The other games today - 2012/13

[BeloEmre]

Not a bad line-up today, for a non-CL weekday: El Clasico at the Copa del Ray, Everton/Oldham FA Cup rematch, and Fiorentina/Bologna in Serie A.

 

Its Bayern vs Dortmund today as well isn't it?

Tomorrow.

[Mole_Toonfan]

Ah right cheers

[Neil]

Lad on GrandOldTeam (Everton forum) does match previews that are nearly always bang on the money. But this particularly rings true; reflecting on the Norwich result and where we currently are. Might be Martin Jol-ish but regardless:

 

"However for many the Norwich game is symptomatic of a larger issue. This whole debating over a contract thing stinks to high heaven. We’re Everton not Exeter, he gets paid a great deal to manage a club that can still attract 40,000 fans at home and sells out most of its aways. I'm not going to pretend we're currently in the elite of the English league but we're a damn good club to manage on anyone’s CV. And that Norwich game was a microcosm of Moyes and his biggest blind spot – being too pragmatic and trying to protect leads when we’d have more luck going for the opposition’s throat.

 

Ask yourself how many games have you enjoyed watching Everton this year? Villa and Swansea will be in them, not only did Everton play great attacking football; they also put themselves in a two or three goal lead – offering you a rare opportunity to relax somewhat instead of fearing a moody opposition equaliser from a set piece to deny us two points. Near enough all our wins are tight affairs and there’s no shame in that if you’re getting the three points but a lot of times it spectacularly backfires. It’s par for the course to give a few teams a four or five goal pasting a few times a season, particularly with the players we have but while even the sh*te are good for it, we can never do similar. Why? Our approach to the game."

 

-------------------------

 

Finding myself agreeing with pretty much everything he has to say. Moyes is becoming a victim of his own success. The ownership issues have been debated ad infinitum but I'm starting to doubt Moyes actually has the capabilities of pushing us on himself, and this season our usually solid defence shits itself the moment the opposition applies an ounce of pressure. Also, the amount of times we've been the better team in games but haven't hammered home our advantage is frightening. But moreover, it's consistent. It's not just the odd one of those "days" where you miss a bucketload of chances or hit the bar 3 times. Those days happen and I can accept that if it's an occasional thing. What I can't accept is the players we have at our disposal leaking points like there's no tomorrow. Some of our results against bottom-half teams:

 

Norwich - draw at home, lost away despite being 1-0 up with minutes to pay

Reading - loss, play them next week at home

Wigan - draw away

So'ton - draw away

QPR - draw away, yet to play again

Villa - draw at home, nearly lost

Newcastle - draw at home, let lead slip twice

Fulham - draw at their place depite creating a bucketload of clear chances

 

Off the top of my head (these stats might not be exact but if they're not they're damn close), we've kept just 4 clean sheets all season. We've won and kept a clean sheet on a massive 2 occasions - hasn't happened since September. We've won by more than 1 goal on just 2 occasions - hasn't happened since September. So nearly all our wins have been by the odd goal which tells me something - we're far too worried about what the opposition are going to do, rather than let the opposition worry about our superior players. And that rests with the manager.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I've always thought of Everton as a tight, scrappy team who battle to results. With a couple of players who are better than that. You're 6th in the league, that's a pretty good return IMO. The true position of your players is probably a bit lower than that, so Moyes is doing something right.

 

I don't think it's that surprising that they'll be beaten by clubs like Norwich relatively often.

 

I'll never thing of him as a great manager because he's fundamentally quite boring, but that's an outsider's view.

[KaKa]

Yeah, Moyes isn't doing a goo denough job with that team. I mean. I really like the attacking potential of your team. You really should be goign at teams more, scorign more goals, and wrappign games up much earlier. The potential for your team to do that is definitely there.

 

Moyes, just strikes me as an overly cautious guy, who is always going to be more concerend about players working hard, tracking back and keeping things tight.

 

It honestly makes me laugh to see him as a suggested manager for clubs like Arsenal and Chelsea. It's crazy to me.

[Neil]

"Most seasons we've tended to finish sixth, seventh or eighth and if you ask the people who know football they would say that´s about as good as Everton can do."

 

"We've probably been playing at our maximum for a long time at Everton - foot hard to the pedal - and I'm hoping we can go a wee bit further this season and maybe do better in the FA Cup."

 

If this is the mentality at the club, we're screwed.

 

Kaka, we were playing good, attacking football earlier this season. Our style of play has without doubt improved gradually over recent years.

 

Then for some reason it's just stopped. It's really hard to fathom what he tells the players at times. We're conceding goals regardless, I haven't got a massive problem with that if we're consistently creating chances but now that's dried up. Snookered.

[KaKa]

"Most seasons we've tended to finish sixth, seventh or eighth and if you ask the people who know football they would say that´s about as good as Everton can do."

