Lunacy
Spurs' midfield permutations under Ange
The first thing I think that we need to acknowledge, is that Oliver Skipp is many things, but truth be told, he may have become a political figure at Spurs, as opposed to a player that ought to be on any player committee, a player that should be mistaken for the heartbeat of Tottenham Hotspur.
The lime green aspect reveals the limited offering of a player that struggles to be the first choice for England’s U21s.
Yet Spurs fans will tell you that Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg is the weak link in the chain. Christ on a bike.
The complete midfielder is a misnomer, of course. What we’re constantly striving for are the combinations that lubricate a side, and make that tedious stuff that the data bods refer to as construction and defensive actions.
The alternative is a midfield that creates naff all and puts out a welcome mat when the other lot comes at us.
Looking at Maddison we see an extremely lively creative, and if quite rightly we ignore Bissouma under Ryan Mason, then we have plenty of va-va-voom potential, but only if Spurs have a man there to take up the defensive strain.
The consequences of ignoring the defensive element of our midfield equilibrium are painfully obvious.
If we look at where Ange might be heading, then he’s got a midfield with a soft defensive underbelly, and that’s if Tanguy Ndombele doesn’t disappoint as he has for every other coach.
Minus Tanguy at his absolute best and our mate Postecoglou has not only the same defensive woes, but less bite in the tackle, and fewer progressive passes which are vital to Kane and Sonny, but even less defensive assistance.
Lunacy.
As far as Bentancur is concerned, it’s omitted him because this guy is half a season away.
And then, we hope, hope he’s okay.
God help Ange 🤦♂️
I can't recall who said it recently (might have been Ryan....even a broken clock.....), but our current situation is that we have a mish-mash of players many of whom work well in one system but not so well in another. Similarly in the positions they play...........why is this?
Well Ryan may have been right in saying that we need to identify who we are and how we play the game: until we understand that we cannot design systems and then choose players who fit that system and philosophy. A lot of piss taking went on with Poch around this "philosophy" but basically his decline and the clubs subsequent decline was Levy not understanding the club's role in living that philosophy instead of perpetrating an alien one based upon property management.
So we have arrived at a point where yet another guy comes in trying to sort through several different jigsaws, all the pieces jumbled together in the same box and no picture on the front.
We have the legacy: Hugo, Sonny, Kane Dier etc. We have the last purchases of that era, Lo Celso, N'dom, PEH, etc., none of whom (apart from PEH) have worked out in the ultra defensive set-up we've utilised since Poch left. We then have players bought to suit the Jose/Conte system. All this these though are sub-par; the product of the undermining, the overarching incompetence and pernicious greed of Levy.
Each manager has had to compromise their vision by accepting Levy's version of what they want: ie, instead of Bastoni or Skriniar we get Longlet - instead of the leather jacket we get the vinyl one, because there's a rumour vinyl might go up in value.....
So we find ourselves with second rate players, best suited to a number of diverse systems and another poor Dr Frankenstein trying to stitch a body together in the hope it will live, to meet the objectives of the arch Golem in the director's box.
Gonville is spot on with his stats and conclusion: shipping 63 goals means we need a defence - that 's the major piece of work. We won't get a AAA CB we might get an A+ and/or a AA, but already Levy can be smelt in that scenario - we were in for 2 now it's the cheapest 1. You can see him spending a month haggling over peanuts for the dutchman instead of getting out there an offloading the dross.
THEN we can look a midfield option.
For my money we are off the mark with 433 and should probably look initially at a 442 with a diamond formation of a central DM and AM and two "half backs" we have the personnel to implement that: PEH Maddison and any of the handful of the current crop playing left and right.
But it won't matter a damn if we have to sacrifice 1 or 2 to protect the likes of Dier, Longlet or Davies and I can't see the great and powerful Oz (a small man behind a curtain pulling the levers) allowing a manager not to play at least 3 forwards.
You can put a dog in a stable but it won't make it a horse or a chicken in a kennel but it wont be a dog, and this is what we have: a farm where the farmer thinks that if he puts that dog in the stable he'll be able to sell it for the price of a horse and if he has a hen that can lay eggs and round up sheep he won't have to invest in two animals.
We don't have a squad, we have a menagerie: mainly mismatched livestock with a couple of lions but for sure, no pride.