What Effect could the WC have?

Discussion in 'Tottenham forum' started by Felon82, July 11, 2018.

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  1. Felon82 Well-Known Member

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    So on the morning of a World Cup Semi Final that we are competing in for the 1st time since I was a boy and the feel good factor surrounding our own National team it got me thinking what Effect could this World Cup have on us as a club once it's all done and dusted?

    With no less than 9 Spurs players available to represent their countries from the last 4 and with our club captain already in the Final it's now a wait and see how our own will do.

    (It's a great leveler on those who wish to play the underdog card on the actual quality we possess as a side overall.)

    So we have 3 Belgians who will no doubt be deflated as they return home with only Jan looking a cert currently to return to us.
    Lloris who pulled off some wonderful saves yesterday could come home a World Cup Captain Winner maybe even a Villain?
    Then there's our boys.........

    And this was what I was thinking about most.

    They have done us and themselves proud in this Tournament, yes the route couldn't have fell kinder but they've almost wiped out 2 decades of despondent turgid football and have got the nation hoping/supporting/together again.
    Our boys especially have played a massive role in that.

    But now we head once again into the Business end of things. It's great doing well at things but it's another level to be the best and take the Glory, a hurdle our boys for a few seasons now have just not been able to negate. Although this result doesn't firmly land on Spurs players shoulders the Highs and Ultimate lows can effect players and of course there will be vultures lurking to pick the bones out of anything they can.

    (I know I know it's coming home)

    Now just for a second imagine the planets align?
    Imagine Sir Harry Kane and co returning home World Cup winners and basically English Football Royalty, could this be what we need as a Club to finally shake off the Plucky Nearly men mind set?
    Could it be the Catalyst for club dominance?
    It would see our stock rise dramatically having 5 WC winners in it all English in the top English League, it's a Sponsors wet Dream.

    Of course I and I'm sure you do have everything crossed for Tonight and hope that dreams do come true and that only good comes from this WC for our Club because they deserve it.

    Come on England

    COYS!!!!
     
    Gordon Mc likes this.
  2. Cheshuntboy Guest

    Well, we lost, and with all five of the Spurs England contingent (plus Modric and Corluka for Croatia!) on the pitch. We didn't play well, and Kane and Alli looked knackered from very early in the proceedings, so I'm really not sure what positives Spurs' fans can take from this, Trippier apart. I still believe that Rose would have been more effective than Young from the first minute of the first game, and Southgate is getting far more praise than he deserves, given how easy our draw has been, but there it is; at least we won't lose to France on Sunday (and I'm afraid that we'd have risked a real thrashing if as many players, including Kane, had been half-fit or unfit, as they clearly were tonight).
     
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  3. burnt Well-Known Member

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    Well not being English I can see this without the tinted glasses so here goes . For me it is a very ordinary England side who didn't perform particularly well overall but got some fantastic results but they were achieved against teams who ranged from ordinary to piss poor in fairness .. Looking at individual performances I don't think many played particularly well overall including our own lads .. Harry was quite overall i taught given his high standards .. He struggled to make an impact in most games bar from set pieces .. Ali was piss poor overall I taught and the fact he kept his place probably said a lot about the squad overall .. I'm struggling with Ali , I still don't see what he really offers when he's not scoring , he gets a few assists throughout the year but nowhere near enough i.m.o .. His development has definitely come to halt over the last 12 months or so i.m.o .. If someone was willing to give me big dollars for him I'd definitely be tempted .. Hope he proves me wrong in the long run .. Tripps had an excellent tournament overall and was one of if not England's best player i.m.o .. Dier didn't get much game time luckily for yee because he's not a midfielder in any sense of the word i.m.o .. Rose only had a few cameo's but that was to be expected given his injuries and form over last 12 - 18 months .. He did ok when he came on in fairness I taught so hopefully he gets back to the player we know he can be .. Getting onto players from other clubs , Sterling had a mare of a tournament overall , Lingard was ok in fits and bursts but anonymous for large parts but hes making a cereer out of that .. Henderson was decent but that's all he'll ever be , a good old warrior but very limited .. Taught young was decent overall surprisingly enough and the 3 defenders did ok but largely because they weren't tested i.m.o .. I taught if someone had a right go at them they were there for the taking but they got away with it due to the quality of the opposition .. Goalkeeper did his job well overall and given his age profile and inexperience this should bring him on a bundle .. The manager , well I'm not sure about him if I'm honest , I wasn't particularly impressed with the way he set the team up , yee really played with only one midfielder and the 3 at the back I taught was a massive gamble given the personal involved .. One thing he did create was a unity and togetherness that's been sorely missing from England teams of the past and i.m.o that's a massive thing in international football .. Overall I'm sure yee enjoyed it immensely given the lack of expectations going into it and rightly so and it's a pity the Kane's , Sterling's etc etc weren't really firing on all cylinders or that yee didn't have a real top midfielder because it might just have made the difference in what turned out to be a massive opportunity in a shockingly poor quality world cup and one that might not come around again too quickly but then again you never know .. Overall this world cup has been really disappointing from a quality point of view .. There's been some great contests at times but that's always the case when something is competitive but it doesn't mask over the lack of quality overall or the seemingly lack of real quality players around at this moment .. A few positives to come out of this world cup are definitely the clamp down on this pulling and dragging in the box , that's something the v.a.r has definitely helped with even if it needs a bit of tweaking along the way , hopefully it's something that will be kept up now moving forward and have to give the host country Russia a shout given all the negativity and scepticism beforehand , all reports coming out of there are it was top top class ..

