Chalkboard For Lyon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good morning.

Well, we’re nearly through it. What the Met Office might call a tough of low pressure. Tomorrow can’t come soon enough and I can’t recall looking forward to a West Ham game quite so much.

If the Bayern game revealed anything last night it was that fragile clubs get their pants pulled down on sight. Aunty Wenger spoke of a nervousness in his squad and whilst Bayern are an exceptional side, the fella that allegedly put £100,000 on them with Victor Chandler yesterday may well end up looking as green as some of the Gunner’s defending before this thing is over.

Arsenal need to undertake a major overhaul of playing personnel or they are screwed. All this Wenger out business is ignoring the core problem which is clearly that they’ve been asset stripped and left with a gang of makeweights. The list of players that have been flogged off is your answer to the conundrum. He’s been left with an assortment of haircuts and hopefuls.

This is a Spurs blog so I won’t run a detailed analysis by you, but while clubs like us have had the feeder club finger pointed at us for a good while and with good reason, we’ve kinda survived the indignity of the Berbatov, Keane and Modric departures. It’s too early to tell if Arsenal have survived their indignities. Stan Kroenke was apparently there last night. So a ‘heh’ to that. 

Well it’s Lyon away, under the lights, all that jazz. Opinion on the last game of course was divided. There was those who were pleased we won, and there were those so desperate to find something to fret about they decided that we were a very lucky one man band. Well tomorrow we’ll find out some more.

The goal keeper thing will rear it’s head again. Whilst the one that whistled past Brad at The Lane was pretty much a wonder strike, the ‘glued to his line’ fears over the old man will continue to gather a pace. As I said before the last tie, I get worried when I hear people say, ‘I’ve decided’ over anything. It has the emphatic ring to it conceals a judgement that doesn’t really contain all that much wisdom. Like a game show contestant saying, ‘I’ve decided to go for number 15, Noel.’ It’s not a decision, it’s a guess.

Lloris should 100% start, I’ll be somewhere be shocked and pleasantly surprised if he doesn’t. The back four should look like I’ve drawn it, but of course Bonzo will get the jump on Naughton as he is the more experienced of the two. Experienced at what, remains to be seen. Benny needs to have an A&E free evening, if that’s possible. Lyon won’t be on the back foot and ‘lapses’ in concentration can’t happen. 

And so too it’s vital that our midfield stands it’s ground as it will be under pressure all night. Adebayor needs to play his dropping back game to pitch in, this would certainly be no game for Defoe, loitering, waiting for a breaking ball. I pick Holtby over Siggy as his awareness looks razor sharp in both attacking and defending. This could be a perfect game for him.

Prediction: 2-1 again.

Apologies for no Hotspur’s Half Hour this week. I’m poorly and have a cough.