Burnley? So what is the message we get off the critics. Burnley are just promoted and with all promoted teams they face a battle to stay up. These days the 3 that go up are the 3 that go down , such is the competitiveness and the money of the Premiership. But after the Supercup during the week which was more like a competitive Champions League match , there was a feeling with the fans that we may have tired legs. Frank had played 3 at the back against PSG and we ruled the roost for 80 minutes. It was good to watch and even though we lost on penalties , it really did look good for the majority of the match. Frank is a manager that changes the system when he plays different teams. He started with a back 4 against Burnley because they were less of a threat to Spurs. This was the first goof sign. The other good sign was he started with Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray in the Centre of midfield. A surprise for some of the Spurs regular. Archie Gray was only thrown into Centre Mid twice last season. The first time against Liverpool where he was pretty much fed to the wolves. He had been playing Centre Half the whole season covering for injury and he did not do too bad for a player out of position. He then looked lost in Central Midfield which is to be expected. However Frank had tried to sign Gray to Brentford 2 seasons ago. Frank played him against Newcastle in preseason in the centre and even though it was a Sonny love in farewell game, he did play very very well. So to see Frank going with such youth this early on in the campaign is very very promising.
Frank also stuck with Papa Sarr as a number 10. Sarr has really played out of his skin in preseason and looks like Frank is really improving him. He does not unlock defences like Maddison could or Eze will but he did do a very good job in this role linking up with Tottenhams new danger man. Kudus. Kudus just oozes class and confidence. He set Richarlison up for first goal even though the pigeon had work to do , he scored a screamer. But Kudus got around his man, a player that Ange was crying out for on the wing last year. Brennan Johnson even though he gets the goals is normally a 3 out of 10 every game. Goals always mask his performance (a bit like Sonny) but Frank despatched him on the left for this game. Another poor performance by the way masked by another goal. Jeez Louise.
But the game itself was good because Spurs looked solid. Also Richarlison is back fit and scoring again. His big problem is staying fit but hopefully with the new manager he may handle him better than Ange. Richarlison has a crazy stat that he has scored 13 goals in 16 Premiership starts for Spurs. That's Salah numbers there. I had to double check that myself.
Now the negative points with Burnley is that we were not great in the first half and they actually had a number of good chances. But unlike what used to happen is that we did not concede. Frank has been training Spurs on defending set pieces as well as attacking set pieces which Ange did not have any interest in. Franks plan is to get the defence right and from there introduce layers in attack and you can see this is well under way. Brentford got promoted they played a defensive brand of football. Then when they were safe they started playing more attacking. The season after they changed their system completely and were more expansive. So the word on the street is that Spurs will be playing this defensive brand of football until we get the defence sorted. This could be seen somewhat against Burnley but the second half we attacked more. However a 3 nil victory has the fans very happy indeed and they liked what they saw from Frank. Last year Spurs got beat by the bottom three teams. So our hearts were always in our mouths. This year it looks like we will beat these lower league teams and have problems against the likes of Man City who are up next. Whereas Ange could brush City aside. That's football, Mad stuff.
Djed Spence has signed a new deal. Some turnaround since Genoa were offered him for 10 million last summer. He's another player I am hoping Frank will improve because the ceiling is high.
Micky Moore signed a new deal as well. He made his debut for Rangers against Alloa in the cup and I watched the highlights. He was very good alright. I don't think Rangers know what they have yet. I reckon he will take Scotland by storm. Tel played poorly mid week and was racially abused online which is terrible. I hope they find these troll accounts and throw the book at them. I actually though Frank would start him against Burnley but in fairness , racism aside , he was very poor against PSG. Frank may see him as a number 9 so I am interested to see how this pans out.
And in other news
Look at the cut of this line up photo. What is going on here. Woolwich have lost the run of themselves.
Looks at the state of this. Embarrassing. Also my prediction that Gyokeres is a terrible buy is coming to fruition. Arsenal made Man United look like world beaters yesterday. They will be lucky to finish in the top 4 this year.