky Van de Ven, whose importance to the setup seems to grow with each passing game.

AANP’s latest whizz for whiling away the idle hour is to try to decide who amongst our number is the most important cog in the machine. And while Maddison, Son, Sarr and Vicario all have their merits, and in more left-field moments one might propose Udogie or even, when in his pomp, Bissouma, yesterday was the sort of afternoon on which the merits of Van de Ven seemed almost irresistible.

That turn of pace is really quite astonishing. The memory of his hamstring snap a few months ago against Chelsea does linger uncomfortably in the memory, so every time I witness him rev up and move through the gears I do hold the breath and murmur a silent prayer or two, but to witness him in action is quite something.

I have heard it pointed out that not only does he eat up the ground like some prize racehorse, but he is also blessed with the good sense to know when to dive in and when to stay on his feet – which may sound straightforward enough, but in a world of Romeros and Bissoumas and so on, is probably something to be appreciated.

Having a chap of his ilk manning the rear provides an attacking thrust as well as the defensive security, allowing the entire mob to play high up the pitch, safe in the knowledge that VDV’s pace provides something of a safety net, and while the other personnel did not really fulfil their side of the bargain yesterday, Van de Ven did not miss a trick.

5. Vicario

One could probably make a decent case for the notion that Everton’s aggression caused us problems all over the pitch, but it was at corners and against Vicario that the issue really came to a head.

Various of those in lilywhite have invested a decent amount of energy and outrage in complaining that the general buffeting of Vicario at corners is just not cricket, and that such behaviour ought not to be allowed. Personally I’m inclined to give the shoulders a shrug at that one. If the officials allow it – and the evidence of recent weeks indicates that they have done and will continue to do so for the foreseeable – then complaints ought to be silenced and energies devoted to fixing the issue.

Assigning Vicario some sort of burly minder might be an agreeable first step. One appreciates that all involved at corners have their dedicated roles and responsibilities (not that these necessarily carry too much weight in practice, if Richarlison’s marking of Branthwaite is anything to go by), but I would suggest that some physical protection for Vicario is now a priority.

And we’re not short of suitable candidates either. Even allowing for two or three man-markers, there are plenty amongst our number who are constructed from layer upon layer of thick muscle and ligament, so finding a volunteer to park himself next to our goalkeeper and prevent opponents from interfering in his business ought to be achievable.

The other option, of course, would be to train Vicario himself in a spot of self-defence, and perhaps investigate ways in which a bit of bulk could be added to his frame while at it. Vicario’s first reserve, Fraser Forster, I imagine, by virtue of being built like a sizeable oak, is not the sort of fellow who is too often barged off balance as he goes about his business, so he may have a tip or two to impart on these fronts.

Whatever the route they go down, something will have to be done. Clearly it is not sufficient for Vicario to be shoved to one side and bleat away at the ref after the ball is prodded in. Everton did not create too many chances from open play, but the mood amongst my little squadron of onlookers was one of ever-increasing panic each time they were awarded a corner, so it is conceivable that a certain anxiety may enter the minds of those on the pitch. Having achieved so much in open play, it would be vexing in the extreme to concede repeatedly from corners because of one single issue. Time for The Brains Trust to earn their keep.

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Spurs match reports

Villa 2-1 Spurs: Three Tottenham Talking Points

1. The Tactics

Ryan Mason still seems to be receiving a free pass from great swathes of our support. For reasons I don’t particularly fathom, truth be told, but there we go, and I voiced a few of the yays and nays around him last week, so won’t bother going into that again.

This week, his grand masterplan was a dastardly plot to beat Aston Villa’s high line by releasing Sonny with passes from deep, to sprint off into the wide open spaces and make merry.

Here at AANP Towers we spotted three critical flaws.

Firstly, the bally thing just didn’t work. Say about it what you like, and who knows, perhaps the Villa back-four spent the afternoon close to tears with the stress of it all – but the facts are that this approach brought us zero goals. In fact, this approach brought us zero chances, because every blasted time we tried it, Sonny or Richarlison stuffed up their lines and strayed offside.

Once or twice would be forgivable – “teething problems’, would no doubt have been the gist of the exchange amongst the Brains Trust on the sidelines – but when it came to minute 96 and Sonny was yet again caught on the wrong side of the red line, there was nothing for it but to sink the old head into the hands and hope that when reincarnated I come back as something less exasperating than being a Spurs fan.

And when I screech that it happened ‘every time’, this is not a spot of hyperbole, thrown in for dramatic effect. It just happened over and over again. Our heroes simply didn’t learn. Richarlison one understands might want to sneak in a headstart; but goodness me Sonny ought to have worked out that an extra six inches or so were not really necessary when blessed by nature with a pair of size sevens as spring-heeled as his. Surely, ran the train of thought, if Sonny started level he would still have had a decent chance of outsprinting the Villa mob over fifteen yards or so?

Secondly, even if this tactic had born a spot of occasional fruit, one would have thought a Plan B might have been tried at some point too, or even a Plan A, Version 2. Mix things up a bit, what?

Take that lad Porro, out on the right. A flawed sort of chap no doubt, but if he brings one asset to the table it’s his capacity to sling in a decent cross. One might have thought that Mason’s pre-match pearls of wisdom might have included the suggestion that every now and then we keep the Villa mob on their toes by feeding Porro, sticking an extra body or two in the area and seeing what might happen. Maybe just once or twice.

But the evidence of the eyes indicated that Mason & Chums were not having any of it. As far as “Villa (Away)’ was concerned, the strategy was evidently to be “Beat the offside trap, or nothing”. No matter that it failed the first half-dozen times, for a good hour it was our one and only idea.

Thirdly, the whole setup made for a football that was pretty dreadful to watch, from a lilywhite perspective. After a whole season of games, pretty much every one of which has made the eyes bleed, it takes some doing to find a brand new method of boring to tears the watching masses, but this Low-Block-And-Beat-The-Offside-Trap approach managed it.

Central to the approach seemed to be the mad idea to just let Villa have as much possession as they wanted, which as a year of Jose proved, even if successful sucks every ounce of joy out of the thing. Whenever we did stumble upon possession, our heroes seemed strangely unable to master the art of the six-yard pass, picking out opposition players a little too frequently for comfort (and to be fair, young Mason can hardly take the fall for this one; this is just down to the players’ own ineptitude).

And of neat triangles or the whizzy stuff that lights up the eyes and quicken the pulse, there was none. It was just left to Kane, or Lenglet, or whomever to try sticking the ball behind the Villa back-line for Sonny to dash onto and over-complicate everything before the flag went up anyway.  

So in short, this plan brought no success (and did not even get as far as sticking within the rules of the game long enough to gauge whether it might bring any success); had no alternative; and was awful to watch. The ‘Give it to Mason’ campaign, as much as there is one, will need a few additional compelling arguments before AANP is swayed.

