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Monday, 17 January 2011

Stalemate provides questions but no answers

By: Elmesy | January 17th, 2011
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Rafael-da-Silva-Tottenham-007 A scoreless draw is never a result to provide us with too many answers, but a couple of questions have been raised from the game between Spurs and Manchester United at White hart Lane yesterday. Firstly, how did we not win that? Secondly, how are they unbeaten so far this season?

Spurs created the better opportunities over the course of the ninety minutes, Crouch and Van Der Vaart the culprits for missing the most gilt edged chances. Crouch should have scored in the first half when he stole in front of Ferdinand to get on the end of a decent cross, but only managed to divert his finish the wrong side of the post. Van Der Vaart was less guilty in the second half when he fired a rasping shot from 15 yards just over the bar. By his standards it was a bad miss, a lesser player would call it a good effort.

Utd started the game with both Nani and Giggs on the flanks and two up front. A bold move from Ferguson who sought to attack Tottenham down the flanks, in an attempt to push the threat of Bale and Lennon into defensive positions. This tactic backfired to such an extent that Evra and Rafael will still be spinning this morning, after being turned inside out by the spurs wingers.

Lennon tortured Evra on the Spurs right side, going past him at will. The French left back could have been excused for starting another French revolution at half time and refusing to re enter for the second half. As for Rafael crouch chance he was equally exposed by the attacking positioning of Nani. Bale was playing like a man who had been rested for ten days and looked confident and fearless, much the opposite to Rafael who looked more like a boy on his first day at school. Rafael learnt an early lesson in discipline when he was booked for a first half challenge on Palacios that could only be described as “reckless”. The young Brazilian was lucky to escape a red for that challenge alone.

The recipient Palacios, clearly not happy with the referees lack of punishment, decided to exact footballing revenge on the young left back moments later scything him down in the centre circle. Palacios adding his name to the growing card count. Rafael was not to escape punishment for long though, in the second half a collision between himself and assou ekotto, led to the fullback being sent off. A decision that can only be described as, a crowd splitter, Ferguson was rightly upset by the decision, as too was Rooney who started hurling abuse at the referee in a manner more common place in a Tarantino movie, than on a football pitch. Yet instead of a heated dialogue about cheeseburgers, the response to Rooney was a finger over the lips. The young (in age only) England striker did nothing to dispel the Capello rumours that his best days are behind him. He cut a forlorn figure up front for Utd, getting involved in the game for sporadic moments only and never really threatening the Spurs goal. For a player who is supposed to be regarded amongst the best in the world, he is clearly well below par, and all this in front of Fabio Capello.

Another England striker, Peter Crouch, also disappointed in front of the watching National Boss. His ability as a target man has never been in question, his strength in the air is obvious, but his clinical finishing is poor. Spurs need that clinical touch or the “strikers instinct” as its often referred to win these tight games. Crouch has not been able to provide it. Against Everton recently and also Manchester Utd yesterday, Crouch had chances to win the game, and missed them both. They are the sort of chances that a Defoe or Pavlyuchenko would have tucked away every time. I don’t question Harry’s tactics very often, but I would have liked to have seen Defoe up front yesterday, or at the very least brought on earlier than he was.

With everything considered a point was a good result, and the fact Spurs fans will be rueing the missed chances shows that we are pushing the big teams all the way now. As for Utd, they are well organised and have two high class centre backs, apart from that they are not invincible. As harry said after the game, he does not expect them to go unbeaten for the rest of the season. I for one would agree with him, with that in mind, the title race now looks closer than ever, with 8 points separating the top five teams, its all to play for.

Some Related Spurs Posts:Super Spurs Beat Werder Bremen, And Make It Look Easy! (Includes Highlights)Tottenham Vs Man Utd (How to beat the unbeatable)Spurs extend festive cheerSpurs Beat Villa 2-1 Thanks To Van Der Vaart DoubleOne Cup, Two Wins, One Day

Category: Team News

Tags: Aaron Lennon, Benoit Assou-Ekotto, Game Review, Roman Pavlyuchenko, Spurs, Team News, Tottenham Hotspur, Tottenham Hotspur Official Site
Tweet « Tottenham Vs Man Utd (How to beat the unbeatable) | Home | Comments | Add your comment Bobby | January 17th, 2011 at 1:35 am

A garbage writing. Must have been a one sided fan if all you saw was a day old school bay in Rafael. You never realized that Bale only found it easy to beat him when the attacking midfielders came for his support with a one two approach. You must have also deliberately blocked your eyes whenever the so called school boy was making his forage a head to offer support to the strikers. How many times did your school boy go through the pack at ease? I guess you could not see this when all you can offer is how poor Rafael was. POOR writing and POOR observation.

