With new Tottenham Hotspur gaffer, Nuno Espirito Santo, experiencing his first real struggles with performance levels and results in recent matches, it was a change of pace on Wednesday evening as he returned to Molineux to face former club Wolverhampton Wanderers in the EFL Cup.
It was an unexpectedly bright start from Spurs and 25 minutes in we had a two goal advantage following efforts from Tanguy Ndombele and Harry Kane and it looked like we might take some real confidence into Sunday’s North London battle with Arsenal.
Sadly not as Wolves hit back to take the game to penalties and even though we secured a 3-2 win, it was again more of a sense of relief than a reemergence of any real form.
Although we head to the Library with a three point advantage, form is clearly on their side as they come into the tie looking for their third win on the spin, so with derby day tensions on top, it takes a brave man to try and predict this one – but with a reaction expected from the players, there would be little sweeter than travelling home with a win from this one.
I have a feeling we will Thrash them 4-0 and Arteta will be sacked following the game.
On the other hand I might feel differently in the morning when the effects of the Merlot wear off! 🙂
It’s great in dreamland ain’t it. Mind you, it is football so who knows. A win at the neighbours would do wonders for our mental health.
Hi TQ
I’m much in the same boat 2nd bottle of Sauvingnon Blanc.
However if we stick to a similar ethos to Wednesday, we may just about be on the right track.
For me the team should be :
Lloris, Emerson, Dier, Romero, Regs, Hoj, Skippy, N’Dombers, Sonny, Gil(Dele), Kane.
I do think with that line up we could do some damage, tho’ 4-0 would be fantastic. 👍😏😉
I hope nuno has the players a bit more schooled in 433 shape and alternatives…352 or 442 or 4231. These derby games with arsenal are closely run and a 1-0 or 2-1 is the usual score. But a 3-0 spurs win would be acceptable to geof and all of us 🙂
https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11661/12412821/harry-kane-remains-goalless-in-premier-league-ahead-of-arsenal-vs-tottenham-clash
Interesting article on Kane’s current form.
We can all speculate on Harry’s current mental state but the heat maps don’t lie. As I was suspecting, Nuno and Harry’s understanding is still a work in progress, Nuno is asking Harry to drop deeper and wider, which is bound to negatively affect his goal return. Regardless of what pundits might think, I believe this is a far bigger reason for his lack of goals, and Nuno has to sort this out quick.
I have a feelin this will end in disaster, they have a chance to go on level points after us winning 1st 3 games and them losing 1st 3 games, we don’t look like keeping clean sheets. The tactics seems all over the place. If we can get a result it would be great. A defeat to a shocking arsenal team as they want arteta out etc. This will test our mentality.
We are currently no better than under Mourinho. Boring, defensive football relying heavily on Kane and Son. No creative midfielder/ goalscorer. Poor captain who fails to motivate. Dodgy defence. Weak subs bench.
,
There is indeed a bit of a poor display in our first few games.
What did we expect?
We have a new manager who in reality hasn’t had much time with his full squad, thanks to international competitions and qualifications, leaving us at times with a much depleted squad.
HK and N’Dombers were (reportedly) wanting away from the club and are really only getting their heads (possibly) right just now.
Even Conte at Chelsea took about 6 or so games to get a winning formula, and it wasn’t a pretty watch.
We don’t have the money that was given to Conte at Chelsea for 12 top class transfers over his tenure.
I will say whilst we are still defensive, we are not as pedestrian as last season.
We have got a defensive minded manager so what did we expect, hopefully Paraticis’ thoughts that Nuno can be an attacking manager will come to fruition.
Jury’s still out.
Well its the first NLD at the empticrates on Sunday, am going for that we will win it.
Mind its is about time that we beat em on there patch, 2010 if am right the last time we did that. COYS
Niall – It is all perception/individual opinion of course, but I actually look at our performances so far and they worry more than our performances last year.