 

"We've probably been playing at our maximum for a long time at Everton - foot hard to the pedal - and I'm hoping we can go a wee bit further this season and maybe do better in the FA Cup."

 

If this is the mentality at the club, we're screwed.

 

Kaka, we were playing good, attacking football earlier this season. Our style of play has without doubt improved gradually over recent years.

 

Then for some reason it's just stopped. It's really hard to fathom what he tells the players at times. We're conceding goals regardless, I haven't got a massive problem with that if we're consistently creating chances but now that's dried up. Snookered.

 

I know! I agree completely about the fact you were playing attacking football earlier thsis season, in fact you still do, but in fits and spurts.

 

It's not consistently done, and it just seems the team isn't really being given full license or freedom to play this way.

 

I was really enjoying your games at the start of the season for sure. The team looked amazing at times.

[The College Dropout]

I agree with that Neil, Pardew is similar. Hughton's tightened up his approach at Norwich but under him we could really slap teams. Push it to 3 or 4 goals to nil.

 

Moyes is a good manager but I think he's close to hitting his ceiling.

[leffe186]

Just seen the Fulham game for the first time. How on earth was N'Zonzi not sent off?

[KaKa]

Just seen the Fulham game for the first time. How on earth was N'Zonzi not sent off?

 

Who nose?

[afar]

Two ways you can look at Everton under Moyes. You could rightly point out that he took over a club that was in a bit of a state, narrowly avoiding relegation a couple of times. He took them consistently to challenge for Europe. He's bought well with limited finances and got the best out of the players at the club. But, does he have a level where his effectiveness as a manager wears off ?

 

There are a lot of managers out there, that are hugely successful in the championship but get found out when moving into the prem. Perhaps Moyes's level is slightly higher than that and he plateaus at around the 6th or 7th spot.

 

I don't think though that you can argue that he is getting the best out of the squad, if you look at the squads of the five teams above Everton, Manure, Man Shitty, Spuds, Chelsea and Arsenal, they are all stronger than Everton's. It's debatebale whether Liverpool and Newcastle have stronger squads too and Everton are well ahead of both those teams.

 

So he's doing all he can imo with what he has, I think the big question regarding Moyes would come up if or when he gets big money to spend or inherts a team capable of winning the PL, would his style achieve what is expected ?

[afar]

Just seen the Fulham game for the first time. How on earth was N'Zonzi not sent off?

 

Yep that was ridiculous, clearest straight red all season for me. I don't know if you saw Huth elbow not seen by the ref too (rightly he's gonna get punished retrospectively for that) but Stoke doing nothing to stop people calling them what they call them.

[leffe186]

"Most seasons we've tended to finish sixth, seventh or eighth and if you ask the people who know football they would say that´s about as good as Everton can do."

 

"We've probably been playing at our maximum for a long time at Everton - foot hard to the pedal - and I'm hoping we can go a wee bit further this season and maybe do better in the FA Cup."

 

If this is the mentality at the club, we're screwed.

 

Kaka, we were playing good, attacking football earlier this season. Our style of play has without doubt improved gradually over recent years.

 

Then for some reason it's just stopped. It's really hard to fathom what he tells the players at times. We're conceding goals regardless, I haven't got a massive problem with that if we're consistently creating chances but now that's dried up. Snookered.

 

I'd suggest a Martin Jol smiley to preface our posts. Not least because it would be unbelievably cool for every one of my Spurs posts to be prefaced with a Martin Jol face.

 

It's strange, it almost seems like we've gone the other way. Under Redknapp, we really did play some sparkling attacking football at times, but we also struggled to break down the bus-parkers, and were far too open at times when we should have closed teams down. We've lost two of our best three players, and picked up some awkward injuries, but AVB has clearly adopted a style which is more resilient, and more amenable to changes in personnel. It's also noticeably duller. The clearest change is in making us more pressing, which is something that Everton have usually been so good at over the last couple of years.

 

The difference between us seems to be better organization at the back (despite us almost never playing the same defence, which is arguably AVB's biggest achievement with us), a slightly better level of skill and passing in our midfield, and Bale (who AVB has built our team around, although Fellaini is almost as important for you). Additionally, AVB saw our tendency to let silly late goals in, and took steps to change it in training. We now make a habit of scoring late goals, rather than letting them in.

 

I haven't seen enough of you recently to say what the problem is. What were the two nil-nils like? I saw the Villa game, where Fellaini pulled you back into it, but your defence tried their hardest to lose it beforehand.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

Weren't the periods of good attacking football (for Everton) the exception though, and now things are regressing to the mean?

 

I noticed they were playing some better football earlier in the season.

[Deuce]

Here's an interesting article on Spurs' transformation under AVB: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/feb/26/gareth-bale-sensation-tottenham-style?CMP=twt_gu

 

 

Dembele was a particularly shrewd acquisition. Guy is quick becoming one of the best CMs in the league. If Sandro can continue to develop into a strong DM, in addition to Holtby locking-down an AM role...that's a pretty devastating 1-2-3 punch in the middle of the park.