After an hour of this nonsense however, Mason had the good grace to bang his head against the nearest wall and try something different. Richarlison was relieved from duty, Kulusevski was stationed out on the right, and for two minutes or so the entire collective bucked up their ideas a bit. Irritating, then, that that particular balloon was punctured by their second goal, after which both sides pretty much shrugged their shoulders and were happy to bump into each other and shout for the remainder.

As if to really twist the knife, the only time our heroes showed any genuine urgency was for approximately five minutes of injury-time at the death, after Kane’s penalty. If they’d bobbed about their place with that same meaning and dash from minute one I’d have been all for it. Our lot might have had a decent stab at the win, for a start, and we the viewing public might have had something about which to make a racket. It might even have added a bit of gusto to the “Mason In! (Permanently)” campaign.

But when they only muster that energy for added time at the end of the ninety, I’m afraid they won’t get much more than icy glares and a few stinging words of rebuke from these parts.

2. Kulusevski

As mentioned, just about the only time things picked up, added time aside, was during a brief, post-substitution surge. Bissouma looked game, possibly just excited to be on a real pitch again, but the lightning rod for that halcyon ten minutes seemed to be Kulusevski.

He beavered away in that curious manner of his, bludgeoning past people in that ungainly fashion that suggests that while he was not born to be a footballer he has nevertheless hit upon something so might as well keep going until told otherwise.

It was already a big day for trying the same old trick over and over again, but whereas springing the offside trap had failed miserably, Kulusevski’s party-trick of chopping back inside his full-back (again, in the ungainly manner of someone who prefers football not to involve a ball) seemed to keep working, no matter how many warnings his opponent had.

With the first few steps of Operation Kulusevski working so well, it was slightly maddening that the final element kept missing the mark, but life – particularly in Season 22/23 – is like that, what? Where last season the young specimen would cut in on his left and either find the net or hang the ball up for an arriving surge at the back post, this time around the ball has tended to fly off into the galleries, leaving all in the vicinity with hands on heads and a general chorus of “If Only…” echoing about the place.

There’s no real knowing what zany idea Mason will magic up next week, but having injected the faintest murmur of a pulse into a collective that had otherwise looked for all the world ready for a toe-tag and body-bag, one wonders if Kulusevski might be involved from the start next week.

3. Forster

In the great Lloris vs Forster Debate, AANP comes down pretty heavily on the side of the latter. Monsieur Lloris has played a fine old innings, no doubt, but in the last season or three the old bean has seemed to lose the faculties somewhat, so if he is lofted on the shoulders and carried off into the sunset, he has my blessing. ‘All hail that Foster chappie, at least for the time being’, is very much my motto.

As such, having nailed my colours to this particular mast, I rather find myself bending over backwards to applaud Forster’s every contribution – never missing an opportunity in so doing to pointedly highlight how Lloris would never achieve such glories – and excusing his mishaps. And there were arguments in both camps yesterday.

For a start, and in the debit column, Forster made a couple of very good saves. One in particular, in the first half, involved some of that quick-reaction stuff, which always looks good when replayed from multiple angles. It was a low shot, well within his vicinity, but involved him bringing the entire frame down towards the dirt in double-quick time. This he achieved within the necessary timescale, managing to scoop back a ball that seemed almost behind him. Buoyed by feverish anti-Lloris sentiment, I applauded as if he had taken a bullet for the Pope.

I also noted that at one point a corner was hoisted into the general mess of limbs that is the penalty area, and where Lloris tends to flap around in such situations, Forster got such a meaty paw onto the thing that it flew off towards somewhere near halfway. Again, the reaction at AANP Towers was mightily overblown.

The whole propaganda machine was thus pootling along pretty smoothly until that second half free-kick. Even I can admit that Forster did not really cover himself in glory at that juncture.

The shot may have ended up at the opposite end to that which he had opted to patrol, but still. It was not in the top corner for a start, and more pertinently, he actually did the hard part well enough, transferring himself from right to left in good time. All that was left was to bring that same meaty paw back into play, and bat the thing off into the gay old meadows of Villa Park. Instead, he got himself in a bit of a tangle, and batted the thing into the roof of the net.

Now my Spurs-supporting chum Ian, not being one to hold back on a spot of constructive criticism, duly acted as judge, jury and executioner and delivered an instant take on Forster’s attempts, and not a complimentary one.

My immediate reaction was to point out that at least he tried to save the thing; Lloris, I inevitably argued, would have stood rooted to the spot and watched. And Forster, in his defence, did have a lot of bodies around which to peer. Failing to slap the ball away may be a flaw; not being able to see straight through the human body is not.

But nevertheless, he might have done better. Coming at a time when we were just beginning to impose ourselves, it did much to kill off the game too. While there’s no knowing what the hell will be going on at the club next season, the AANP vote would be for a younger, shinier upgrade on Lloris to be unwrapped pretty sharpish; and for Forster to remain in situ as this season, backing up when required.

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Spurs match reports

Everton 1-1 Spurs: Four Tottenham Talking Points

1. The Post-Conte Era

AANP is pretty sharp. The former Commander-in-Chief may no longer have been of the parish, but it couldn’t have been more than an hour or so into proceedings last night when it dawned on me that actually, for all the bluster and announcements, not a dashed thing had changed.

For a start there was the formation. Now one generously acknowledges that, thirty games into a season, one can hardly force a completely revamped model down every available throat, and expect everything to fall into place without so much as a squeak. The newly-installed Brains Trust had had by my reckoning about five days to inspect the troops. So, much though the wretched 3-4-3-featuring-two-defensive-midfielders grates, one understood the logic and waved an accepting – if grudging – hand.

But nevertheless, while tearing down the foundations and creating something completely wacky and new might have been a bit rich, a few nuanced adjustments would have been nice, what? Brave new era, and all that. Would it really have cost the earth, I asked myself, to have rearranged the deck-chairs and including an extra creative soul in midfield? Not that we seem to have any such souls left, but with a bit of jiggery-pokery – and maybe a Pape Sarr – I thought we might see Hojbjerg pushed further forward, or Kulusevski more central, or Kane and Sonny as a front two, or literally anything that indicated that Conte had biffed out the door in deed as well as word.

But nope. The formation was exactly the same. And if that was not enough, the performance ended up being even more Conte-esque than it had been under Conte, which takes some doing.

In fairness, there were patches of play in the first half that weren’t too bad. Everton had obviously got into their heads the ridiculous notion that we were the sort of mob that would fold immediately under questioning, and so spent the opening exchanges charging in a frenzy at whichever of our lot were in possession, lacking only a bayonet to brandish and a war-cry to shriek. And our lot responded pretty impressively, at least at various points between approximately minutes 5 and 25. Whomever was in possession tended to do a quick tap-dance, shimmy around the nearest swinging Everton leg and pop the ball off to a nearby chum, at which point the whole routine began again.