I will be the first to admit that I had probably been guilty of affording JM too much credit. Even when performances weren’t good, there was always that false sense of security, for me, that there was a “method to the madness” given JM’s track record. Eventually, I had to look at the situation objectively and it wasn’t good enough.
My problem with Nuno is that the performances aren’t good but he just doesn’t have that winning track record to buy him time/give him the benefit of the doubt. There is no real tangible evidence that he knows what he’s doing at a big club, hence the doubts. Thinking that things will get better with time is all just wishful thinking and/or hope, really.
Yes, Nuno has had to deal with absences and distractions but some of those wounds have been self-inflicted. It will be a situation where depending on your opinion of him, you will either see those things as mitigating circumstances, or lame excuses and/or the day to day reality of any manager.
The pressure is already on, sadly for Nuno.
BS,
Fully understand your comments, I just feel that we are not as pedestrian this season in our build up, and that we do start defending a bit farther up the field.
But with Nuno I’m still on the fence but given his difficulties I’m not putting the guy down yet.
Nuno has inherited a failing team ( end of Poch and Mourinho ) and to be quite honest although I have not been impressed so far I have seen possible glimpses of attempting to get players to play in different positions which might work . These playera are not of Nuno’s choosing however .
After all the players haven’t covered themselves with glory in the past few years so he will have to attempt to introduce a different mind set .
Give the guy some slack and pass judgement after a few more games .
If he is deemed not to be up to the task then the buck must stop with Levy who would have presided over ….how many ” failed ” managers .
Has anyone else noticed Lloris is not catching the ball ? he is parring / deflecting away. This is down to nerves loss of form IMO… and has an unsettling effect on the defence.
block…..I was saying the same ages ago, our defence always looked more confident when Gazzaniga was behind them.
I think in all fairness we should give Nuno until January before we make any realistic assessment of his performance as manager. That will at least give him a fair go. There have been some worrying signs and some hopeful signs so far. By January there will be more of one and less of the other, providing a better perspective on which to base our opinions.
Except for Son and Kane, we have a very uninspiring squad of players. N’Dombele provides a little light relief when in the mood. Other than that we have no dribblers, decent passers, wingers, decent wing backs, reliable defenders, strong,vocal captain or a convincing keeper.
We are so far behind top 4 teams and are drifting into mid table obscurity after a flooky reign at the top. If we lose to Arsenal, it will be the final insult as they are probably worse than us.
So disappointing after the heady heights of the Poch era. Levy has so much to answer for.
Morning Folks,
Danny a bit late, but thanks again for the thread.
Geoff, Allan that’s much my thoughts on Nuno, I would be of the opinion to give him to around Christmas, as I said I was never in the camp for his selection in the first place, but I feel we need to give him a fair chance, and if we factor in what I said in my earlier post plus Alans’ comments the team need more than 4 or 5 games to gel.
I we can accept that we won’t win the league this season with our current squad and that we are in transition, lower our collective expectations, we may get a good cup run or a trophy and hopefully top 5.
I know that doesn’t help from where we were a few seasons ago, but it has happened to other clubs in and around us, not long ago Liverpool were finishing 5th or 6th, as we’re Man U, even Leicester dropped out of sight for a while.
But if we can get to a stage, where we are playing decent entertaining football with a good few wins and a couple of “nearlys”, at least for me it would start to look like progress.
Though I suppose that won’t help on a game by game basis.
Hoping for TQ’s wine fuelled prediction on Sunday. 🤞😉
Couple of cracking results already this weekend, a win tomorrow would have us right back in the mix.
In my opinion, Nuno has picked up a bad/poison chalice, so has to start again, give the bloke a chance, that for me is 1 season! COYS
Nuno has a choice to keep players or sell them, orbwont be part of his squad,the likes of dier, winks, lucas, stevie all failed under poch, jose and now nuno has kept them on so expect the similar results. These players are not going gto get any better.