style of play

[deadleyledley]

the style of play has caused us alot of problems.
crouchy started yesterday gainst stoke. it was the obvious swap and i have no problems with that decision but why is the mindset to automatically go route 1 when he play. he is miles better on the deck than in the air. this played into stokes hands and we were left dumbfounded.

against chelsea redknapp went to match there compact diamond midfield. i dont understand why when palacios ended up playing on the left. this played into chelsea's hands because we didn't know how to play the system because our full backs didnt come forward as much as theirs.

why dont we play the way we have done well with and that is with to little strikers and lennon out wide with a feeder from the middle and wilson hunting the ball. we play well when the ball is on the floor and tottenham is a team known for its passing play.

modric is a key loss and so is defoe but we cant rely on 2 people. i hate to say this but a*se play their way no matter who the opposition and it works for them most the time. we have a squad capable of adapting during a game and we will be able to come away with a good result if we play to our strengths.

[spurs61]

Did you go to the game DL? The press reports stating we kept using route one are well wide of the mark (much like Crouch's header). We kept the ball on the deck and hit Crouch only when appropriate, and even then it was generally from a cross from at least half way inside the Stoke half. The problem was one of lack of pace and guile, neither Crouch or Keane are what you would call quick and consequently Stoke were able to defend very deep and nulify the neat flowing football we are renouned for. Jenas' energy made a difference when he came on but we really missed Defoe's clever runs off the ball. Both Tom and Niko were extremley poor and should have come off early in the second half, their respective distribution was shockingly bad, especially for two technical players. Hopefully Saturday's performance demonstrated just why Tom cannot be a first choice in a two man central midfield.

I'd alos like to point out that Stoke are the most negative, stiffling team I can recall seeing at the Lane, they had no ambition and simply came to kick, block and spoil. The should be acused of bringing the game into disrepute. But then this is the club who once had a manger who stated "If you want entertainment,go and watch the clowns".

[Gino Ginelli]

There is an undoubted increase in early hit crosses into the box when Crouch plays, but that's expected because that is what is meant by "bringing something different" to the team. With JD/RK we have to keep the ball on the deck and play intelligently to bypass the defences (which is a very good thing) but with Crouch on you have the added option of just belting the ball into the box for him to win it (no bad thing initially, unless overused at the expense of the more intelligent and rapier-like football we are capable of)

To be fair to Crouch and the players trying to find him, he had a good 3 or 4 headed attempts where he won the ball, only for the chance to be saved or cleared by an inprobably high James Beattie boot (although he's reputedly had plenty of practice at getting his leg over. Usually with dirty blackburn/southampton ladies of the night).

The (Tottenham) style I'd be more concerned about is the classic "ah this'll be easy, how hard can it be" complacency approach, with effort pegged back to 60% of the norm.

[Rojoknapp]

I agree with 61, I was at the match and we actually didn't look long for Crouch very often at all. I even said to my dad at HT, I wonder will Harry tell them to be more direct, but if anything we were less so after half time. In fact, I think we were a little too indirect - we kept trying to pick our way through the middle, we would have been better served pinging in cross after cross, making Stoke deal with Crouch and if not getting a goal then getting some corners, just piling pressure on. As much as we had the ball, there was never really a time when Stoke looked particularly uncomfortable with what we had.

[deadleyledley]

interesting views. i was at the game and i thought that a more route 1 approach was used than usual. not sure if harry was going to change it at the beggining to full throttle route 1 and bring on pav at half time.

defoe was a big loss, we lost his speed at knowledge that we had a striker in hot form. he plays off the last man and therfore he would have caused stoke lots of problems. i thought keane was dropping too deep at times and that didnt help crouch who needs people to run off him.