Starting the new season at St James Park, Alan Pardew
fielded nearly his best lineup, only without injured captain Coloccini. Cabaye,
Ben Arfa, Demba Ba and Papiss Cisse were all cleared to play. Players
demonstrated tonnes of confidence. Despite Cisse and Ba not at their fittest,
the midfield performed admirably. Ben Arfa was the crafter, while Jonas
excelled as the tireless soldier.
Nevertheless, there is still room for improvement in
defence. James Perch was not put under enormous pressure, but fullbacks were
crying for help. Jonas teamed up with David Santon to stall the runs by Lennon
several times, with the only exception which
led to Gareth Bale hitting the crossbar. Danny Simpson was forced to
fight off Bale without much help from Ben Arfa, the projected right wing in the starting XI. Pardew needs to
re-weight the balance of letting Ben Arfa get loose in offence and filling the
void on the flanks in defence.
The 4-3-3 he played in 2nd half is very threatening, but could be exposed by good wingers.
The high defence line rejuvenated in Tottenham's jersey, in a slightly altered fashion. Centrebacks were deeper than where AVB normally prefers, with everyone else roaming around the midfield line. It was a significant improvement to Tottenham, as this lessens the chance of their shaky defence being exposed. The tactics were more effective with Sigurdsson starting in place of Van der Vaart, who only reported back from Netherlands duty.
 |
| Ben Arfa fouled by substitute Van der Vaart |
Midfields were no short of energy, but the playmaking
department was missing. Without a major distributor in central midfield, Lennon
and Bale were often asked to do more than they should to start an attack from
scratch. Jermain Defoe was very sharp, but he either had to, or preferred to
work on his own. The passes were just lacking in the final third, which came
from Modric, Van der Vaart, or even Adebayor last season. When Tottenham turned
to Harry Kane for the final push, their desperation for a striker became more
obvious. AVB still has a lot to work on before claiming his comeback season.
Brow-Raiser:
Undoubtedly the start of William Gallas. Nobody would have imagined the 35-year-old would fit in
the high defence line, but AVB needed some leadership on the field. His
partnership with the solid Younes Kaboul did not disappoint the fans too much, but
Demba Ba's goal clearly stated he is in decline. When captain Dawson comes back
fit, Gallas won't be expected to feature as much as he used to.
What If Jenas came in
for Livermore? Three Lions
debutant Jake Livermore is a decent defensive midfielder. When it comes
to attack, he is still relatively raw though. Jenas has only just come back
from injuries, but his passing range was what Tottenham was missing in the
game. With Sandro already there protecting the backline, was it possible to give Jenas 25-30 minutes of run-out when they were
trailing? Or maybe Huddlestone who was
not on the bench? AVB might have gone a bit too conservative for a large part of the game.
Player of the Match: It would have easily been gone to Ben Arfa for his match-winning contributions,
but Jonas deserves recognition for his enormous work rate. Starting on the left flank, he spent his effort more on closing down Lennon. When Ben
Arfa promoted to a more advanced role in 2nd half, Jonas covered even more
ground to maintain the balance of the team. He was the invisible contributor to
the victory.
 |
| Gutierrez (L) doubled up on Lennon, again |
Flop of the Match: There
were clearly high hopes in Sigurdsson, which might have also over-stressed him.
He did well in executing AVB's defence plan. However, apart from the freekick,
his long shots were far from threatening, as well as below-par passes. In his
first appearance at a top-tier club, he seemed to have gradually lost the
confidence as time went by. Surely not the ideal debut for the Icelandic midfielder.
No comments:
Post a Comment