    Moving forward I hope our lads from all countries get over the disappointment fairly quickly and get some rest because we don't have the greatest record at starting a season quickly .. Some of them looked absolutely jaded to say the least and others didn't seem to be in tip top form for whatever reasons ... Its got all the signs of a rather sluggish start from our boys in a couple of weeks time .. Was there mention of all our transfer buisness being done before the world cup by someone not so long ago , well that went well .. The clock is ticking ....... C.O.Y.S .....
     
    Last edited: July 12, 2018
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  4. antony Active Member

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    Good post! Agree with every single word.
     
  5. Cheshuntboy Guest

    Trippier obviously did himself no harm at all over the past few weeks - perhaps he'll be off to Real Madrid for £100 mill any day now - but the rest of our contingent did little to enhance their reputations, even Kane, who looked very sluggish throughout. As for Alli, he was peripheral at best, and we have to hope that he realises that he's not a teenage wonder-kid any more, and he's got to knuckle down, or risk throwing away a potentially glittering career, because he's more Bostock than Bale at the moment. We're slow starters at the best of times, and the coming season doesn't bode well if we pick where we left off last night.
     
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  6. Felon82 Well-Known Member

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    So 'Glorious Failure' again!

    Bitterly disappointed but not suprised.

    We'll never get a easy run like that again and fluffed our lines.

    The lack of experience and leadership was all too prevalent again.

    Southgate shouldv reacted earlier imo made a formation change 2nd half packed the midfield out and pushed Croatia back up the pitch.

    It does amaze me these days the lack of being able to see what's going wrong and fixing it mid game from both Manager and Players. The more time they were giving the Croatian midfield on the ball the more and more they were dictating the play.
     
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  7. Felon82 Well-Known Member

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    Alli & Kane etc have been flogged near on to death last couple of seasons by Poch triple training sessions playing almost every game no matter what.
     
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  8. Big fran Guest

    Agree with felon and burnt 100%.. Crying out for a formation change around 60 mins once Croatia took over cm. If not 60 mins then certainly at one each we were rocking.
    Should have back 4rd it with Rose coming on for young and dier in cm to help out the overrun Henderson.
     
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  9. antony Active Member

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    I'm concerned for Dele! I personally thought last season saw him loss confidence maybe this was due to him carrying a knock for a while or maybe just couldn't deal with the "attention" of being singled out by certain players of certain teams, but its his WC displays that concern me and how opposing fans are likely to treat him, sending him further into his shell as a player.

    He (with the help of the club) is gonna have to dig deep this season imo!
     
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  10. Felon82 Well-Known Member

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    Is it any wonder that of 9 Spurs players in the Semi Finals only 1 made it to the final????

