Top four after a quarter of the season – and in a team sans Dembele, Kaboul, Adebayor, Parker, BAE and Lloris – there ought really to be few grounds for grumbling. And yet… Asking any Spurs fan not to grumble is like asking a 1920s dandy to stay in for the afternoon and peruse some Descartes – it rather flies in the face of that whole raison d’etre jamboree. Thus it transpires that top four though we may be, one jolly well hopes that AVB’s tactical genius extends to more than these slightly desperate attempts to cling on against teams skipping around the relegation zone. Our glorious leader can hardly be judged on 10 or so games, but performances to date have hardly been of the ilk of the majority under ‘Arry.
First Half Fun
In that joyous first half of course things were so entertainingly one-sided it seemed almost cruel, and the two-goal lead was the half-time minimum. Recent mumblings about lack of fluidity were merrily shoved back down the AANP gullet as Hudd had a whale of a time in those midfield acres, Bale did his usual thing and Lennon’s form continued to be as sparkly as many can remember in his lilywhite career.
The use of Lennon in particular in that inside right channel also has the merry side-effect of unleashing the increasingly angry young Master Walker to gallop up the flank, and while his form this season has not quite been what it was, one imagines that opposing left-backs would rather he just stayed in his own half and picked his nose.
Second Half Regression
So all tickety-boo by the break, prompting ill-advised musings in the AANP cranium as to whether this might be the day on which we racked up four, five or more. Wrist-slappings have been duly administered for such churlish optimism about our heroes’ capacity to get from A to B in the simplest manner possible.
Naturally enough, what followed was not the hiding of Southampton lives, but the gradual regression of our lilywhite lot (or black and grey quarters, or whatever the blinking heck that pyjama outfit is supposed to be. Quite what relevance those colours have to anything in our history is beyond me. Honestly, young people these days.).
Presumably the AVB order was not to drop back ten yards en masse and be a distant second to every other loose ball (at least one jolly well hopes that that was not the AVB order) but in the finest White Hart Lane tradition they certainly contrived to make dashed hard work of it.
Whatever the problem was, poor old Livermore did not seem to be the solution, but in calmer moments of reflection one expects he will improve in time. The overall contribution of Dempsey also remains a little mysterious, and Sandro has some way to go before he can be classified as Dembele-esque (although that close-range, near-decapitating head-block certainly go the juices flowing – good lad).
Plenty of room for improvement then, but one way or another we are picking up these wins, which is the nub of the thing I suppose. Not exactly comfortable though, is it?
2 replies on “Southampton 1-2 Spurs: As Straightforward As It Gets With Out Lot”
Yet again we have a comparison with a Harry team with a very different midfield (VdV, Parker, Modric, minus Dembele) and a very different back four (minus BAE and Kaboul, plus Vertonghen). This all carries a hidden agenda, and one which, I would suggest, seeks to flog a dead horse. We would all like Modric back but he ain’t coming; aside of that I suspect you would have very few takers if you started banging the ‘Bring Back ‘Arry’ campaign drum. From me in particular, NO THANKS.
What ho TommyHarmer, thanks for dropping by. For clarity – no agenda at AANP Towers to sneak ‘Arry through the side entrance and plop him into the seat of an aghast AVB. Fully signed up to giving AVB several years at the helm of the good ship Hotspur, since the wizened elders of these parts speak with misty eyes about the days of yore when a manager was given time and the club accordingly stumbled upon ye olde qualitye known as ‘stability’. A mysterious concept, but quite enticing.
I do maintain however that so far this season our performances have not been of the rip-roaring ilk of the majority under ‘Arry. (And rather a shame, as only minor tweaking seemed to be needed come May 2012, rather than the full-blown surgery that has been effected).
Toodle-pip.