After the midweek disappointment in Lisbon, it was imperative that Spurs returned to winning ways at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium against a Leicester City side marooned to the bottom of the table and lacking in confidence. And return to winning ways we emphatically did, responding to the initial setback of Youri Tielemans’ penalty and then the blow of James Maddison’s equaliser with 6 goals.
Among these 6 goals was a hat-trick for Heung-Min Son, who has ended a goal drought that has spanned 9 games in all competitions up until yesterday’s match. Proof (if it was even necessary) that form is temporary, but class is permanent.
Whether it was Leicester’s overzealous commitment in searching for an equaliser that left spaces for us to exploit, tired defenders, or the greater fury in Son’s play in response to being left out (or a combination of all three) that prompted this hat-trick we’ll never know, but it’s great to see his barren spell end. Equally refreshing is having a genuine competition for places in the forward areas that we’ve been lacking for so long that allowed him to be benched in the first place!
More impressive for me than Son’s treble was scoring 2 set piece goals to take our tally of headed goals for the season up to 7 in the league and 9 in all competitions, having managed 8 in the league and 9 in all competitions for the entirety of the previous campaign. It’s clear that a weakness of our attacking play is being addressed, and both the players and set-piece coach Gianni Vio must take plenty of credit.
As several fans have already pointed out, the scoreline does paper over sufficient cracks, as has been the case with most of our victories this season, with Leicester looking repeatedly threatening in the first half. Even at 3-2, it felt as though there was something there for them, but again, as has so often been the case this year, our class on the break simply took the game away from them. We were simply at our finest as the spaces opened up due to the visitors’ search for an equaliser.
There was so much more to take from the match, including our defensive mishaps, the lack of a convincing wing-back pairing (a discussion we’ve had before), and the frequent rotation dilemma regarding our front three/four. I will leave that to you all to discuss, but I will finish on invoking one more food for thought: the switch to a 3-5-2 at 3-2 following Bissouma’s introduction for the final 20 minutes.
I felt this change was key to neutralising Maddison’s growing threat and pushing Son up closer to Kane, which, given the final score and the manner in which it was achieved, was more than inspired. Bissouma himself had a great 20 minutes, winning both of his 2 duels and making 2 interceptions, one of which preceded Hojbjerg’s pass to Son for his third goal.
In general, we looked really assured finishing the game with this shape and the extra midfielder on top of Son’s introduction squished the jam right out of Leicester’s doughnut. With the North London Derby coming up, against a side who love to suffocate teams with the ball and pass teams to death, it may very well be worth considering retaining a central midfield trio if Conte feels Bissouma is ready to start.
Either way, what a nice problem to have…for now, a great win sees us through to the international break, with a trip to the Emirates on the horizon and an unbeaten record on the line. COYS!
jod – the squad is still a work in progress and players are still either adapting to a new system or learning new positions altogether, as you mentioned with Royal.
Despite this the current results are still very good overall.
As I have said before we are still a work in progress and some Spurs fans are expecting the finished article. Conte himself said he needs 2 more windows to shape the squad to a place where he feels we can contend.
In the meantime, if we can continue to progress incrementally, be it through current players feeling more and more comfortable with the tactics or through recruitment, I’ll happily enjoy the ride.
Conte’s system requires wing backs with pace and stamina, who can attack and defend, and well rounded midfielders who can break up play and bring creativity to the side.
What we have today are players who are partial fits for the system, and are either working on the parts of their game that need work, or probably temporary stopgaps until we can afford to upgrade the position.
Clearly, centre back, central midfield and wing backs are the areas where we can expect an injection of talent at some point. Lenglet is probably a stopgap (unless he plays his way into our squad permanently), as he was plan B when we failed to get Bastoni or Gvardiol. You just know it’s only a matter of time before we try to go back in for those players, regardless of whether we keep Lenglet permanenetly.
Hojbjerg and even Bentancur will probably eventually just be squad players once we go out and sign a midfield general to partner Bissouma – unless Skipp can put injuries aside and become that player (right now the jury is still out).
On the left, the plan seems to be Perisic as a stopgap and mentor to Sessegnon, and on the right we have a collection of partial fits who are either young and needing to work on parts of their game (Royal, Spence) or again stopgaps on expiring contracts (Doherty).
Conte won’t be changing his system for any of these players anytime soon. Instead he’ll be leaning on Levy to go out and sign the likes of Bastoni/Gvardiol, Kante-like players for his midfield (the likes of Declan Rice, Jude Belingham, Nicolo Barella of Inter, or Milinkovic-Savic of Lazio are all players we have been linked with at some point in the past) and proper wing backs (Destiny Udogie is a prieme example of that and I expect us to go out and sign his equivalent for the right).