    There's a huge Chasm in the Mentality of our players when it's time to Step Up
     
  11. guesty Guest

    personally I thought Croatia played a near perfect game. Strong defensively and clever in our third of the pitch.
    They went down early in the game but it didn't phase them. They played with width which effectively made us play 5 at the back. They had really only one player centrally up front...with our 3-at-the-back marking him.
    Southgate has to be cleverer and lose Walker earlier in the game. Dier on to sit alongside Henderson.
    Sterling should have come off earlier for Rashford....putting us to 442.

    anyhow.....back on topic....I'm worried for Kane. He wasn't on his game at all against Croatia or Sweden. Or most of Columbia. he's going to need to some rest time before he starts training for the season.
    And we still have (lots of) our players out there for a meaningless game which keeps them active for the rest of the week before they get home...and then have a break.
    Hugo of course has the important game....but looks like he's doing okay.

    Let's hope we don't have a slow stuttering start to the season

    COYS
     
    Gordon Mc likes this.
  12. Cheshuntboy Guest

    Kane hasn't been right since the last ankle scare (away to Bournemouth?), and no amount of effort can make-up for the immobility and lack of sharpness which has been all too evident for Spurs and England. There's no doubt that his goals have been as important to Pochettino as Bale's were to AVB, and we'll certainly struggle if he can't recover his mojo in time for the new season. All the hype about England's brilliant World Cup will fade when the reality of how ordinary we really are sinks in, and I guess Pochettino will need all his legendary motivational skills if next season isn't to start under something of a cloud, with our slice of Belgium's 'Golden Generation' (if they haven't been sold off - buy Alderweireld, get Dembele free perhaps) and England's over-hyped and over-used walking wounded moping around the Joe Lewis Memorial Stadium, thinking about what might have been. Plus ca change, as Josh Bolton might say.
     
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  13. Gordon Mc

    Gordon Mc Well-Known Member

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    ,Lot of sense in a lot of good posts here - certainly not the overly rose-tinted approval that I'm hearing and seeing in "The Meeja". For me, a really not-much-more-than-average England side in a surprisingly even but sub-par competition has been blown up to almost mythical status by some analysts/fans and at times I'm wondering if I've been tuning into a parallel universe World Cup. The "big hitters" signally failed to hit big and the lesser sides didn't look too bad as a result. Some reasonable games, although outnumbered by the less-than-average and a couple of stultifyingly bad ones. I've just come off watching the News and some bozo, possibly over-fuelled, described it as the "best-ever" World Cup. Really ? You obviously haven't seen many, mate.
    Some might think I'm over-critical, but that's what I saw guys. And - in agreement with some posters here - our boys, Trippier aside, generally didn't cover themselves in glory. Just hope it gets shaken off sharpish for 2018/19.
     
    Last edited: July 12, 2018
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  14. burnt Well-Known Member

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    Well England just weren't good enough overall , they might have sneaked through if the took their chances in the first half but overall can have no complaints ..

    As for the Belgians , well that's a different story , for me probably the best all round side on paper but they will always let you down for some reason .. The manager wouldn't inspire confidence either to put it mildly , apparently a tactical masterstroke I heard their victory over Brazil described as , I nearly choked on a piece of chicken . I.m.o they had the 3 best center backs in the tournament and some how this tactical magician of a manager managed to make them ropey as **** at the back .. A fair feat by any standards but not a surprising one knowing Martinez history as we do .. It's not like he compensated by getting their attacking players flying on all cylinders either , De Bruyne was very quiet overall , Hazard was his usual soft arse self , moments of brilliance but M.I.A for long periods , for me he epitomises Belgium and a lot of Belgian players , unbelievable talent but there's a real drive or want missing .. They got through their group comfortably like yourselves without being particularly impressive , were woeful against Japan and blessed to get away with it , were very lucky overall against Brazil who on another day would have scored 4 or 5 against them and found themselves in a semi final where the winner was going to go to the final as a very hot fav ... They weren't brutal in fairness but like ourselves they couldn't make it happen and you never got the impression they were going to .. Opportunity gone , and time is now running out for this so called golden generation of Belgian players ... Unquestionably talented but like ive said already there's something missing and if their powers that be think hiring a guy last Martinez ( whom I rated when he was making a name for himself but has proved to be brain dead in the long run ) is the answer , well you reap what you sow as the saying goes ......
     
