And Dortmund didn't put their strongest team, Sokratis, Gundogan, Kagawa and Burki didn't start.
The relative strength of the Premier League
- Thread starter Wumminator
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It's weird that people are saying "it's only Villa". They're 5 points behind Leicester and they dropped points at the weekend which Leicester took full advantage of, and Leicester only have the PL on their mind so their players are going to be fresh each week. If Spurs were a bit closer or top of the table I doubt they'd have rested players but the fact of the matter is that they cannot afford to lose or draw anymore in the league if they have serious hopes of winning it.
Completely different situation to Dortmund also. They've recently won the Bundesliga and have been in a CL final whereas Spurs are in a position that they've never been in before and are unlikely to be in again if they don't win the title this year.
Completely different situation to Dortmund also. They've recently won the Bundesliga and have been in a CL final whereas Spurs are in a position that they've never been in before and are unlikely to be in again if they don't win the title this year.
What is weird about that? Villa are, by quite some distance, the worst team in the league. Hence, playing Villa this season is arguably by quite some distance the least tough match.
If there are games during the course of a season where you can use the opportunity to rest key players, SURELY it is against Villa and not 3 days before in an Euro League knockout first leg against a top opponent.
It's really, really weird that you would consider our consternation weird.
I explained right after why I think it's weird and you chose to ignore it.
No.
What followed didn't say anything about Aston Villa, you only talked about Spurs' situation.
But if you live in an universe where resting players in an EL 1/16 against Dortmund for the upcoming league game against last place sure-to-be-relegated Aston Villa makes perfect sense, I guess we inhabit different ones.
We have won the league four years ago under a different coach and while a few of our players were with us back then already, many of our key players are still waiting for their first big title. History of the clubs have very little to do with how much the current personell wants to win the title. We also have to win every single remaining match in the league to keep the chance alive, even more so than Spurs as our opponent in the title race is stronger and won´t give us as much chances as Leicester might. The only real advantage we have is a comfortable position in terms of top 3 but this happens when you have title winning form.
What exactly has Pochettino accomplished with his selection? He has rested some legs, but in turn increased the mental pressure for the next game. They have sacrificed their only other path towards the CL after all to prepare for the mighty Aston Villa. With enough pressure even this god awful side could become a minor road block and then they have to decide if they continue to prioritise the league and get another spanking by Dortmund at their own door step or try to archive the miracle and reverse the score, effectively scoring more goals against us than we have conceeded in all of 2016. If they get hammered again their confidence is destroyed completely before entering the hot phase in the EPL.
Alternatively they could have tried to get a result in Dortmund vs. the top favourite of the tourney, gaining international recognition for that and building up momentum and confidence for both the EL and the EPL. They squandered this opportunity and instead showed the whole world that they are not ready for top level football. Well done Spurs, well done.
Right.
i think his point is that spurs shit in their pants even against villa.
and that team wants to play international next year? good luck.
with their logic, next year playing cl means the spurs have to choose: struggle for relegation, or getting some results in the cl games.
Yeah, that was completely my point.
i think his point is that spurs shit in their pants even against villa.
and that team wants to play international next year? good luck.
with their logic, next year playing cl means the spurs have to choose: struggle for relegation, or getting some results in the cl games.
I don't really mean it quite as confrontational as you do, tbh.
I'm just really struggling to follow the reasoning.
It's quite simple, it doesn't matter how strong or weak the opponent that Spurs play in the league each week, they cannot afford to drop points against anyone. The best chance they have of not doing that is with their best players on the pitch.
so then good luck in the premiership with this mentality.
gazza would be ashamed..
sorry for my confrontional behavior, but iam really disappointed from the second of the pl, tottenham, which has shown nothing. why they didnt' stayed at home? whats is that for a coaching? showing my own players that attitude, i would be pissed as an player and as a fan.
but, i read a lot of spurs fans, which write: "oh yeah, that was the only way to play"
i dont get it.
You are right but it's also true for Dortmund. Which is why they rested some players.
Watch Spurs lose out on both the PL and Europa. Losers mentality.
We did? Sokratis is still in build up training after his injury and Gündogan got a knock in training. Weidenfeller is our designated EL GK. We pretty much played our best possible squad for the formation (3-4-3) Tuchel prepared. We will probably have some minor rotation vs. Mainz (2/3 changes) and now might leave a couple of starters on the bench for the return leg.
That's not 100% accurate. Sokratis and Gündogan weren't in the squad due to injuries, Weidenfeller played all EL matches (bar the one in which he had caught a bug where Bürki replaced him) and Kagawa is currently not in his best shape.
We played with our best team available but I nevertheless agree with your points made.
It's true, but Dortmund can't either, can they? You could also argue that if Spurs beat Dortmund then they're the strongest team left in the Europa and the likely favourites.
I think Poch could've been far more tactful about it last night. The key is rotation, not completely swapping out your team. Fergie was great at that, too many modern managers are obsessed with throwing out their B team to completely rest the others, surely there's a middle ground somewhere?
Let's not forget that Spurs will likely be in the CL next season and Poch's Europa swap in/out policy certainly won't cut it then. It seems over the top to me.
I'm not saying anything about Dortmund or the result though, just that it was perfectly reasonable for Spurs to prioritise the league at this point.
I wouldn't be pissed if it meant winning the league. You say 2nd of the PL as if this is a familiar position for Spurs. It isn't. The highest they've placed in the PL is 4th. They haven't won the league since the 60s. I'm not saying it was the only way to play either. Just that it's not an outlandish thing to have done.
