Villa v Spurs

November 29, 2009 / Alan / 2 Comments

In the middle of my raving and swooning at the wonder of the Spurs performance versus Wigan, I made a facetious remark about cosmic redistribution. To balance out all the missed opportunities and anguish, everything came right, but just in a single huge dollop of Good Stuff. The forces of the universe revealed their fundamental nature not at the Hadron collider but somewhere in the middle of N17.

But the world spins and time rolls on. Against Aston Villa we played almost as well, especially in the second half, yet nearly came away with no reward for our flowing football and total domination of the second half. Given that Villa are a well-organised side who are genuine rivals for a place in the top six, the excellence of our football and our ability to shift up through the gears after the break shows that the Wigan result may be a freak but the quality that produced it is authentic.

Villa’s pressing game stifled much of our endeavour in the first half and they were assisted by some wasteful possession. Crouch and Defoe were adrift up front for some of the time and whilst we were likely to be dangerous, at half time O’Neill would have been scheming ways of hanging on to a lead provided by a messy goal. In our efforts to block the header and rebound, the defence were pulled to the near post and Agbonlahor was fractionally quicker to move into that gap to reach a loose ball.

In the second half we upped our game and took over for the rest of the match. This was less a failure on Villa’s part to repeat the pressing and more about our collective ability to raise our game. We passed our way round their midfield and pushed them further back until they fought a rearguard action in and around their box. Lots of talk in this blog earlier in the season about resilience, and we have developed the wherewithal to respond positively to adversity rather than crawl back into our shell. This is just as significant in terms of future success as our superlative passing.

More shimmering brilliance from Kranjcar, drifting in from the left. Superb touch, inventive accurate passing and a killer shot, this could be the best £2m we or anyone has spent for many a year. I always rated him but had no idea he was this good. He didn’t get a regular start at Pompey for some of the time there. With Hud in a forward position we prompted and probed. Freidel was in good form and often in action.

Our final ball was not as telling as on Sunday. Much of this was down to resolute defending in the box, closing down the space. Crouch drifted to the far post and expected some success there but Beye dealt with him very well. Also the ball did not stick on that final touch as it did last week, when JD had one touch and bang. That extra couple of feet makes all the difference. In the battle of the wingers (see the comments section on the preview), honours were about even. Lennon did less but was still dangerous when he had some room, but Villa blocked the inside channel effectively. Milner and Young are more versatile as they work back well but as the game wore on they were pushed further and further back so their crossing threat was nullified.

Great goal from Daws. He hit it high on the bounce and kept it down well. I was so pleased for him. He’s one of the players I just like a hell of a lot. So willing and genuine, he puts his all into every match and has done well to get back into contention after his injury pushed him down the centre back pecking order. I really hope that the transfer rumours about the arrival of more defenders do not effect him. And yesterday his distribution was excellent. Bassong alongside him played well, his pace dealt with Villa’s increasingly sporadic breakaways.

We faced one of rivals for the top places and did not lose ground – that will do. More than that, we were the better team and that’s the message I will take from this game.

More about that later this week – no time as Christmas shopping beckons. Or to give it its proper title, sodding bloody christmas sodding shopping. I will be giving money to charities who stop playing electronic musak stylophone carols in the street. Turn it off and you get the cash. Bah humbug!

Villa v Spurs Preview. And I Love You All

November 27, 2009 / Alan / 11 Comments

Same again. Steady as she goes. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Blimey this blogging lark is too easy.

I’ve spent this week glowing mostly. I like to think that my fellow human beings have been enriched by the experience as I spread warmth and happiness amongst them. If only they had let me have a crack at those nuclear negotiations Iran or that climate change stuff, the world would have been a better place.

I’ve not really had the inclination to write. Happy happy joy joy. Hello clouds, hello sky. Everything in the world is lovely and it would spoil it if I picked up the laptop. It is such a wonderful feeling, I just want to extract every ounce of pleasure and delight, savour every last moment. Sunday was a great day: I left the ground grinning like an idiot and am grinning still.

