This is a football podcast well worth listening to. Essentially, ESPN’s Gab Marcotti and Julien Laurens ask if Jose Mourinho is justified in what appears to be the Portuguese “throwing the towel in” simply because Harry Kane and Heung Son-Min are both out injured.
The performance against Chelsea was poor, but one has to ask, was it any poorer than the one against Manchester City, which was near enough identical – bar the result.
Perhaps the biggest problem Mourinho has right now, is that there are plenty of people out there who want him to fail.
Botch ? A lucky Chancer, and a Serial Loser.
A pretty fair analysis. Doesn’t have to be all out attack but you have to be able to hold the ball and play some football through the middle. At the moment we sit too deep and defend in the defensive third. Giroud only had to be waiting for a rebound to have a shot. Long balls to Moura? Not his fault but does anyone think there is benefit in this setup. We’ve actually lost the strength of a fast player who likes to run at defenders.
People wanting Jose to fail are not the reason we are playing poorly.
TBF Maureen’s hands are tied. We only lost 2-1 to Chelsea. If he had taken a risk we may have been pumped a la Bayern. Which is why he took two respectable defeats over humiliations galore IMO. If we had been beaten badly, imagine the media circus. He’s playing it perfectly till next season when we will be one of the strongest teams I sincerely believe. Maybe we scab a cheeky 5th spot Champs league, maybe we don’t. Poch would have us relegated and humiliated by now. I did respect Poch but never liked him, his tactical ineptitude or his decision to play Son at left back in an FA cup semi final (against Chelsea? or possibly Utd). W have only lost by very fine margins under Jose and with a fit team and a bit more time, I really think a lot of pundits will look very silly come this time next year. Oh the eternal hope of a Spurs fan.
Its got me concerned now tbh, in the last two games the performances were simply not good enough, they should be able to produce a system that offers more of an attacking threat than was on show in those matches. Mourinho has made it abundantly clear about his limited attacking options, but we should still be capable of creating chances with the players available, whether we take them or not is another matter. Irrespective of the results, I doubt the players have enjoyed the style of play in those matches too, it has to change or he will lose them.