So we looked competent enough in possession, and able to sidestep the Everton press. Most notably to the AANP eye, we moved the ball pretty quickly. One got the sense that Team Stellini had spent their five days barking a few choice phrases celebrating the virtues of the quick pass and one-touch football, because there was a welcome dash of urgency about the place.

On top of which, whether by our design or the accident of Everton being rather narrow, Messrs Perisic and Porro had a few moments of joy up the flanks. Hojbjerg seemed to be having one of his better days in the centre. Kane had a couple of near-ish misses. Rumours of a new-manager bounce were no doubt miles off the mark, but for half an hour or so I at least thought that we might just about edge our relegation-zoned, lowest-scoring-team-in-the-division opponents.

2. The Performance at One-Nil

I should have known better of course. From the latter part of the first half onwards, our lot absolutely stank the place out. Whatever upper hand we might have had early doors was old news by the midway point, and there was not much improvement in the second half.

It took some pretty generous and unsubtle interventions from Everton to get our noses in front, because goodness knows our clueless heroes weren’t going to manage it themselves. First that laddie got himself sent off; but on seeing that our lot hadn’t really taken the hint, and were still scratching their heads a bit, another Everton slab of meat took it upon himself to give us a penalty, just to make sure.

And at that point, I fancy I even allowed myself a smile, which just goes to show one never really learns. The one-nil lead was not really a deal-breaker; but a one-nil lead against ten men with under half an hour remaining struck me as the sort of binge even our lot couldn’t foul up.

Of course, it is a little hard to describe what happened next. One simply stared in disbelief, and rubbed the eyes a few times. After Sheffield United and Southampton – and seemingly every other game we’ve played this season, in truth – it shouldn’t have come as any surprise, and yet this seemed to be one of the worst performances of the lot. By just about any metric available, we managed to let ourselves get comprehensively outplayed by ten men. Even now, 24 hours on, the recollection of it seems to hollow out my insides.

It is tempting to get a bit Shakespearian about things and declare this the worst I’ve ever seen from our lot, but having had my teenage years fashioned by the delights of Francis, Graham and Gross a little perspective is probably in order.

Nevertheless, though, this collective offering – let’s call it The Conte Tribute Act – was down there amongst the absolute dregs. If a chum had suggested to me that with twenty minutes to go against one of the worst teams in the league, and up a man, our lot would choose the option of dropping deep, ceding possession and praying for the final bell, I’d have laughed them out of town and suggested for good measure they had over-indulged in the sauce. And yet our lot did precisely that! Forsooth!

The amateurish passing from the back; the aimless hoicks upfield; the introduction of Davinson Sanchez as a means to shore up the defence; the brainless red card; the continued absence of Danjuma – I’m not one to betray the emotions unnecessarily, but when I tell you that at least one of my lips quivered with despair as I watched matters unfold I rather fancy you get the picture.

3. Son

The rest is mere details. By full-time I was in such a state of shock that I found myself groping blindly towards the drinks cabinet, but at half-time, when thoughts were slightly better ordered, one of the principal points of concern was the latest dithering performance from young Sonny.

The wise old coves have it that form is temporary and class permanent, which is true enough I suppose, but it makes this dip in form one of the longest temporary contracts in living memory.

The poor blighter was dreadful yet again, in just about every area of his game. I admired to an extent his diligence in trying to track back or drop deep to receive the ball, but seeing him trip over his own feet and fall to the dirt upon every contact, I did look skywards and utter a silent prayer or two that he might just relocate to the top of the pitch and stay there. I much prefer the chap playing on the shoulder of defenders and scurrying off towards the opposition goal.

Not that his attacking manoeuvres bore much fruit either, mind. The days of him dipping a shoulder, side-stepping a defender and whipping a shot goalwards seemed pretty distant specks as we watched him shuffle straight into an opposition frame and, more often than not, complete his routine by yet again hitting the turf.

After last night it is admittedly hard to make a case to suggest that Lucas is the answer, but one does cast a longing look or two towards Danjuma on the bench and wonder what on earth that is all about.

4. Lloris

Amongst the bigger decisions our newest Glorious Leader had to make was between the sticks. Absence, of course, makes the heart grow fonder, and Fraser Forster has not been without the occasional flaw, but I did puff the cheeks and think it rather a shame that he was automatically elbowed aside and the red carpet rolled out for Monsieur Lloris.

In Lloris’ defence he did grab a cross or two of the high-and-swirling variety in the first half, which lowered the blood pressure a bit around these parts. However, with the ball at his feet he seemed, as ever, to be not entirely sure of what day it was or which sport he was playing, and there were more sharp intakes of breath than any right-minded nurse would consider healthy whenever our lot tried to play out from the back. An admonishing clip should be aimed around the ear of Romero at this point, for his bizarre inputs into this particular nonsense, but the whole fiasco did have me pining for the return of Forster.

The real blow to the ribs, however, was the goal. The objective viewer would, naturally enough, raise an appreciative eye at the quality of the strike, but at AANP Towers the headline was all about Lloris and that utterly infuriating habit of his, of simply standing and watching, rooted to the spot, as the ball sails past him.

I don’t mind admitting I could have absolutely screamed at him to use his bally hands. Why the dickens does he keep doing this? Adopting the pose of readiness, as if coiled to leap into action, and then, as the crucial moment approaches, instead of leaping as advised, simply swivelling the hips to watch the ball? It happens over and over, and drives me to absolute distraction. What is stopping him from extending the frame and at least broaching the possibility that he might reach it?

It is galling at the best of times, when he is nowhere near the ball; but last night the thing whistled within his wingspan! I’m not sure he even needed to dive in order to reach it, simply extending an arm might well have done the trick. That the ball was travelling at a fair old lick is beyond doubt; but geographically this was no insurmountable challenge.

Utterly bewilderingly, after that utter crate of garbage – and all the other ones we’ve witnessed – we sit fourth in the table, but given the games played and whatnot (and, more pertinently, the utter guff we keep peddling) we’ll be waving that one goodbye pretty sharpish. One can only look onwards, and hope yet again for an upturn on Saturday, but this really is getting a bit thick now, what?

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Spurs match reports

Wolves 1-0 Spurs: Just The One Tottenham Talking Point

The vicissitudes of life mean that AANP is no longer able to watch 3pm games most Saturdays (although, oddly enough, this has barely prevented me from watching our lot in recent years). It does mean, however, that I couldn’t rattle off anything about yesterday’s game beyond the five-or-so minutes offered up by Match of the Day.

1. Forster’s Saves

But as it happens, a heck of a lot of Spurs-supporting angst can still be shoved into five-or-so minutes, if you select the right bits. And the bits that caught the AANP eye were both the goal conceded and also another Wolves effort earlier in the piece (circa minute 55, apparently). The common denominator in these two were that both featured resident goalkeeping giant F. Forster Esq. beating away goalbound efforts.