Maybe we Spurs fans only get worked up about the bad stuff. In my job I tend to come across many problems – the good stuff goes on but the few complaints and wrongs end up on my desk. I encourage colleagues to take a positive approach, to dwell on strengths and success rather than be problem-oriented, but here’s me feeling a little odd. All is well and nothing to say.

In the end, this feeling is unusual because this is a very special week. When you witness a piece of history, it’s hard to put it into context, but nine goals, eight in one half, one player scores five, almost the biggest ever margin of victory – this club has been going for over 125 years, I’ve been part of 40 or so of them, and this is history right here right now.

On Saturday I would not make any changes but Harry may be tempted because of course Villa will present a totally different challenge. Martin O’Neill will have looked at Sunday’s game with the gimlet eye of a true predator. Not for him the beauteous wonder of Kranjcar’s touch: he has eyes only for the gaps left behind as Niko trundles unwillingly back to defend. Milner is the ideal man to both protect the Villa defence and then dash forward into the space. Defence-splitting through-balls will not be admired either, as O’Neill will instruct his back four to hold back and stay close to cut down the space behind and in between them.

O’Neill is one of my favourite managers. If consistently getting the best out of players is the key to being a fine manager, then he qualifies every time. Normally I’m sceptical about the bosses who cavort hysterically on the touchline but his appears to be genuine enthusiasm and involvement. And behind sits John Robertson, a dour faced perfect foil apparently thinking only about when he can pop out for a quick drag. The straight man for the star but without each other, neither would be so famous.

Rumour has it that O’Neill had dinner with Levy when we had a vacancy but it did not come of anything. The Irishman asked for a big salary, maybe £2m, and would not accept a director of football. Levy should have shaken hands on that one. I hope O’Neill does the World Cup again for the BBC. He’s fantastic because he’s happy to talk about football but can’t stand all the hype and dumb questions – and he’s not afraid of showing that on screen. I bet Lineker and Chiles are really scared of him.

Back to Saturday. Harry might be tempted to replace Crouch with Keane to work on Villa’s back four but I’d keep it the same, telling Crouch to come off his markers into the space in front of them, thus shifting the centre halves from their defensive line. His height will be valuable in defending set pieces: Villa have scored a high proportion of their goals in this fashion.

Whatever plan Villa concoct to stifle Lennon, it either won’t work because he is just so hot right now, or it will commit so many players as to leave space elsewhere. We must be ready to slot Defoe and maybe Hud into channels on the right, and/or shift the ball quickly across field. There will be gaps if we do it right.

Bassong is fit, I’m not sure about Ledley. Dawson has done well but may step down if more pace in the box is required.

I’d also keep attacking, not recklessly and with the safety net of Wilson permanently stationed in front of our back four, but to maintain pressure on Villa and score one more than them.

Spurs v Wigan. Joy and Pain. Without the Pain.

November 23, 2009November 23, 2009 / Alan / 13 Comments

Just a fantastic day, one for celebration and delight rather than analysis. I cannot recall a 45 minutes of sustained joyous brilliance like it, a whirlwind of marvellous passing, electric shooting and outstanding athleticism.

Less a football match, more an exercise in physical and psychological destruction, imagine what the total might have been if we had actually played for the last 30 minutes of the first half, instead of sitting back and allowing Wigan to ease back into the match. Come on, be honest: at half time how many of you said this was typical Tottenham, letting our advantage go to waste? The Bloke Behind Me confidently predicted one-one.

Remember the way the old teleprinter on Grandstand would chatter the big scores, giving the figure and then the word in brackets, lest anyone think an error had been made. Tottenham Hotspur 9 (nine) Wigan 1 is how I shall hold this victory in my memory.

I saw the 9-0 against Bristol Rovers but as I’ve said elsewhere, I don’t recall that as being an exceptionally good Spurs performance. What was different about yesterday was that every goal was fabulous. Not a deflection or scramble amongst them.