I agree with you @SilentWitness as I said in the Europa League thread, I think it's a choice that makes sense for Poch despite it being Villa at the weekend. Basically, Poch probably looked at it thinking: with my full strength team, I have a 90% chance of beating Villa this weekend. If I rotate a few against Villa, maybe that goes down to 80 or 70%. It's just a little less likely. A little bit. But at this stage, given Leicester's advance, if he's really serious about winning the league, then giving a few players a rest (again, they've played loads of games and the style of play of Spurs is intense and physically challenging) was a good choice. Not only with Villa in mind, but more generally given the run-in they have in the next few weeks.
I find it a bit bizarre that people are getting annoyed about this and acting as if this meant Spurs had no place in Europe and will never be a top team. They have a historic shot at winning the PL (which means a huge deal for PL clubs), so putting all the chances on his side made sense.
I find it a bit bizarre that people are getting annoyed about this and acting as if this meant Spurs had no place in Europe and will never be a top team. They have a historic shot at winning the PL (which means a huge deal for PL clubs), so putting all the chances on his side made sense.
I'm not saying anything about Dortmund though apart from the comparison doesn't work as Dortmund have won the Bundesliga recently (I think 4 years ago isn't that far away, it's still fresh in the mind of many) and Spurs haven't won the league since the 60s and in the PL era have been nowhere near winning it. It doesn't matter about the CL or swapping in/out policy next season either as it's not next season. It's this season and they find themselves in an excellent position to win the title. I'd have no qualms with my club doing the same if it meant that we would have the best possible chance of winning the league. It's not like he completely swapped his team either though, the only players from their side last night that don't get a lot of game time are Carroll and Onomah, the rest are given 90 minutes here and there.
Because they didn't want to gain international recognition by beating the mighty Dortmund or something...
I understand your point about Tottenham but I don't understand how the fact that Dortmund won the Bundesliga in 2012 is relevant, the manager and some key players never won it and they want to win it.
I'm sure Dortmund fans would disagree that it's less important to them. Toppling this almighty Bayern side who've won it three years on the trot, constantly poaching their best players along the way, would be seen as a pretty amazing achievement in itself. Like I said, I'm not saying Spurs shouldn't have rotated, of course they should, but I think they basically admitted defeat as soon as they sent that lineup out there, the whole world knew Dortmund would hammer them, which they did. I don't think a manager should ever put teams out with such a disadvantage.
They're also not going to face a team as good as Dortmund again this season, and conversely, the momentum of getting good results against a team as strong as Dortmund could have benefited them immensely in the PL. This is just heaping more pressure on them now.
I guess it makes it more acceptable for Tottenham fans to prioritise the league that way over the EL than it would be for Dortmund fans. Not sure if that's what he meant, but at least that makes sense to me. Not sure if it's really true either.
Kind of this. The fact that Dortmund have finished 1st, 1st, 2nd, 2nd, 7th, and most likely 2nd or 1st this season compared to Spurs who've finished 4th, 5th, 6th, 5th, the mentalities aren't the same at all in that regard.
Yeah but the club and the players are not thinking like that, they want to win everything. Like Herm Edwards said: "You play to win the game".
Spurs are fairly notorious bottlers with what may well be a one off shot at the title. I can understand why they rested players despite personally disagreeing with their decision to do so.
I agree it's not such a bad decision to rest players when they have a real chance at the league title, a history in the making. But if it is true that Spurs rested only 4 players(same as Dortmund) then it seems it was neither here or there. If you want to rest players then might as well rest 6 or 7. Now not only have they lost in europe but their team also didn't get much rest.
In what world do teams not care about their domestic titles? Doesn't matter if it has been 4 years or 40. Even Bayern are playing at full throttle in the league after winning it three times in a row.
Why did Spurs bother with the Europa League from the start? They were fielding full-strength sides in the group stages all the way up to this tie with Dortmund. That's 8 extra games they could have done without if they were genuinely concerned about fatigue.
Because they didn't know that they'd be in with a realistic shot at the Premier League back when the Europa League was starting.
Huh? When have i said people don't care about domestic titles? Just that 4 years and 40 years aren't comparable at all as the mentalities are completely different.
Why does it make a difference? Dortmund aren't giving it any less than a full 100% in the league, just because they won it a couple of years ago. The chance to beat Guardiola's Bayern and the massive (deserved) hype surrounding them probably even adds some extra incentive.
They've been around top 4 from November. That's a BS excuse.
Even if Spurs went full strength side they'd get fecking shat on by BVB so it's better to field some reserves and then pretend that 'heh we don't even care lol'.
For the sake of playing devils advocate, it's likely as well that Dortmund, seeing a grossly understrength Tottenham side, decided to go full throttle at them. Maybe if they saw a full strength opponent they'd be more reserved?
Very possible that I may be wrong.
Dortmund basically played like they always do, Tottenham were just a lot worse at dealing with it than most Bundesliga teams.
I don't really know how to explain it to you if you're unable to understand how a team like Spurs that's only won 2 top division championships and the last time they won it was the 60s, while recently dwindling around 5th spot, isn't something which is monumentally different compared to a relatively recent successful Dortmund side that have only been outside the top 2 once in 5 years, have won their top division recently and have 8? top division titles.
If Dortmund lose the title will they see it as a big chance wasted? Probably not as they're fighting against one of the best sides in the world. Will Spurs? Most definitely as it's the first time in a while that there hasn't been a dominant figure or top 4 in the league.
Ah, nvm then.