So far so successful, one might think, and indeed, in a sense, the most basic requirements of the role had been met. After all, there have been a few occasions this season alone on which I’ve subjected Monsieur Lloris to a spot of choice Anglo-Saxon for his failure to master such essentials. But yesterday, Forster waved a meaty paw first at a close-range header from Jiminez, and then at a longer-range hit-and-hope sort of job from the same chap, and in both cases achieved the basics.

But mark the smallprint. The footnotes. In each instance, while Team Forster were still high-fiving one another on a job well done by their man, a troubling spin-off was in immediate development. For in both cases, Forster had made the pretty short-sighted call to bat the dashed thing straight back into the heart of what might be called ‘Hostile Territory’.

The close-range header he patted in a neat parabola that had its terminus around the penalty spot, or would have done Porro not made the executive decision to smash the ball away first and take questions later. And while goalkeeping is one of those subjects about which, as soon as any given expert starts prattling on, the old mind downs tools and sets off on a wander, I nevertheless recall that one of the fundamentals of the art is to make sure that in making a save the ball ends up comfortably out of focus, preferably nearer the aisles.

(Having said that, the ill-informed AANP take on such things is to yearn for the days when the goalkeeper would simply catch a shot – seemingly a forgotten art now. But such robust situation management would no doubt have current coaches going weak at the knees in horror. The current vogue is to give the ball a friendly pat back into play, and AANP’s goalkeeping masterclass be damned.)

So as mentioned, the Jiminez header was bobbed gently up towards the penalty spot, which seemed a mightily risky approach to me. And in fact, given that Forster had had to transfer his frame horizontally off to the right in making the save in the first place, it also seemed to me that it would have been a dashed sight easier to have sent the ball off even further to the right, rather than scooping it back into the centre of the stage. Physics, and all that, what?

Anyway, the gods smiled on him and the danger was duly averted, but no such luck half an hour later when Jiminez had a pop from outside the area. Again, Forster went a-tumbling to his right, and manoeuvred a significant proportion of his frame between ball and goal; but again, the curious young cove somehow manged to bat the thing straight back into trouble, in the centre of the penalty area. The finish from Traore was surprisingly good, but that seems beside the point: Forster really should have ensured that the ball would head off into a completely different part of the mainland.

And watching the beastly sequence replayed from all angles, it all reminded me of a moment against Chelsea last weekend, when Sterling had a pop from the edge of the area, and again Forster produced a big thick tick in the box marked “Save The Thing First and Foremost”, but then spilled the ball into prime goal-poaching territory, and was bailed out by a closely-situated chum.

From memory the Chelsea episode involved the ball bobbling off his chest and various assorted limbs; but for both of yesterday’s he had rather more control of the thing, getting a solid hand to the header and a delivering a two-fisted punch to the second shot. As such, in each instance the blighter really ought to given more thought to the entire story arc.

So much for Forster. Those five-or-so minutes of highlights revealed precious little else. It was, I suppose, nice to see Harry Kane pass on the opportunity to thump another free-kick straight into the wall, instead allowing Pedro Porro to demonstrate a pretty handy additional string to his bow (Kane’s generosity in this matter, my spies inform me, extended only so far, and the following free-kick he duly claimed, and did his usual thump-and-wall job).

But as for the rest, it’s a mystery to me – and a one-nil defeat away to Wolves is, in truth, one of those into which I would rather not delve too deeply. As mentioned after the Sheff Utd loss, the stage now seems set for Dr Jekyll to emerge midweek vs Milan.

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Spurs match reports

Sheff Utd 1-0 Spurs: Six(ish) Tottenham Talking Points

I remember in my school days occasionally studying those morbid poets who would rattle off 12 lines or so about a dying cat on the side of the road, evidently feeling that nothing could have better captured their mood at the time.

And I was reminded of those miserable souls last night when Sheff Utd slotted in their goal, because like a dying cat on the side of the road back in the day, at that moment nothing could have summed up our performance better than the sight before my eyes (specifically, the quite ridiculous ease with which that chappie gaily skipped through our defence.)

In a match that our heroes couldn’t have approached more casually if decked out in sun-hats and flip-flops, it made perfect sense that some lower-division soul should weave past 5 of N17’s finest without actually having to ride a tackle, before beating the ‘keeper at the near post of all blasted things, to really twist the knife in.

1. Hojbjerg’s Role In The Goal

Given that literally half the team were involved in the above dereliction of duty, it’s not difficult to go around pointing the finger with some meaning. Hojbjerg was one of the principals here. It drifted under the radar a bit, amidst the mass of limbs resolutely not putting in a tackle when the laddie went on his run, but immediately prior to that an attempted Sheffield United pass was aimed straight at Hojbjerg, who rather than control or clear the thing, pretended not to be there, turned away and let the ball bounce off him.

An odd one but no matter, thought AANP, convinced that the chap would rectify the situation at the earliest opportunity. And as luck would have it this opportunity arose pretty much immediately, the ball rebounding to the SUFC cherry, who duly put his head down and ran straight back at Hojbjerg. And while understands that our man was not really in the market for a wild lunge in order to regain position – this being the penalty area and all – I couldn’t quite wrap the bean around the choice of action for which he instead opted.

As this Ndiaye chap approached him, Hojbjerg took one step towards him and then promptly aborted the interaction, withdrawing his frame and waving his hands in the air in some gratuitous act of surrender.

This I absolutely could not stomach. Refraining from clattering the man would have been one thing, but explicitly showing the world that he would have no further part in Operation Tackle The Blighter – waving surrendering hands, forsooth! – was absolutely galling. Why did he not shepherd the fellow away from goal? What’s the point of avoiding concession of a penalty if you instead just let any dandy who pleases waltz right in and score? And what’s the point of being on the pitch at all if you’re not going to put body and soul into stopping the other lot? I ask you!

2. Porro’s Role In The Goal

Pedro Porro was next up, or, more accurately, simultaneously up. As the rebounding ball fell to Ndiaye to rather obviously cut inside, Porro dedicated his entire bodyweight to covering the outside. And having flung himself off towards the wrong postcode, Porro sized up his options and evidently decided that regaining his balance and charging back to rectify things was not The Tottenham Way. A fast learner, this one. So as Ndiaye set out scaring Hojbjerg into timid surrender, Porro simply gave up, deciding that he would grab the nearest bucket of popcorn and just watch how things panned out.

3. Sanchez’s Role In The Goal

Enter Davinson Sanchez (although I use the term ‘Enter’ pretty loosely, as that would suggest this particular wretch had something meaningful to contribute). With Porro and Hojbjerg having shrugged shoulders and let their man walk straight between them, Sanchez at least appeared to present a specific and considerable obstacle in between Ndiaye and the goal. It would not have taken too much effort, it appeared, for Sanchez simply to remain in between Ndiaye and the goal. The concept of effecting a tackle was probably a wild one at this point – this was Davinson Sanchez, after all – but simply standing firm and blocking off the fellow’s route to goal appeared both sensible and feasible.

