Where's the Logic???

So we won last night 3-1 against a poor CSKA to finish our Pathetic Champions League campaign in 3rd place and in turn have secured a spot in more familiar surroundings the Europa League.

Despite some decent play this should not be seen as any form of success it was a case of clawing a booby prize out of failure.

Let me get this right-

We fielded a weakened side in a must win game Vs Monaco (which we lost)

To concentrate on a League fixture Vs Chelsea (which we lost)

To then field a full strength side Vs CSKA (which we won) to qualify for the Europa League.

Forgive me if I'm not jumping for joy I'm just again baffled at the 'logic' or lack of it again.
We've spent years trying to get back in the Champions League and turning our noses up at the Europa as a hindrance yet have nose dived out of the Champions League using a weaker side to then field a full strength side to obtain Europa League football.

(Answers on a post card)

Where do we stand now after all the 'progress' we've made?

In 5th chasing the big boys and back in our hindrance cup the Europa League.
The whole thing has been a Debacle and the only justification now for any of it is to ensure a top 4 finish and give the Europa a real go. NO EXCUSES!

Failure to do so makes the entire episode a joke which needs some serious questions asked.

What is the Ambition at Spurs?
What's the strategy?
What's the point?

Can anyone shed some light on our stance on any competition we're in because we sure aint in any to win them.

 

There's no way we would have won the champions league. Let's get on with it. It's a trophy that we have a realistic chance of winning. Personally I'd rather win a trophy than have a 'good' run in a trophy that we have no chance of winning. Let's get real, we are NOT top notch yet but a work in practice. we're doing ok, starting to play better, holding our own in the league, getting key players back fit. Let's stop blowing our own trumpet and thinking we're something we're not. Let's try to win SOMETHING before we start giving it large.

 

Could not agree more, I was stunned when I saw the team sheet last night to see a full strength Spurs side in a dead rubber match that nobody would have been too upset if we had lost and missed out on the Europa League and the intrusive Thursday and Sunday fixtures, just baffling as two weeks ago in Monaco when we needed a win to stay in the Champions league we rested several players and were then run ragged by Monaco and crashed out of the tournament, I always try to support Poch when I can but I have to question his decision making in this case, now from February onwards we can look forward to slogging it out in the likes of Ukraine and Russia on Thursday nights (in a competition we don't want to be in) while Liverpool and Chelsea can rest up and prepare for their Premiership fixtures, I'm just so disappointed, this is going to impact on our top four challenge for this season big time .

 

I wasn't suggesting wed win the CL but after struggling to get back in it, i dnt expect us to go out with such a whimper.

I totally agree we should give the Europa a proper go it is achievable but if i see second string players going into it now im gonna be pissed.

 

Stop whinging for heavens sake, unless you didn't notice we have had some really key injuries, not 1 game but lots, Kane, Toby, Eric to name a few. Last night was all about building confidence from the good performance against Swansea and if I recall Wembley will be our home next year. Apart from Derby and sometimes hapless finishing it was a stunning performance. Harry Winks is going to a first choice start in the next 3-4 months.

 

The cynic in me wonders whether its income related strategy? We may have had 1, maybe 2 more games at Wembley in the champions league, before we faced an opponent that is just too much for us at the moment. If, and I mean 'IF' we give the Europa a real go, we can get a good number more games in at Wembley (good practice for next season) with 60k-80k supporters, plus potentially more win bonus if we go far enough? Might all in all appear a better financial option in order to finance stadium or transfer/wage budgets? Of course, this is a gamble and could appear fruitless if we bail out of Europa with a whimper!

 

Im sorry should we be celebrating Failure?

 

Not sure players were rested for Chelsea, per se. Just that three games in a week requires changes to prevent injury and maximise performance.

 

Really got to agree with this article. Managing European football and the domestic league and cup comps is a difficult task even for the most experienced managers but I think MP got this campaign all so wrong. It was a favourable group probably too much so that the first game Monaco were massively underestimated and in truth we never recovered from there with each coming game more and more must win..
If I'd have been someone like kyle walker for example and I'd played hard all season to earn a crack at the champs league only to be rotated when considered first choice right back at the club...well..I wouldn't be happy to be fair.
My opinion of the group stages is you go hard for the first 3/4 games and hopefully rest and rotate once the points are on the board. Do players really need to be rested only a month or so into the season ? I don't feel they do. This is the period where a squad pecking order is established prompting those out of the squad to raise thier game and players season form is forged by establishing a run of consecutive games,match fitness and sharpness for the campaign ahead.
Had vardy and mahrez been moved in and out of the Leicester side last Aug,sept and November does anyone feel that they and Leicester would have gained that momentum, form and belief?. No and nor do I?