[leffe186]

Two ways you can look at Everton under Moyes. You could rightly point out that he took over a club that was in a bit of a state, narrowly avoiding relegation a couple of times. He took them consistently to challenge for Europe. He's bought well with limited finances and got the best out of the players at the club. But, does he have a level where his effectiveness as a manager wears off ?

 

There are a lot of managers out there, that are hugely successful in the championship but get found out when moving into the prem. Perhaps Moyes's level is slightly higher than that and he plateaus at around the 6th or 7th spot.

 

I don't think though that you can argue that he is getting the best out of the squad, if you look at the squads of the five teams above Everton, Manure, Man Shitty, Spuds, Chelsea and Arsenal, they are all stronger than Everton's. It's debatebale whether Liverpool and Newcastle have stronger squads too and Everton are well ahead of both those teams.

 

So he's doing all he can imo with what he has, I think the big question regarding Moyes would come up if or when he gets big money to spend or inherts a team capable of winning the PL, would his style achieve what is expected ?

 

That's rather like the perception of Martin Jol towards the end of his time at Spurs. Levy thought he needed someone else to make the step up. Ramos was a failure, Redknapp a great success, but probably not the long-term solution. Difference is, we generated more money along the way, which allowed us to improve despite wasting shit-loads on Bentley and a couple of others. Moyes has never had that room to manoeuvre.

[leffe186]

Here's an interesting article on Spurs' transformation under AVB: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/feb/26/gareth-bale-sensation-tottenham-style?CMP=twt_gu

 

 

Dembele was a particularly shrewd acquisition. Guy is quick becoming one of the best CMs in the league. If Sandro can continue to develop into a strong DM, that's a pretty devastating 1-2 punch in the middle of the park.

 

Dembele and Sandro worked really, really well together. Dembele and Parker, not so much. Dembele has a long-term hip problem, and we're pretty confident that that's part of the reason his performances have dropped off recently. He's still a good player, but looking at the West Ham game you saw Parker making the runs that you'd really rather Dembele was making. Hopefully he can get some rest next year, with Sandro coming back and kids like Carroll getting more game time.

[Deuce]

I'll be honest, I really enjoy watching Spurs (and not just because my main man plays there). AVB was shafted at Chelsea, glad to see him succeeding. Just a quality side, glad to see someone throw a wrench in the engine of Chelsea/ManU/City/Arsenal.

[Mole_Toonfan]

Here's an interesting article on Spurs' transformation under AVB: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2013/feb/26/gareth-bale-sensation-tottenham-style?CMP=twt_gu

 

 

Dembele was a particularly shrewd acquisition. Guy is quick becoming one of the best CMs in the league. If Sandro can continue to develop into a strong DM, in addition to Holtby locking-down an AM role...that's a pretty devastating 1-2-3 punch in the middle of the park.

 

Indeed, its actually important to mention though that Dembele has been playing a lot deeper since Sandro's injury due to Parker not being that good.

 

Which has coincided with the team being built around Bale with devastating effects mind, but its less of a team effort without Sandro holding down the fort and Dembele driving the team forward giving space to Bale and Lennon. Its just become about Bale which honestly i can see tripping them up at some point relying so heavily on one player and having other important players restricted to mere role players to make it work.

 

 

 

[Ishmael]

Tottenham are performing at exactly the same standard as they did last season.  Almost to the point.

 

And thus, they need to add better players to challenge the top two.  The current crop wont.  Still under the glass ceiling, which will wont be breached for the foreseeable future.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

Except Bale has gone up a level.

[Ishmael]

He's only been setting the world alight for the last month or so to my knowledge. 

[Mole_Toonfan]

I think Spurs are better than last season honestly.... they have improved defensively and most of their key players don't hide in big games anymore.

 

Last season Modric as talented as he is can often be found missing in big games while Dembele always raises his game against the big boys when Modric arguably did the opposite.

 

And of course Bale has stepped it up, but i think on the whole they have improved.

 

They lack a bit of creativity compared to last season but it doesn't seem to effect them at all most of the time.

[leffe186]

Tottenham are performing at exactly the same standard as they did last season.  Almost to the point.

 

And thus, they need to add better players to challenge the top two.  The current crop wont.  Still under the glass ceiling, which will wont be breached for the foreseeable future.

 

We definitely need to add better players, but everyone will do that. Still, you're now talking about the glass ceiling being under the top two, which is an improvement. Up until last year the glass ceiling was under the top four, at best.

 

The good sign is that we're performing similarly to last year with a weaker first team, bigger injury problems, and a new manager who has been under enormous pressure from day one. You'd hope we would improve next year even without strengthening the squad.

[Neil]

Get to see the sight of Neville in midfield it seems. Let's see how he matches up to League One relegation candidates.

 

No Fellaini.