Instead, as Ndiaye adjusted his compass and turned about forty-five degrees to his right, a move that raised the stakes but by no means sealed the deal, Sanchez’ brain began to melt at the complexity of what he was witnessing. At which point, he then appeared to malfunction and stop completely, dash it. He just stopped! Ndiaye carried on with his merry dance, and Sanchez stopped participating, as if the whole incident had evoked some unhappy memory from his childhood and he couldn’t bear to be involved any longer. What the blazes is wrong with this utterly mind-boggling fish?

Honestly, if I were Master of all I surveyed and granted endless power, there are a few obvious first steps I’d take. Curing some of the incurable diseases of course, and regular breaks during the working day for a refreshing bourbon – say one an hour, on the hour – but top of the list would be some form of legislation forbidding Davinson Sanchez from every darkening our door again.

4. Dier’s Role In The Goal

Eric Dier was next on the rollcall of ignominy. He at least had the dignity to appear interested, adopting that ‘long-barrier’ pose, with a knee on the floor, no doubt with the intention of saving the day by blocking whatever shot might be unleashed. I suppose in principle it was not a bad plan, given that Ndiaye was now very clearly at the ‘Fire’ stage of his ‘Ready-Aim-Fire’ routine. Where all else had lost interest and stopped bothering, Dier was essentially telling the world that he had had enough of this nonsense and was going to resolve it himself.

All of which would have been absolutely bucko if he could have got himself into position lickety-split. The shot would have been blocked, and the deadlock would have remained. But alas, Dier’s masterplan fell apart when it came to swift reorganisation of the relevant limbs. Dier, one sometimes feels, was intended by Nature for Walking Football, or some other sport played at a more sedate pace. As Dier was manoeuvring the knee towards earth and creaking the joints into the appropriate stance, the SUFC laddie was already sprinting off for his celebratory knee-slide. A nice idea, Eric, I felt like muttering, but far too slow for heaven’s sake.

5. Skipp and Forster’s Roles In The Goal

I actually felt a pang of sympathy for Oliver Skipp, who deserved better than to be found guilty by association in this ghastly affair, but he was last on the scene. No real blame attached here, it wasn’t really his problem to fix but he had a go anyway, flinging a pretty meaningful leg at the problem, but alas too late. The shot was already away.

And Forster? That whole mantra about not being beaten at the near post is arguably a little over-played, but it was still pretty crushing to see the whole sorry mess end in that way. One understands Forster prepping self for the action to reach its climax at various locations to his left, but he still ought to have included ‘A Shot To My Right’ in the old Risk Assessment.

6. Dreadful

And to be honest, beyond that goal it was difficult to muster words for anything else. Partly because the goal itself was one of those ghastly scenes it was difficult to stop seeing, even with the eyes clasped tightly shut; and partly because our heroes appeared not to possess one creative fibre between them for the entire duration.

The absurd insistence upon playing a back-three continued, even when up against a single Championship 37 year-old, and as a result our midfield remained, as ever, utterly bereft of creativity.

Having banged on all season about how this 3-4-3 system requires decent wing-backs to make it work, we finally took to the pitch with Signor Conte’s WBs of choice in situ, and then silently wept as the chosen pair were repeatedly swatted away without making a dent. Porro showed a spot of pace, so no doubt Eric Dier cast a few envious glances his way, but there is no escaping that this was dreadful stuff throughout.

And these repeated Cup defeats to lower-league side really seem to sum up the side we are – to wit, possessing neither the fight to match nor flair to hammer a lower-ranked team. (Which means, by the by, that I’m now expecting us to turn over Milan at home next week, as that’s precisely the sort of incomprehensible guff our lot would roll out.)

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Spurs match reports

Spurs 2-0 Chelsea: Three Tottenham Talking Points

1. The Skipp Goal

Flitting over the first half handbags and jollies, that Skipp goal positively burst at the seams with all the right sort of stuff.

For a start, it came straight from second half kick-off. I suppose you might say there is nothing so remarkable about that – the game does have to restart somehow after all. Nevertheless I’ve sometimes watched our lot peddle this same routine each game, and wondered if they might not rustle up something with a touch more grace and elan than simply giving it to Dier to clout up into the heavens and loading the left flank with runners in preparation for when gravity does its thing.

I would have expected that Chelsea would a) have been wise to this approach, it being the one we adopt just about without fail every time we start a half, and b) not had too much difficulty in countering it.

But there it was, considerably higher on altitude than subtlety, with Davies, Richarlison and Kane queueing to see what would be on offer once the thing fell to earth. Davies and Richarlison were the principals in this instance, the former plucking the ball from the sky whilst the latter did an impressive spot of swivel-and-onward-shovelling towards the centre. And when the Skipp household crack open their umpteenth bottle of champagne tonight and light up a cigar or two to round the thing off, they may want to offer a toast to the neat footwork and general alertness of Richarlison, in rotating affairs from a position of no more than general promise, on an inside left perch and with back to goal, to a position of considerable threat, with Kulusevski and inside the D.

There then followed a sequence of suitably dramatic events in the build-up to Skipp’s big moment, which included a few helping hands from our odious guests. For a start Kulusevski found Emerson, whose presence in the prime attacking spot should no longer surprise anyone. His shot was handled by the Chelsea ‘keeper with considerably greater theatre than necessary, meaning that rather than slamming the door on the whole episode it instead created a even glitzier sequel.

Another Chelsea fellow picked up the baton and handily threw in a rubbish clearance, which kept things alive. And at this point young Master Skipp cleared his throat and marched onto the stage for his big moment.

Amidst all the fuss over his finish – and it oozed with quality, make no mistake – the preamble might easily be ignored, but I was particularly taken by it. It involved the fine young fellow winning a ball for which he was, if not exactly a rank outsider, certainly second favourite. But a spot of upper body beef, did half the job, and it was topped off by a general desire and will to win that I wouldn’t normally associate with our lot. And yet there it was, and against the odds Skipp emerged from the conflab as master of all he surveyed.

All that remained at this point was for him to close the eyes, swing the peg and hope that the outcome was one of those half volleys bestowed once or twice a lifetime from on high. Not only did he catch the thing on its sweetest possible spot, the ball also slapped off the underside of the bar – an element that, as is universally acknowledged, augments the aesthetic value of any goal by around a thousand per cent.


One cannot but help beam with avuncular pride for young Skipp. Such an earnest soul, and a Tottenham boy from root to stem, but by virtue of his role in life rarely the sort to receive much acclaim. It was pleasing enough to see him score his first goal for the club, but to do so in quite such glorious fashion really does make the heart sing a bit.

2. Romero

It says much for all concerned in the lilywhite defensive ranks that Chelsea didn’t really get a decent view of goal the whole match. Sterling’s first half sprints had me chewing the lip once or twice, and there may have been a long shot or two, but really nothing to make the blood freeze over and spine quiver.