It was as if the forces that hold the cosmos in equilibrium decided that the Tottenham Yin and Yang needed squaring up, but rather than do so over the course of a season or two, they squeezed the reckoning-up into 45 minutes. To make up for all those moments of hand-wringing, hands clasped to face in horror or utter derision, everything worked. The mental aberrations and Laurel and Hardy pratfalls, the late comebacks and underserved breakaway deflections, balanced out in one fell swoop on a chilly November afternoon. The earth is spinning more smoothly on its axis, don’t you agree? Although it might have been nice if Bentley could have saved the one decent free kick since goodness knows when for the winner against Chelsea or United.

The fact that Defoe scores five and I’m not sure if he was Spurs’ best player says something about the quality of the second half onslaught. Earlier in the season in a match report I remarked on JD’s progress. He has bags of natural talent but not the football nouse that delineates the good finishers from the great. Or so it used to be. Against Hull he moved better, one touch for control and the second for the strike, and yesterday showed how far that development can take him. His running and positioning was canny (granted Wigan gave him enough space but he took full advantage) and his finishing was deadly. Twice he took the ball too wide, or so I thought, twice he found the net, unerringly into the corners, keeper a tangle of limbs.

Through-balls and crosses, they were all the same in this display of the art of finishing. This is what he can do if given the service – all afternoon he was able to run onto the ball rather than have his back to the goal. Credit to Crouch, who bewildered his markers by coming off the back four into no man’s land where he was not picked up. Mind you, it did not take much to befuddle Titus Bramble, bless him. Plaudits also to Harry, who insisted in the second half that our runs started higher up the pitch, thus exploiting Wigan’s lack of pace in defence, just as we did against Burnley.

Our 4-4-2 looked right, a brave decision to leave Keane on the bench but absolutely the correct one. However, who needs tactics when all you have to do is give the ball to Lennon. It still took us 45 minutes to work that out but poor Wigan never quite sussed it. Even right at the end of the game, we were still passing the ball wide right to Lennon or Defoe and they were still leaving them all alone. They were great passes, though.

Eric 'the Invisible Man' Edman pictured yesterday

Lennon produced a scintillating performance of classic wing-play, harking back to the golden years of Jones and Robertson, although neither were as quick as he is. In the first half he loitered on the wing, feeding on sweeping cross-field passes from Huddlestone and Kranjcar, whose abilities mean we can change the point of attack quickly and opposition defences can never therefore be at rest. After the break his diet was supplemented by telling through balls, but these days it is all meat and drink to him. No longer does he dwell on the ball, twisting hither and thither because he can’t make up his mind, nor do crosses sail aimlessly into Row Z. He can pick out a man, cut to the by-line or switch inside. A remarkable achievement for one who is still comparatively young, and an absolute credit to the coaching staff.

But what is most memorable is just how thrilling this was. When he came onto the ball, I held my breath and rose from the seat in genuine expectation and excitement. Something would happen but you didn’t know exactly what, and there’s the beauty.

Wilson stayed back and Tom went forward, that’s the natural order of things. The stand-out for me was Kranjcar’s superb midfield creativity. He displayed the complete array of skills: impeccable first touch, the vision to see the ball early and inch-perfect weight of pass to deliver. Deft flicks, through-balls or 50 yarders across the pitch, they were all the same, all performed with the nonchalance brilliance of the top class thoroughbred. I adored that cross from the left in the second half, caressed early with the outside of his right foot, or the flick over the hapless opponent’s head late on, followed by a run into the heart of the box.

I’m enjoying this so much, I’ll leave to another day the debate about how we shoehorn all this talent into the team, but suffice to say that Woodgate had to have a strong word with him about his failure to pick up Scharner’s runs into the box, one of which led to the handball, sorry, goal, a defensive shortcoming which better teams would have punished more severely.

I ended the game with a sneaking admiration for Scharner. He kept going for the whole match as his team-mates disintegrated around him, still making runs, still trying to get something out of the game. He had the front to look the Shelf right in the eye when given the bird towards the end of the match (you can’t put your heart and soul into abusing a bloke who was seven goals behind at the time, even if he is a cheat) and straight-faced hold up his right hand. I’d invest in that bloodyminded attitude for our midfield – shame about the talent.

A few minutes from the end, I managed to draw breath and it started to sink in. That bloke in Worcester Avenue, laughing uncontrollably, that was me and I’m chuckling still. It’s a feeling that won’t go away for a good while yet and I hope you had as much fun as me.