 

I don't think he is celebrating failure. I think he is pointing out some pretty damn extenuating circumstances. Aside from other, shorter key injuries, we have had Alderweireld, Dembele, Lamela and Kane each missing something like half our league fixtures so far. Other players, particularly Eriksen and Dele, have been out form. We have had a pretty tough start to the season, too. And you have to remember, Poch is still young and learning - this was his first ever CL campaign.

Let's reverse the focus of your anger. If Poch had put out the very strongest team available away to Monaco, but, due to injuries had to field a weak team at Stamford Bridge - how would you have reacted? Would you have been as angry?

 

And how many times have we won at Stamford Bridge in say the last 20 years?

Both Games were Big and shouldve been treated so with our best players, wouldn't it make more sense to look at your fixtures and rotate against someone like an abysmal Swansea?

In the end Poch blew both which makes it a bad call however you look at it.

With regards to it being Pochs 1st CL campaign hed bettter had made the most of it coz his very limited tactic and decision making doesn't bode well for a quick return.

 

It's a double edged sword and I think a case of damned if we do, damned if we don't.
Whilst our Champions league campaign has been poor, Poch felt a victory would be good in the long run of the season. In the first half at Chelsea we were much better and played well against Swansea. Maybe he felt it was justified to get the team into a winning mentality again?
Eriksen looks like he is getting back to form and Alli and Kane seem to to have the understanding back from last season.
If we win against United then I'm sure all will be well but if we lose then the knives will be back out.
For now, I will wait and see but I am hoping we can get back on track with a win at the media darlings.

 

I'm not taking anything from the CL game. ....CSKA were a really very poor side who wouldn't have beaten a Championship team!

Someone mentioned that Liverpool & Chelsea can rest their players for the PL games. ...so what? ....are you worried that we will finish outside the top4?? ....what does the top4 mean??? ....CL football! ....you mean the competition that we didn't turn up for??
......modern day footballers are money orientated idiots. Spend the whole time banging on about CL as the holy grail.....and then don't turn up when they are playing in it. W....

For me the PL is about winning it....not about finishing top 4. ....it is unfortunate that by trying to win the PL you are putting yourself into the CL

when a team who finishes 4th in the PL can be crowned CL winners......it is then you realize it is a money making nonsense competition owned by people who just want the named branded everywhere.
I never watch any (non Spurs) CL games

 

I did say after the Monaco game that we would probably field a full-strength side in this must-lose game - I was only joking though. The real joke is yet to come when we field all the youngsters in the next Europa League game.
I am not in favour of CL drop-outs ending in the Europa League but now we are in it we have to take it seriously.
The only good thing to come out of the game on Wednesday is that now we are used to playing against a team whose only strategy is to whack long, high balls to a lanky striker - great preparation for Sunday.

 

So we had injuries to key players. So what. It's a contact sport and you will get injuries. Other clubs have injuries. My physio, a Gooner, is always on about his long list of injuries. It doesn't seem to affect their form, this season or for many seasons past.

For me there are two stand out things in my mind:

- our efforts in the CL were nothing short of a disgrace. A capitulation. 85,000 suffered that dross. Hang your heads in shame all of you.

- For me winning the Premier League is THE prize. Okay so you go into the CL by default, but we aspire to be the best, don't we.

Now we suffer Sunday fixtures and 50% more games to win it, than if we'd not been in. That must surely water down our PL.

I watched the CL highlights, which I rarely do. The truth is we are not up there with many of those sides. Short of top quality and true game changers.

That's how I see it. I'm still a fan, always there to support them, but at the end of the day if we treasure the Premier League, then I'm afraid DL needs to
spend .

COYS

 

How many times we've won at Stamford Bridge is an irrelevance.

You think that by putting out a team that hindsight shows wasn't good enough in Monaco he didn't treat it like 'a big game'. I think he put out a team he thought could get a result and it was a miscalculation. It happens. Even the greatest managers have a career littered with miscalculations. I've got Manchester United supporting friends who spent the best part of thirty years tearing their hair out at Ferguson's miscalculations. There is no guarantee, absolutely none, that we would have got a result in Monaco if he had put the strongest available 11 on the pitch. And no guarantee that we would have got the results we needed on CL match day 6. By the same token, we totally played the league leaders, on a run of straight wins, off their own pitch in the first half. Only one moment of individual brilliance just before half time turned the game, and the balance of morale, on its head. It's not like we rolled up at SB and put in a damp squib performance, is it? The Swansea game was a week after the Chelsea game - what is the point in talking about rotation for that game? The issue was that we had a depleted squad and two very tough away games in four days - the Swansea game, where we would have a week to recover from those two games - is irrelevant.