On one of the few occasions in which they did threaten, courtesy of a couple of neat diagonal passes through the lines that shifted things from ‘Minimum Threat’ to ‘Clean Through On Goal’, I for one was grateful for the intervention of one C. Romero Esquire. On that particular occasion, Romero displayed in the first place a decent sense of awareness of current affairs, in springing from his usual spot on the right of the centre-backs, to cover a breach on the left. On top of which, he then had the bright idea to pursue a policy of minimal contact in order to see out the danger.

Romero, as is public knowledge, is the sort of egg who cannot resist solving life’s problems by throwing a full-blooded limb or two at it. Recourse to such action in the penalty area, and indeed in the six-yard box, might have had some pretty dangerous consequences. In this instance, however, he opted to insert his frame in between the ball and the onrushing Chelsea forward, and the ploy worked to perfection. What had threatened to escalate into a clear-cut opportunity, instead fizzled out quietly, as Romero guided the ball to safety much like a responsible adult escorting some unruly child across a road.

It was one of a number of pretty impressive interventions from Romero throughout. In recent weeks – just about every week, in fact – I have cocked a pretty dubious eyebrow as he has flung himself, body and soul, into a challenge, seemingly not content unless some furniture is damaged and a card brandished at him. Today, by contrast, the feist and aggression were on show, but always in controlled and regulated fashion. He tackled firmly, cut out passes and crosses and the like, and also did a spot of overtime covering in random areas like left-back whenever the situation arose.

Those casual moments when he mistook our one-nil lead for an eight-nil lead and rather complacently allowed the ball to be nipped from him took the sheen off things, but I wave a forgiving hand in this instance. He carried out the nuts and bolts of defending pretty robustly, and I was all for it.

3. Forster

Another chap whose name is likely to receive only the briefest mention, but whose occasional inputs caught the AANP eye, was Fraser Forster. Not that he was exactly overburdened – the five colleagues directly in front of him, and indeed the five in front of those, all contributing pretty diligently, leaving Chelsea unable to muster more than a shot or two in anger.

 And in fact, one of the few shots that Forster did have to deal with, in the first half, he made rather a pig’s ear of. It was one that either needed a clutching to self or shoving pretty mightily off to the margins, but Forster did neither, the ball popping from his frame and requiring an intervening bloot from Ben Davies to extinguish.

But in the second half, the gigantic chap seemed to get the message, seemingly struck by the benefits of doing simple things well. Most notably this happened when one or other of the Chelsea mob wriggled their way into the area and looked for all the world like the next item on their agenda would be one or other of rounding the ‘keeper or toe-poking into the net. Either way, a spot of pretty serious peril loomed.

Now wandering off on a tangent, I suppose it is possibly a mite unfair to criticise a chap both in his absence and for a crime he didn’t even commit, but at this point the curious thought that flashed to my mind was that if Hugo Lloris had been in situ and minding affairs, I would have bet my mortgage on him somehow uprooting the Chelsea forward, at considerable cost to the overall masterplan.

However, we were blessed in this instance not with Lloris but with Forster, and he pretty admirably addressed this crisis by catapulting every inch of his eleventy-foot frame forward across the turf, so as to snatch the ball from the toe of the blighter, thus averting either toe-poke or rounding-of-‘keeper scenarios.

In common with Romero’s intervention described earlier, since the net result was an absence of any damage, and what one might describe as a dot ball in the scorers’ book, it would be easy to shrug off the whole affair and pretend it never happened. But AANP has made a habit of getting rather too carried away with the small print when watching Spurs, and through this intervention (plus the handful of crosses caught with minimal fuss and dressing), Forster, in my book, earned his evening bourbon.

And there we have it. To a man our lot scrapped and fought as required, threw in a couple of moments of quality in the final third, and tootled off with another pretty comfortable win. Long live that Stellini chap.

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Spurs match reports

Brentford 2-2 Spurs: Six Tottenham Talking Points

1. Same Old Same Old

For those of us so distracted by all that World Cup guff that we forgot how the good souls of N17 go about their business, our heroes helpfully wasted no time at all in reminding us of their preferred Don’t-Bother-Until-Two-Down gambit.

No point in fighting it at this stage. Best just to shrug the shoulders, stiffen the upper lip and accept. They’ve had a whole month to chew over the tactics, practise their drills and so on, and this is the result, so no matter how nonsensical it seems to those of us in the outside world, the plan – of waiting until two down and then going full throttle for the final 30 – is evidently here to stay.

There is of course a temptation categorise our performance as only fitting the extremes of Gubbins on the one hand and England-vs-Holland-at-Euro-96 on the other; but actually there are plenty of nuances in between, and I thought our lot hit a few of those yesterday.

In possession in the first half, even at 0-0, I thought we at occasionally least tried, to force matters. It was not as turgid and sideways as it has sometimes been. Hojbjerg in particular seemed struck by an urge to get through his day’s work in a hurry, and generally tried to shovel the ball along tout de suite, often looking for a diagonal pass “in between the lines”, as they say, which seemed a pretty progressive idea.

Of course, behind him Eric Dier was doing his best to negate any such urgency, the fellow seemingly deciding that, having spent a lifetime receiving the ball and taking approximately 23 touches before distributing it, he would be damned if he were going to change the routine so soon after Christmas. So this was a bit of a spanner in Hojbjerg’s plan, but help was on hand from other quarters, notable Sonny, who at least seemed to recognise what the Dane was attempting and bobbed up in space to receive the thing.

Short we may have been on clear-cut chances in the opening hour or so, but intermittently there were clearly recognisable attempts from various members of the clan to insert themselves deep within enemy territory and fashion something. Nevertheless, it wasn’t quick or inventive enough, until we conceded the second and the whole bally lot of them reacted like a bunch of Roman slaves being freed from their shackles and given the run of the town.

2. Dreadful Goals Conceded

Beavering about in slightly uninspiring fashion might have been bearable, but married to defending so bad that one wondered if some of them had spent six weeks actively un-learning how to play the game, it made for some pretty serious lip-chewing from the galleries.

For the first goal, I apportion little blame to Forster (big man). The deflection was unhelpful, and he displayed adequate reflexes in simply blocking the thing as it flew at him. Of course it would have made for a pleasant festive treat if his hands like a frying pan had scooped up the thing, but we can’t have everything, and he at least did the basics.

Which is more than can be said of those in snazzy sky blue around him. The initial cross picked out a Brentford forward on the right, who appeared to have been gifted the freedom of the Tottenham penalty area, or at least half of it. One appreciates that this was something of a counter-attack, but really, to leave the chappie unattended in his own acre of land seemed to be laying it on a bit thick, even for the first game back.

Perisic was barely in shot on the TV cameras, while Bissouma, having tracked the fellow’s run stride-for-stride, had rather maddeningly veered off towards the centre rather than sticking with him to make a challenge, evidently attracted to the ball like one of those less intelligent moths you see going hell for leather at a flame.

So much for part one of the attack; the sequel, picking up immediately after Forster (big man) had parried the shot, was pretty much entirely contained in a single act, comprising a Brentford chappie strolling up to the ball and tapping it in, not one objecting soul anywhere near him.