Irish Indignation – Society Is To Blame

November 21, 2009 / Alan / 8 Comments

By now everyone who has any connection to Ireland has had their say about the handball. Prime Ministers, footballers including our own human wind turbine, and, on the Today programme yesterday morning, A Rich Irish Bloke Who No One has Heard Of. My neighbour’s Irish setter is in mourning. That must be why he was howling all night, and if I was kept awake, then it’s a worthy sacrifice in the face of such a craven injustice. I like to be seen to do my bit for the downtrodden and exploited.

But one voice rang loud and true. Roy Keane never struck me as big on regret or hand-wringing, and his advice to the Irish F.A. to get over it and move on may have ruffled a few feathers, just as his tackles did on the pitch, but never was he more effective. Opinions are divided on his status as a manager but this interview uncovered his attitude and methods. Imagine the defenders’ reaction if he were in charge, entering the dressing room full of injustice only to choke on their protests as Keane reminds them just how bad they were. You would have to be a strong character to emerge from a battering like that. No wonder the players don’t always respond as he would wish.

Mind you, this was nothing compared with his dressing down of the unwary journalist whose mobile rang not once but twice during the press conference. The hapless hack wilted under the twin-pronged assault of the burning heat of Keane’s stare and his sarcastic silences. I shuddered, and I was only listening on Five Live.

The question at hand is not so much whether or not the game will be played again – that was never going to happen – but why the demand for a replay is so great. The Irish have been badly treated, their most justified complaint being not so much the handball but a play-off seeding system that allows FIFA to confer a huge advantage on their favoured teams. However, the fact is that matches are simply not replayed in these circumstances. Ever. Bad luck and move on. This has always been an element of a game where the unpredictable provides much of its enduring fascination.

It’s always tempting to divorce sport from the society of which it is a part. Cricket has been the most illuminating example in recent years, with tours to Zimbabwe threatened and/or cancelled as debate rages over whether the game should be independent of the politics of the countries England play. Sport not politics was infamously used as the justification of the English cricketers in the seventies who took the South African cash in the face of iniquitous apartheid and world condemnation.

Closer to home, we all use football as a means of getting away from it all for a couple of hours. Enter the ground and we work to a different set of customs, morals and rules. As someone who is so mild I make Clark Kent look like Gengis Khan in comparison, I would not only not say boo to a goose, I would give the goose a very wide berth in the first place. Yet I am more than happy to sputter and rage at Spurs’ opponents, and from my vantage point fairly close to the pitch, I glory in their fear and trepidation.

But football is an integral element of our culture and the two are inextricably linked. The roots of the barrage of Irish indignation lie within the growing trend in our society not just to find someone to blame when things go wrong but to seek redress from the institutions that govern us. On one level, we have the compensation culture where accidents seldom happen or individuals are never at fault. We no longer trip over cracked paving stones, we are instead victims of a council deficient in their road repair duties. Schoolchildren cannot play ball or make ice-slides in winter because the school could be seen as culpable if injuries follow. An institution is faulty in some way.

It’s the same on a broader scale. News items, some covering undeniable human tragedy, so often conclude with a demand that ‘the government should take action’ or ‘the government should compensate us’. A car company goes under, there’s a terrible accident or people lose money when investments fail, in all of this and more the government may have some sort of role but primarily that’s the way the system is. I truly feel for the individuals involved – I have lost children in tragic circumstances and there is nothing worse. However, that’s not the point: the clamour for the government or a governing body to ride over the hill top and save us all is so much hot air.

This is my only way of understanding the source of these increasing demands for redress and replays after the event. It’s definitely on the increase and never used to be part of the game. We grumbled and moaned, shouted abuse from the stands or indulged in murky conspiracy theories in dark corners of smoky pubs. Society is changing and so is football. Improve refereeing, put the onus back to players regarding their conduct and get the governing bodies closer to the fans, but resist these attempts to rewrite history. In the face of the forces of these social trends, that may not be so easy, but if the game’s ruling bodies cave in at some future point, football will be changed forever and not for the better.