You totally ignore this injury/suspension crisis we have had no matter how many times it is raised - why is that. He didn't 'completety blow' both games. We were unfortunate against Chelsea and certainly deserved something from the game. Even without our injury troubles we wouldn't have been favourites for either game (whether we would have fancied ourselves to pull off a result or not), but you are talking as though we were. In my book, if you deserve a result in your second tough away game in four days, against the league leaders with a string of straight wins at a ground you haven't won at in over 20 years, it's not exactly 'blowing it)!

You avoided answering the question: if Poch had sent his strongest possible 11 out at Monaco, remembering the whole injury problem, and therefore had to put out a depleted team at Stamford Bridge, would you be angry about that? Regardless of how well or poorly they performed or whether we got the result we wanted in Monaco or not.

In regards to it being Poch's first CL campaign, that was by way of a component of an explanation. You think he has limited tactics and decision making, I disagree with you. But, given our league position and entry to the Europa League, I think it is totally and utterly ludicrous to claim that his decision making and tactical ineptitude don't bode well for a quick return. In, fact, given our difficult start to the campaign and the injury/suspension crisis it made me want to run over to the bookies and put money on us for a top four finish. As well as others, we have had Alderweireld, Dembele, Lamela and Kane each out for nearly half of our league games in a definably tough start. Imagine Liverpool without Mane, Firminio, Henderson and their best centre half (hard to compare with Toby as he is best in league, more or less, and a massive miss whereas theirs are all white)? They have had no European football and are only 3 points ahead us. But folk are fapping over them as having this amazing season. We have important players returning, other important players gaining some form and you are writing our chances off. That's a bit sad.

 

"Only one moment of individual brilliance just before half time...."
I trust you don't mean Pedro's....give him time and space to hit the target....goal??

If he can't hit the target from 20 yards....from a central position....he probably isn't worth the money. It is a decent goal....but a moment of brilliance......not sure

IMO we gave Chelsea that goal when we didn't need to.........which sounds familiar

 

Differing view here...
We are starting to become a club that (along with a couple of others ) that will hopefully give the Sky top 4 a shake up .
Natural progression is normal, the Leicester fairy tale was a one off, a perfect storm perhaps ..
We have gone from mid table to top 5/7 and gained the Europa League and onto a top 3 placing .
All a nice progression imo .
We were never going to win the CL so dropping out really is not an issue.
We are in the EL and may have just two more matches, should we get knocked out, the same amount as continuing in the CL.
Yes if we win it we will play more matches than if we won the CL, personally do not think either will happen.
Thursday/Sunday, some people have a real problem with it, I do not, no real difference to Wednesday/Saturday.

So now we are in the EL, we will be able to use some more of our squad, that is if Poch rotates, he seems not to in my eyes.
Maybe players like Wimmer, N'Koudou, Davis, Trippier etc will get some much needed game time, so when required they will be somewhat match fit and geared up to fit into the team.

The progression we are making will become more apparent come seasons end should we again reach the top4.
If not, the the EL is there again.

Personally I would change the EL format for less travelling or perhaps back into a knockout but I will have little chance to change it and to be quite honest the whole thing is similar enough to the CL to be used as a training exercise to be able to play in both competitions.

We will need a stronger squad to complete in the PL plus either the CL or EL.
Or, we will have to trust our second string.

The resting of players for the CL game against Monaco was strange.
Especially as the stronger lineup was played against CSKA ..

I would say Poch is learning, it is his first season in the CL but I am afraid to say the jury is a little out on him at present.
I do not want him gone in any way, I just think he is making some strange decisions.

We now do not have any Europe until February?
So no excuses on the tiredness of the squad through any travelling.
The top 4 is not all cut and dried, ManCity are not that strong, managed by Pep who has always managed the top 1 or 2 team in the league and has always had money to burn, do not see that great a manager in him.
ManUtd will along with Mourino will be mid table if lucky, especially after Sunday !
Klopp and Liverpool, good team at the moment but now they are getting some injuries .
Chelsea look strong but lets see what happens when Costa gets wound up, as he will.

We have not played well and are still in touch, still looking good imo.

As usual though .... COYS !

 

IMHO, the combined income from the UEFA will be a lot less than the combined income from the CL had we got out the group stage, so that will not be it.

 

Thursday/Sunday, some people have a real problem with it, I do not, no real difference to Wednesday/Saturday.

One issue with playing Sunday is that you are always catching up. Everyone else can get points on the board. Your 3 points for a win may not move you up places (against the top teams who play on the Saturday).....they only get you back to where you were. Plus you know the results which can add pressure.
...so what you hope for is top4 v top4 PL games....when there is midweek CL/EL games.....as they will generally be on a Sunday (as live tv games).