As long as Levy is happy to continue backing Conte, we’ll continue buying system players of increasing quality, and the quality of our play will naturally increase as the calibre of players increases. It happened with Liverpool too: they’ve been playing th same system under Klopp for almost 7 years now, but it’s fair to say that they’re a lot mor fluent in their play now that the have Alisson, Van Dijk, Thiago, Fabinho, TAA and Robertson instead of Mignolet, Sakho, Clyne, Moreno, Lucas Leiva and Emre Can (all players in Klopp’s initial squad). Same tactics but better players. It makes a big difference.
Ref the Bentacur goal, let’s face it, it’s a bad individual mistake. Sure Bentacur deserves praise for the effort, but it’s a poor goal for Ndidi to concede at that level and not necessarily one borne out of our tactics.
BS
I do think Lenglet, whilst perhaps not our first choice, may prove a vital defensive prospect.
He was just a season and a half ago considered among the best in his position.And may prove to be, as good again.
I do feel that, that player is still there.
Re mid field I do feel also that once, settled Bissuma is “the man” to work with Bentacur.
I do agree that Hoj will be a squad player and indeed Skippy who doesn’t seem to have gotten over his injuries.
I don’t think we have as many ‘square pegs “as you are alluding to.
Also the areas you are talking about aren’t the main focus.(IMO)
For me it’s at RB and indeed somewhere around CB perhaps the Dier position.
Udogie and Sess should be in contention by next season for LB and by that time Perisic should move on.
My issue by next Summer, Lloris is 35 ish, Sonny hitting 31.
But as usual with Tottenham, we are just about 2 players short.
But I disagree that many are “bit parts”.
But I do agree that in some positions, there is work to be done.
Niall – it depends what the benchmark is. To be a top 4 squad, very little is needed. To overtake City, well that’s something else.
BS
Re the bench mark
I’ll refer you to your own comment of 21 September
Where we took points from both City and Liverpool.
So no worries there 🤔😉
But indeed there is work to be done at our squad
As you said re Sanches, are any of our RBs good enough?
Agreed there are a few upgrades needed.
BS, it seems in your well put together in-depth analysis when mentioning our right back position that Spence is glazed over or not regarded as a candidate to take over that spot. One wonders with all the effort it took (all summer long) to sign him, how it is that he’s so lowly regarded at this point. I’m sure he will get an opportunity at some point and I will be very curious to see what he can produce. The only time I’ve really watched him play was in the playoff game at the end of last season where he looked very skilled and solid for Forrest.
Another player who could possibly fit that right fullback position could very well be Lucas Mora who got some rotation there in our preseason and did a good job especially in pivoting the ball from the back into attack. He definitely has the skill to do that and it would just be a question of his defensive capacity.
Spence isn’t lowly regarded, but he is a work in progress. It’s a big step up for the lad to come to a top 4 PL team, and he’s a project–with a lot of talent to be developed if it works out. But he wasn’t brought in with the idea he’d be starting this soon. Nothing can harm a young lad’s confidence than being tossed in the deep end of the pool before learning how to swim well enough. He remains at this time a hope for the future, and he seemingly has enough talent to justify that faith and the resulting investment in money, space, and time.
I’m not sure whether people here see a squad in the same way as Conte. To him a squad is a set of interchangeable players that he can rotate and make tactical changes with. In an ideal world there would be no first choice players in a Conte squad and that’s what he wants to create. None of the summer signings went straight into the side because that’s simply not why they were bought.
People on here though seem to see a squad as something completely different, where you have a first choice eleven with other players that fill in when required. Which means what Conte does will probably never make perfect sense to them as he does not think the same way.
Considering Conte is such a lively and excitable character, his style of football is mundane and defensive.
Sometimes, I yearn for the excitement of Modric, VDV, Assou-Ekotto, Defoe etc. We have Kane and The wonderful Son but who else to light up the winter months? Who else?
Wentworth – What do Modric, VDV and Assou-Ekotto have in common ? none of them won anything at Spurs. Defoe just won the Carling Cup in 2008, 14 years ago and the last even minor trophy the club has won. Of course for a league title you have to go back 60 years.
I don’t have a problem with someone who values style over actually winning things. Its a valid viewpoint though obviously not one I agree with. But no one actually comes out and says that, rather its “lets pretend what hasn’t worked for a long long time now is magically going to start working”.
Jod. Why keep banging on about trophies?
Most teams have won nothing. Only the wealthy big spenders win.
However, I enjoyed the ride with Poch when we reached the Champs final.
To me,football is or should be entertainment. Sadly Conte is not interested in entertainment. We might win something ( I doubt it) but I will be yawning all the way.
Come back exciting free flowing football.