Analysis of the goals conceded against Blackpool (22/2)


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Better late than never…

A bizarre game in which our lack of top-class (or at least in-form) striker seemed to be the difference, although all of the Blackpool goals were frustratingly avoidable.

Blackpool goals

Adam’s goal.

Eardley receives the ball, and has time to take a touch before Pienaar closes him down.

He swings in a cross before Pienaar can get to him; Bassong is marking Campbell in the penalty area.

Kornilenko cleverly holds off Dawson, and chests the ball to Campbell, who has made a run off Bassong.

As Campbell takes a touch, it looks as though he’s going to strike first time, with Bassong not in touching distance.

Bassong actually does quite well to get back to him, but then stupidly attempts to swing a right boot at the ball, and his momentum takes him into the back of Campbell, who goes down for a penalty.

Adam takes the penalty – a good height for the goalkeeper, as they say, but far enough into the corner to make sure that Gomes can’t get to it.

Campbell’s goal.

Blackpool look to launch a counter from deep in their own half, with the majority of our players caught up field.

Quick, slick, one-touch passing means that Campbell receives the ball beyond two Spurs players.

It’s now effectively two on two, as Assou-Ekotto tries to catch Campbell, who has Dawson (out of shot) to beat, and Kornilenko is on the half-way line, with Bassong (out of shot) beyond him.

Dawson commits himself, and it seems that Assou-Ekotto has a chance to clear the loose ball. Difficult to tell from this shot whether that is the case or not, but either way, Campbell keeps hold of the ball and goes beyond both defenders.

Campbell finds Kornilenko, who faces Bassong up.

He comes inside, and Beattie (disappointingly untracked) makes an excellent overlapping run. Assou-Ekotto is in a reasonable position to deal with Campbell.

Kornilenko finds Beattie with a clever back-heel, totally taking Bassong out of the game. Campbell has pulled off to the back post, and Assou-Ekotto’s position is now not good enough.

That said, it’s a good ball from Beattie, but Campbell is clearly offside.

So when he tucks the ball in at the back post, the flag should go up. Still, an excellent break from Blackpool (although we made it easy for them with some poor defending).

Ormerod’s goal.

Southern has the ball in a relatively “safe” area of the pitch, but Campbell’s dart away from Gallas, followed by his first time pass opens things up.

Campbell receives the ball and finds Phillips in one motion, totally beating Gallas is the process.

Phillips is up against Assou-Ekotto, who uses his strength to manouevre the winger off the ball.

He passes up the chance to clear with his right foot, and instead tries to turn on to his left – clearly suicide, as Ormerod has taken a gamble.

As Assou-Ekotto flounders, Ormerod pounces.

And he slips the ball past Gomes.

It seems our defenders only know extremes right now – the sublime, as in the Milan game, or the ridiculous, as in the Fulham game and now this. It was a risky strategy from Redknapp to make two changes, with only one enforced; by moving Gallas out of the centre he unsettled the entire defence. I would personally have started with Palacios at right back in order to minimise the changes.

Our back four should have a more familiar feel to it for the Wolves game – let’s hope that they put in a better performance.

Join the conversation

  1. Two cock-ups and an offside make it seem that we were badly done by.
    But as your analysis often proves it's errors and poor positioning in the build up that lead to individuals being exposed and making errors under stress.
    At one time we had a team of right backs now we are having to re-deploy settled centre halves and disrupting the defence.

    We still should have won on chances.
  2. Windy yesterdays drug scandal has thrown my constant rant to get energized drug induced performances stop. Blackpool scored three goals granted but the sand in the penalty area helped in two of there goals and the third by a referees assistant. and My concern is the energized defending god knows i have tried to tell our fans Defoe and our other strikers are suffering form this blanket defending and Goalkeeping saves enhanced by energy Kolo Toure is the tip of a huge Iceberg of abuse causing shocks and our next opponents have had shocks against the big clubs yet got beat by other energized teams check there results and other struggling teams.I told my fellow Spurs fans how Man City who where getting shocked by some of these teams upped there tempo after there form was not good enough for the calibre of the team and this desperation has caused this cheating. his energized form of cheating is even in amateur rugby and football in my area the North Westand this is how i can spot this abuse the weight loss defending in numbers the gaunt overheating faces caused by running more than there body can normally achieve and sadly loads of sudden and mysterious deaths. So windy you are doing a great job but in your mind you have to factor this form of cheatin g into your excellent blog. Davspurs watching the cheats save blocks and beat my beloved Spurs for the last three seasons and we lost two managers to this form of cheating
  3. Prior to the game, I had hoped that Palacios would play right-back, rather than play Bassong instead of Gallas in the centre.
    I thought we became too desperate. Jenas got caught too far forward (would have preferred Sandro) and I think they were all shooting on sight, desperately, in the second half, when more thoughtful play would have been better (the number of shots off-target was awful).
    I think Sandro plus a more measured approach would at least have got us a draw.
  4. I am not too sure when Jenas got caught too far forward. Presumably for the third goal, at which time he was playing right back, although I didn't think that the move originated down their left hand side. I thought that moving Jenas to right back really nullified our creativity in the final 15 minutes, as he was heavily involved in keeping the ball moving and getting Lennon more involved in the second half. In the first half, far too much went down the left hand side.

    The second goal was the killer and, although offside, the failure to pick up Campbell's movement was terrible. Even so, if we had just converted one of our chances early in the second half the game would have been completely different. In addition, we should have had a penalty when Modric was taken out by the goalie.

    All in all, this was really just one of those games. We totally outplayed Blackpool and end up 3-0 down! Just goes to prove what Arsenal have found out in previous seasons, good build up play is useless if you can't defend and score goals!
  5. Slow down Dave your grammar and punctuation's all over the place! Have you been on the ephedrine again?
  6. Just seen this Windy, interesting to see our goals analysed in depth. despite the marginal offside DJs goal is one of my favourites of the season.
  7. It was a top class move - tore us apart!

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