Well that was tough viewing wasn’t it? Just as we start to gather a bit of momentum, we have the rug pulled right out from under our feet, and so it proved again tonight.
A decent run of 3 wins on the bounce came to an abrupt halt as Spurs slumped to second-half strikes from Fred and Bruno Fernandes. In truth, however, the damage was done long before Ben Davies’ deflection took the ball past Lloris in Spurs’ goal.
For starters, ponderous on the ball, and passive off it, we contrived to surrender 19 attempts on goal within the first half. Within the first 30 minutes, Lloris had to be called into action 5 times – 5! None of them were exactly ‘routine’ saves either.
Conte was seething, but whatever rocket he gave the lads at half-time served no inspiration whatsoever, and we somehow seemed to become even more passive and ponderous after the restart.
The 3-5-2 formation only works when we press as a unit and drop off as a unit – as we did effectively in spells against Leicester, Brighton, and Everton – but pressing of any sort was completely absent tonight, and United almost had a free run at goal, as evidenced by the total attempts figure of 28 from United, 10 of which were on target.
Granted, given the lack of faith in Bryan Gil (which is wholly justified in my view) and Lucas Moura’s lack of match fitness (and arguably, his lack of quality in the final third), I don’t think we had any other choice but to play this system,which most readers were calling for in the build-up to this game in the first place…the old adage ‘be careful what you wish for’ comes to mind!
That said, I think one ought to allow for some mitigation in this regard, in the sense that the players (particularly Yves Bissouma) are still getting used to playing with a midfield three, and – with all due respect – playing this formation against Man United will obviously yield more challenges than playing it against Leicester, Brighton, and Everton.
Although it is unfair to single out an individual for our collective misdeeds tonight – indeed, the only player in lilywhite in my book who can emerge from Manchester with his head held high is Lloris – Yves Bissouma struggled a lot in my eyes.
Generally speaking, he held onto the ball too long, and when your back is against the wall, you need quick balls into your forwards in order to release pressure and force your opposition towards their goal rather than yours. Via Whoscored, he had the fewest touches of the midfield trio with 44 (which can be interpreted in several ways, of course), compared to 85 for Hojbjerg and 62 for Bentancur.
However, it was generally a poor night for our midfield, who made just 1 key pass collectively, and were overrun in the centre frequently by Casemiro, Fernandes, and Fred (Fred, of all people…Fred! The man who Louis Saha called out ahead of the match for being unworthy of playing in League Two).
What disappointed me the most was our failure to effectively go direct when it was clear playing out from the back wasn’t cutting it – of our 52 long balls, only 30 were successful (again via WhoScored).
When the opposition fields a vertically-challenged centre-half who is about as physically imposing as ‘Nick Nack’ from ‘The Man With The Golden Gun’, we simply have to be more accurate when going direct, and keep targeting him, as Brentford did in August with great success against Lisandro Martinez.
I felt Kane was really tame against Martinez when we actually had success going long, only winning 1 aerial duel throughout the match. Kane ultimately failed to use his size and physicality with the same efficiency as Ivan Toney did against Nick Nack in Brentford’s landmark win 2 months back. This in particular was really disheartening.
In conclusion, while this was exhausting viewing, what is even more tiring is listening to the tosh and histrionics from certain segments of our fanbase and the media getting on Conte’s back and placing our shortcomings on the Italian’s shoulders. Get behind the manager!
I anticipate the whole “will he/won’t he stay” argument to rear its head in tomorrow’s back pages, as is always the case when we lose. Get behind the manager, get behind the players, and remember how lucky we are to have him leading the club – he’s a proven winner, and we’re not proven winners. I know whose side I’m on!