It's not Sherwood!

[Legion]

A plan to achieve our next win...

[Damo70]

Looks more like a diagram of all the dead ends and U turns of Randy and Lambert put together.

[Mister E]

The challenge is to have players on the bench that can bring something extra or different to the game. We do not have such players, unless one of Gil or Sinclair are held back as an impact player.

[john e]

The problem is we chop and change  the players around especially in midfield and we still get the same performance out of them, no matter which different ones we try it doesn't make much difference
we change the style of play from long ball to possession to counter attacking and we still get the same level of performance
We go the whole hog and change the manager, and on the basis of his first game we get the same old crap

Maybe we are just going to have to accept the players arnt good enough,
We are the exact opposite of a 'to good to go down ' team

[Rudy Can't Fail]

Having slept on it I'm still shocked with Sherwood's long ball tactics yesterday. I doubt for one milsecond Sherwood ever adopted those tactics at Spurs, whether at youth level or with the first team. He'd be aware that Lambert had spent the last couple of months trying to get us passing the ball as the long ball/hoof up to Benteke clearly wasn't working. Surely he'd be aware, like every journalist/pundit out there knew it was failing as it was too slow. He'd have seen our stats and realised we can hold onto the ball quite well and he'd seen with his own eyes against Leicester how with a little bit more urgency we can get the goals we were lacking.

What the hell went through his head to think, especially against a physically strong team like Stoke, hoofing it up front was going to work when it's failed for so long? Did it ever cross his mind that if he could get the players to speed up their passing game we'd have a far better chance of beating teams? Is it any wonder the players looked lost, confused and out of ideas yesterday having worked on their possession game to suddenly abandon it for route 1 football.

I can only think, much like Lambert against Bradford, he decided to play with lots of attacking players, ignore the midfield and play over the top of them in the hope that we got a lucky flick on and having so many forwards we'd score lots of goals. The fact that it wasn't working he left himself no real options to change it. He may say all the right things but yesterday he even surprised me with his tactics, they really made no sense at all.

[Monty]

Having slept on it I'm still shocked with Sherwood's long ball tactics yesterday. I doubt for one milsecond Sherwood ever adopted those tactics at Spurs, whether at youth level or with the first team. He'd be aware that Lambert had spent the last couple of months trying to get us passing the ball as the long ball/hoof up to Benteke clearly wasn't working. Surely he'd be aware, like every journalist/pundit out there knew it was failing as it was too slow. He'd have seen our stats and realised we can hold onto the ball quite well and he'd seen with his own eyes against Leicester how with a little bit more urgency we can get the goals we were lacking.

What the hell went through his head to think, especially against a physically strong team like Stoke, hoofing it up front was going to work when it's failed for so long? Did it ever cross his mind that if he could get the players to speed up their passing game we'd have a far better chance of beating teams? Is it any wonder the players looked lost, confused and out of ideas yesterday having worked on their possession game to suddenly abandon it for route 1 football.

I can only think, much like Lambert against Bradford, he decided to play with lots of attacking players, ignore the midfield and play over the top of them in the hope that we got a lucky flick on and having so many forwards we'd score lots of goals. The fact that it wasn't working he left himself no real options to change it. He may say all the right things but yesterday he even surprised me with his tactics, they really made no sense at all.

I agree. It was generally baffling. I don't mind being a bit more direct, considering our possession play under Lambert was about as sharp and threatening as a flump, but to go as actively long-ball as he did was clearly a mistake. However, he acknowledged as much in the post-match interview, so let's hope it tempers a bit in the coming games.

[paulcomben]

Maybe he had not realised that Benteke cannot win headers nor hold the ball up. Maybe a Paul Furlong type could be lured out of retirement & signed as a free agent?!

[Mister E]

Having slept on it I'm still shocked with Sherwood's long ball tactics yesterday. I doubt for one milsecond Sherwood ever adopted those tactics at Spurs, whether at youth level or with the first team. He'd be aware that Lambert had spent the last couple of months trying to get us passing the ball as the long ball/hoof up to Benteke clearly wasn't working. Surely he'd be aware, like every journalist/pundit out there knew it was failing as it was too slow. He'd have seen our stats and realised we can hold onto the ball quite well and he'd seen with his own eyes against Leicester how with a little bit more urgency we can get the goals we were lacking.

What the hell went through his head to think, especially against a physically strong team like Stoke, hoofing it up front was going to work when it's failed for so long? Did it ever cross his mind that if he could get the players to speed up their passing game we'd have a far better chance of beating teams? Is it any wonder the players looked lost, confused and out of ideas yesterday having worked on their possession game to suddenly abandon it for route 1 football.

I can only think, much like Lambert against Bradford, he decided to play with lots of attacking players, ignore the midfield and play over the top of them in the hope that we got a lucky flick on and having so many forwards we'd score lots of goals. The fact that it wasn't working he left himself no real options to change it. He may say all the right things but yesterday he even surprised me with his tactics, they really made no sense at all.

I agree. It was generally baffling. I don't mind being a bit more direct, considering our possession play under Lambert was about as sharp and threatening as a flump, but to go as actively long-ball as he did was clearly a mistake. However, he acknowledged as much in the post-match interview, so let's hope it tempers a bit in the coming games.

It might have worked better if the ball was launched more effectively! I watched the highlights of the Hull-QPR game where the quality of Hull's crossing into the box was excellent. Ours has been piss-poor all season.

[Monty]

Crossing isn't the same as a long ball. Even long balls aren't all the same - the attempted flick-ons, whoever's fault they were, were a disaster.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

Crossing isn't the same as a long ball. Even long balls aren't all the same - the attempted flick-ons, whoever's fault they were, were a disaster.

They were and as I mentioned above, he left himself no options to change it.

I really hope you're right Monty and Sherwood holds his hand up and isn't too proud to admit he got it completely wrong. I'd hope that Sherwood plays to his strengths, what he knows, rather than experimenting with failed and binned tactics that are alien to him.

[Villafirst]

What's happened to Benteke's dominance in the air? He barely gets off the deck and won very few headers. He used to leap so high - is it the injury I wonder?

[myf]

What's happened to Benteke's dominance in the air? He barely gets off the deck and won very few headers. He used to leap so high - is it the injury I wonder?

It's Bizzare when you consider how he used to dominate teams in the air and hold the ball up so well. Yesterday he didn't win jack. Makes you wonder if he's just given up but not exactly putting himself in shop window.

[silhillvilla]

I'm still having to stop and pinch myself that Tim Sherwood is managing our football team. And not in a good way.

[tomd2103]

Crossing isn't the same as a long ball. Even long balls aren't all the same - the attempted flick-ons, whoever's fault they were, were a disaster.

It was noticeable that a lot of the long balls from the back were diagonal balls, so it was clearly a planned tactic. 

[brian green]

Villadelph you echo my own thoughts. My expectations of Sherwood was that he would want to play quick football. I also expected him to know enough about Stoke to know that high balls into the centre circle are meat and drink to their huge defenders. I also expected him to tell somebody to keep with Benteke in or near their box. I can only assume Sherwood was playing to the gallery by adopting the Bradford strategy of lots of attackers equals lots of goals and we would applaud his positivity. I also agree with the poster who said Guzan cannot kick the ball far enough for effective Route 1. Very poor start for Sherwood who needs to sort himself out as much as his under achieving players.