Elmesy | January 17th, 2011 at 1:48 am

Ummm…I thought this was the Spurs section. Take your fancy brazilian full backs back up North, perhaps if they manage to play for the full ninety minutes we can take them seriously. Mancs !!

IOANX | January 17th, 2011 at 1:58 am

Any level-headed man who knows and understands football is aware of the slogan “good defending teams win championships and good attacking teams offer show”. The truth is, as it comes through facts, that in order to win a championship you must have a well balanced team. Spurs, as it is proved from the facts, the numbers and the statistics, don’t have a well balanced team. Besides they have many players who luck strong personality and a winner’s mentality. They have also 4 strikers who on average score a single goal after almost 3 hours of play and thus the scoring and subsequently winning ability of the team falls on two players:VDV and Bale. If to this add the fact that seldom can keep a clean sheet at the defence it is obvious, for every reasonable thinking person, that it is impossible under the current roster to win the championship. Football is a simple game governed by simple rules. The problem with football is that there are too many brainless persons hanging around it.

Howdidwenotwin | January 17th, 2011 at 3:52 am

The problem when Spurs are the next team on opponents register that teams form good or bad it wouldn’t matter and make no different to there shock value. You will notice how energy is the main ingredients of some teams shock wins you can see men passing energy drinks even before a sub has even come on remarkable and a very dangerous practise because most of these drinks are caffeine based and mixing this with the substance i discovered is being used is to put it mildly is not recommended. When Utd got in to massive dept they found themselves a big club with no money just like Wigan Bolton Everton and others . The problem was Utd ignored this mounting dept and kept buying players Carrick Berbatov Hernades Smalling and others . Then the recession hit every club and the country hard this meant Utd had to win every trophy on offer just to keep the Bankers happy. They lost out to Chelsea and the Banks and there sponsors Aig had to be baled out by the American Government . This left Utd exposed to the media and takeover rumours also there mar-key player Rooney leaving to there main rivals Man City. This meant the mighty Utd form suffered. Manchester Utd called a crisis meeting with Ferguson and the press after the meeting Rooney backed down excepted a huge pay rise Utds form suddenly with Nani and Berbatov playing with a new high tempo and work rate Ferdinand beating the pain barrier and is limping leg and Utd caught and passed the fading Chelsea who started running out of energy with all the bad press about there size being the biggest team in the premiership 13 stones the well built muscles and loads of goals dried up with there fading Muscles meanwhile Arsenal runner who are the slimmest team 11 stones because of the high energised passing game are now flying after we beat them. So you see the problem with the premiership dept is causing teams to up the one thing that helps better teams win when the inferior opponents tire the class tells the problem now is the opponents don tiread the shocks blocks saves dirty tackles swearing nasty players and sadly mysterious deaths are why we are struggling to beat teams and who leave Harry saying i never seen us losing that game at Half time they came out and stopped us from playing its this second half energy surge where results are hatched and trust me its not legal and can be deadly if overused.

NoLsKi | January 17th, 2011 at 6:11 am

I don’t think Rafael’s first challenge was red card worthy, and I certainly think he was hard done by with his second yellow. Crouch should’ve finished since it’s what strikers do: score goals. It was a great ball and a good run & it should have been easy pickings. To me, VDV’s chance late in the second half wasn’t as simple or as certain as many are making out. There were a lot of bodies in front of him; it was either top left or bottom right, and he was better poised for top left.

I am annoyed that Vidic’s shirt tugging in the box on VDV didn’t get us a penalty, and that Mike Dean’s inconsistent refereeing decisions meant that he controlled the game on his entirely on his terms rather than letting play flow. And this bloke Howdidwenotwin has posted the most confusing block of text I’ve ever seen on this website.

In the end, for me, both teams submitted lackluster performances; a game I’m more than willing to forget.

Robert Reed | January 17th, 2011 at 9:20 am

A drab affair. Still, another clean sheet, eh?

@Howdidwenotwin-Are you sure you aren’t the one overdosing on the caffeine?

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