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  15. burnt Well-Known Member

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    Not too sure about this " perfect game " mate .. The Croatia I was watching were absolutely terrible in that first half and if England had nicked a second which they should have then I think there'd probably be a different team in the final .. Why didn't Kane slip that ball to Sterling for a tap in , something Kane needs to bring into his game to become a more complete player i.m.o , we see it umpteen times a season , now the fact he goes on to stick it in the back of the net himself more often then not is not the point and doesn't make it right , if someone is in a better position then yourself then pass the feckin ball ... Croatia's strength is in midfield but they're a fairly toothless side , that's why they've already been in two penelty shoot outs going into this game and that again was against two ordinary to poor sides in Denmark and Russia and they can certainly be got at defensively ... Overall a decent side i.m.o but no more then that ...
     
  16. Big fran Guest

  17. Cheshuntboy Guest

    Interesting article, but I can't agree that the stream of back passes to Pickford were the result of Croatian pressure; time and again, in all our matches, good possession in midfield or well into the opposition half was wasted because our supposedly comfortable-on-the-ball centre backs chose to play back to the keeper, rather than push forward or try to play a positive forward pass, and it's negative anti-football, as reprehensible as anything perpetrated by Graham's Arsenal or Herrera's Inter-Milan. Surely everyone agrees that possession is pointless without punch and purpose (excessive alliteration!), but Southgate's England were so devoid of imagination that possession, and the hope of winning free kicks in dangerous areas, seemed to constitute their entire strategy, and that's not something to cheer about, not in my book at least.
     
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  18. Felon82 Well-Known Member

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    Is there any Evidence of any 'Bravery' going on at the club in this window?
     
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  19. DangerHereDuce

    DangerHereDuce Member

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    Great to read so many well thought out view points on what has been an interesting World Cup lads :)

    A lot of people view the World Cup as a bit of an update on the state of the game from around the globe. That said, I think this World Cup was best summed up by Gordon Mc:

    Taking a look at some of football’s traditional powers then:
    • Argentina, an abundance of attacking talent, too much to even squeeze onto the field (our Juventus tormentor Dybala hardly got on the pitch)… but in defence, dreadful, simply dreadful. It would be interesting to hear MoPo’s thoughts on his country’s inability to produce defenders of any sort of quality.
    • Germany really underperformed, the much lauded Loew just didn’t get anything out of a much fancied squad, which is unusual for the Germans. They were perhaps destabilised by Ozil and Gundogan’s little Turkish Delight snafu before the tournament. As a team they never got going and seemed really split as a group. I think it’s here that Southgate deserves the most credit, he got more out of his limited squad then Loew did with a supposedly more talented bunch.
    • Spain shot themselves in the foot before the tournament even began (or rather, Real Madrid handed the Spanish FA a loaded gun, and then snuck up behind them and shouted BANG very loudly)
    • Brazil excited at times, as they always do. But they drifted through games a lot, or seemed ready to play with fear at a moment’s notice. Could Brazil be becoming a bit like England were for most of the last 20 years or so, i.e. crippled by fear, nervously anticipating getting ripped to shreds by an overly expectant Brazilian public before the final whistle has even blown?
    • France remind me of Mourinho’s first era Chelsea, incredibly strong and athletic, they’ll grind you down and win 1-0, without really blowing teams away. Honourable exception here for Mbappe though, if he can develop his footballing brain to match his athletic speed, he’ll be unstoppable.
    • Holland and Italy didn’t even qualify

    Heaven forbid I mention Arsene Wenger on this hallowed forum, but he did talk a few times about the decline of the international game. Take out the national pride element of a tournament like this and what have you got? Not much in the way of footballing quality. And this quality is going to be further reduced in 2022, with FIFA expanding the number of teams taking part, which will surely lead to more turgid, meaningless games.
     
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  20. burnt Well-Known Member

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    Only if 'Bravery' constitutes sitting on your arse or twiddling your thumbs , if that's the case then we're being exceptionally brave .....
     
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