Rewind the VHS and one sees that the Brentford bod in question started his gallop forward at the same time and from the same starting point as one P-E Hojbjerg, only for the Dane to keep his jog carefully within the limit of ‘Slow and Steady’, rather than busting a lung or two to ensure he stayed with his man.

Crosses will be made and shots will be taken, one accepts this; but simply to stand – or jog – around and watch the aftermath, rather than trying to muscle in and prevent ensuing calamity, is just not cricket.

And if that first goal had AANP crafting a few choice curses, the second had the air turning purple. For a start, Dier’s shank to gift the corner in the first place inflamed the passions of the watching masses.

And then, once the corner was delivered, Hojbjerg was again at fault, incredibly waiting for the ball to bounce towards him on the goal-line rather than charging towards it like a frenzied bull determined to clear all in its path. Rather inevitably, a more alert opponent was vastly more proactive about the whole thing, and simply trotted a couple of steps forward, a manoeuvre sufficient to earn him pole position ahead of Hojbjerg, Lenglet and Perisic.

The whole business of zonal marking has a rationale to it, but I rather fancy that if those involved take literally the business of staying in their zones, and simply do not budge from their allotted spots, then the entire system crumbles like a house of cards. One cannot overstate the obvious flaw, that if the defenders in a zonal system do not move at all, then the opponents will pretty swiftly learn to pop the ball around them. It is breathtakingly empty-headed, and yet this is precisely what each of Hojbjerg, Perisic and Lenglet – seasoned internationals – did in allowing Toney to mooch past them and tap in.

3. Perisic’s Crosses

On the subject of Perisic, few in our ranks are quite so maddening in the way they go about things. Credit where due, first of all, his crosses are things of beauty. Be it with right foot or left, he ticks every box you can think of in the Crossing Department, whipping in the things with pace, curl, elevation, top-spin and whatever else is relevant.

I don’t mind admitting that there have been times this season when I have watched our lot labour to get the ball anywhere near the penalty area, and been struck by the thought that we should simply abandon all pretence of subtlety, give the ball to Perisic and queue up in the six-yard box.

On the flip side, bar these crosses (and occasional long throw-ins) the chap seems to do little else at all. Of defending he wants no part, seemingly viewing that particular exercise as little more than the pause that exists in between attacks, a chance to catch his breath and ponder with which foot he might deliver his next cross. As mentioned, when Brentford pushed forward for their first, Perisic was a good ten yards behind the action.

Of course, this is the consequence of buying a wing-back who is a little long in the tooth. As AANP knows any too well, the march of Father Time is pretty relentless, and anyone expecting Perisic to motor up and down the flank is in for an unpleasant surprise.

All of which would be pretty vexing – but by golly, he does whip in some glorious crosses.

4. Tanganga

If Perisic can at least point to his crosses as justifying his participation, young Tanganga has no such get-out. Now one ropey defensive performance doth not a dreadful centre-back make, and the young bean will doubtless have better days, but alas this was a stinker. If there were an opportunity to make a pig’s ear of a contribution, Tanganga was first in the queue every time.

His headers were wildly mistimed, which was as peculiar as it was ghastly to observe, and he fared little better on terra firma. Even his distribution was below par, passes to Doherty often delivered with too much force or too little accuracy for the wing-back to do much more than scramble to keep the dashed thing within the confines of the playing surface.

His selection was understandable enough – he has featured in recent friendlies, and one would have supposed he were possessed of the sort of assets that would be useful enough in a tete-a-tete with a fellow like Ivan Toney.

Alas, you know you’ve had a pretty miserable afternoon when you look up to see your number raised and the awkward figure of Davinson Sanchez giving those limbs a swing in preparation to replace you; and it speaks volumes of Tanganga’s contribution that Sanchez of all people seemed a clear upgrade once stationed within the back-three.

5. Doherty and Kulusevski

On any other weekend this season, the news that Doherty had been preferred over the wretched Emerson would have been pretty sensational front-page stuff, but in truth when the team news filtered through, such had been the gap between fixtures that the seismic relevance of this pick failed to register in the AANP loaf.

And in fact, for much of the first half it didn’t have a particularly big impact either. I suppose one forgets quite how much the endless faux pas of Emerson prompted howls of rage and despair in those pre-World Cup days, and instead the sight of Doherty keeping his head down and not really doing anything particularly wrong or right in the first half just drifted by me.

But in the second half, once the concession of the second goal forced all concerned to buck up their ideas, Doherty’s assets as an attacking wing-back gently surfaced, not least in bobbing up at the back post as an auxiliary forward, when Perisic or Lenglet or whomever delivered crosses across the box.

However, the real star of the right flank was undoubtedly Kulusevski. Probably our brightest spark in the first half, he was a pretty key figure in the second as well, setting up our equalizer and generally thrusting himself slap bang in the middle of events whenever they unfolded on the right flank. The Kane-Son-Kulusevski triumvirate has still not quite clicked, but this seemed to be due to no fault of his.

With Doherty appearing vastly more attuned to what ought and ought not to be done as supporting act on the right, one imagines that Kulusevski will continue to play a pretty major role in the second half of the season – and Emerson, with a little luck, will have to make do with guest appearances from the sidelines.

6. Hojbjerg

A word in passing on Hojbjerg. At fault, to varying extents, he may have been for both goals conceded, he did a lot to atone for these mistakes in the rest of his game. As mentioned above, in that often lacklustre first half he seemed motivated to push matters along rather than wait for death to reach him, and in the second, as if to ram home the point that he was taking the gig seriously, he popped up with an extremely well-taken goal.

Hojbjerg’s all-round contribution was much-needed too, given that Bissouma, in the first half in particular seemed not to know what sport he was playing. His touch in the first half was oddly appalling, the ball bouncing off his size nines as if allergic to them, and the memory of a few imperious performances for Brighton last season seemed all the more distant.

Mercifully, he picked up a bit in the second half, but there could be no doubt that, particularly in the absence of Bentancur, Hojbjerg was the boss of the central areas yesterday.

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Spurs news, rants Spurs transfers

Perisic, Forster & Gollini: Three Tottenham Talking Points

1. Ivan Perisic

The headline summary of AANP’s reaction to this one is somewhere along the lines of “Ripping stuff, what?”

Oddly enough, Perisic is one on whom I’ve had my beady eye for quite some time. And those who know me best will attest to the fact that I do not use the term “oddly enough” casually. For a start, when watching Spurs I rarely compute the identities of any in opposition, so contorted am I in paroxysms of anguish by the performance of our lot. After all, there’s no time to be taking notes on anyone else when you’re busy staving off massive coronary events within your own framework 

And when I do make the very occasional observation of some lad not of lilywhite persuasion, one might label the exercise “Miss” as often as “Hit”. Take Shane Long, for example, a johnnie who presumably looks back on his apples with some satisfaction, and should be able to see out his days in some comfort – but nevertheless not a player one would honestly say has risen to the heights for which AANP earmarked him several years back. 

Perisic, however is a different kettle of fish. Here’s a lad who back at the 2014 World Cup had AANP nodding a sage head and tipping for glory. And while these things are subjective, one would be hard pressed to dismiss a CV that includes the Champions League, titles in Italy and Germany and a goal in a World Cup Final dash it. 

And as it happens it is precisely this clutch of medals and rosettes and whatnot that has AANP nodding with vigorous approval at the scrawl of I. P. on the dotted line. For here is a chap who knows how to win on the biggest stages. A chap who laced his boots before crunch games and Cup Finals, and 90 minutes later waved shiny pots above his head. Marry this to team Hotspur’s famous ability to trip over their own feet at the final hurdle, season after season, and suddenly the sense of the move rather lurches into view. 

Yes we have Monsier Loris who has had his mitts on the World Cup, and Kane with a World Cup Golden Boot, and Dier and Sonny and Hojbjerg, all of whom have been around the block often enough to know how to get things done – and rarely was this nous illustrated better than against Woolwich last month – but laddies who’ve actually done the deed at club level are pretty thin on the ground in N17. So if Conte and chums want to roll out the red carpet for an egg like Perisic then I’m all for it. 

I’m reminded of the invigorating effect of Cambiasso at Leicester a few years back, or even the positive impact reported by those in the know when Edgar Davies rocked up in this parish – attitudes in training, reactions to defeat and so forth – and am inclined to gush a fair bit with excitement. 

On a practical level, I’ve spent the best part of the Conte era bleating that a system like Conte-ball requires as a pretty essential component for success a couple of wing-backs a good few notches above the average, and while Messrs Reguilon and Sessegnon have rarely lacked willing, few of sound mind would categorise them as World Class. 

Admittedly, whether or not Master Perisic can shake a defensive leg is something of an unknown at AANP Towers, but if Conte likes him enough to bring him into the gang then I consider the requisite boxes have been ticked and criteria met. 

The Causes For Concern

The principal objection to the signing of the multi-award winning and still-in-presentable-nick Perisic is his age. 33 don’t you know. Personally, I’d happily murder a lesser member of socially to be that age again, but some of the pickier sorts seem convinced that a fellow who’s been around the sun 33 times ought to have no business in the Premier League when there’s a retirement home sofa with his name on it.

I suppose more pertinently, one wonders about the lung capacity of a chap signed up for wing-back duties at 33, and particularly one transitioning from Serie A to the Premier League. And being a fair-minded sort, even though I am a fully paid-up member of Team Perisic, I am happy to acknowledge the risk in this scheme.

I suppose the riposte here lies in the fact that Perisic will presumably be asked to perform his duties in tandem with young Sessegnon. That is to say, one of the pair will strut his stuff midweek, the other take the stage at weekends. As well as allowing Perisic to catch his breath in between assignments, one might also hope that this Master-Apprentice arrangement might serve to chivvy along the career of young Sessegnon, a bounder whose ability to follow positional instructions appears vastly to outweigh his competence with ball at feet.

And as much as anything else, I’m whistling a particularly upbeat ditty on account of the fact that the whole approach to transfers, firmly embedded in the marble halls of N17 over the last decade or two, appears now to be subject to a minor adjustment. It seems that ever since the ‘90s, The Tottenham Way on such matters has involved hoovering up young sorts as yet unproven on grass but with buckets of potential and – tellingly – sell-on value. As part of a broader strategy, involving one or two experienced heads, this would be sage business. At Spurs, however, the strategy in its entirety seems to have been to bank on these fellows in their early twenties to blossom into world-beaters on our watch, with world football’s more established stars strictly amongst the more non grata breed of persona.

Therefore, seeing us invest in a chap whose finest years might be behind him, and whose sell-on value might be minimal, but who, crucially, has a few tales to tell and medals to display, represents a pretty significant swerve from the route usually trodden. In theory at least, however, it ought to complement well the massed ranks of younger nibs buzzing about the place, and strikes me as a pretty sound piece of thinking.

Fraser Forster In; Pierluigi Gollini Out

The more perceptive amongst you, having skim-read the above, will be unsurprised that the AANP stance on the incoming of Fraser Forster is not a million miles from that on Master Perisic. At 34, Forster could theoretically bounce Perisic on his knee and spin a few tales from his youth, whilst, at the risk of sounding like a Brexit Minister, our quota of home-grown players also apparently receives a nudge in the right direction by virtue of his arrival.

Any reserve goalkeeper worth his salt in a Champions League side ought to have a few decent character references and work experience jaunts, and Forster, while not necessarily amongst the world’s elite between the sticks, seems have enough experience both to fill the void in random Cup games and also to deputise for longer stints should Monsieur Lloris happen to chip a toe-nail at any point during the season.

One might argue that the very fact that Forster has won a clutch of England caps at all says something about him in the first place, because if four decades of watching the national side has taught me anything it’s that back-up goalkeepers rarely get a look-in.

That said, I can’t claim to be any sort of expert on the fellow. Science, a pretty reliable gauge of these sorts of matters, informs me that he measures six foot seven, and while there is more to being a goalkeeper than general mass alone, I dare say he has put his presence to decent use over the years in his chosen profession. However, the issue of whether a chap whose brain is so far from his feet offers any value when kicking the thing is not one to which I can attest.

A cautionary note might be struck in that the last time we welcomed aboard an experienced and seemingly capable, home-grown deputy goalkeeper, the name ‘Hart’ was being ironed across the back of replica shirts. However, while Joe Hart had struck me as a pretty sensible addition when brought into the fold a few years back, on his donning the lilywhite (or lurid goalkeeping equivalent) I was swiftly reminded of his principal failing, namely his inability to save anything directed to his left.

For most of us, I suppose the inability to dive to one’s left might not really interfere with life’s mundane tasks, and far less one’s paid employment – but in a goalkeeper it can be quite the hindrance, and thus it proved with Hart. Principally for this reason, Hart fairly quickly became exposed as being at his best when hollering at those around him, but vastly more limited when pressed into actual on-pitch service.

Young Senor Gollini has similarly underwhelmed during his year at the Lane. The initial plan had apparently been for him to bed in and gradually usurp Lloris, his year-long loan designed to culminate in a triumphant permanent move, which just goes to show how wrong folk can be, what?

The fellow’s sporadic appearances in various Cup competitions were of fairly middling quality, his stint with us most notable for that rather curious if emphatic flap at mid-air during the Carabao Cup defeat to Chelsea. Few, one suspects, will mourn his departure.

All of which seems to point to Forster’s most useful attributes being the fact that he is neither Joe Hart nor Pierluigi Gollini. Nevertheless, it was a spot of business that needed doing, and if he can guide us through the early Cup rounds without too many alarms, then Forster-in-Gollini-out will represent a pretty tidy spot of early-summer give-and-take.