Spurs head coach Andre Villas-Boas had already been very vocal about the scheduling of the Capital One Cup, even going as far as to say that the fixture list had left the club with no chance of progressing. The squad has many new faces but with injuries and a number of loan deals agreed, many of those who featured in Sunday’s win over Cardiff are likely to have to take to the field at Villa Park tonight.
“It is not our absolute number one priority but I don’t think we have been given a fair chance to play in this competition this year,” AVB said.
“It could be possible for the players who played against Cardiff to play this game, but I am not sure I want to risk the players who played getting a hamstring injury which could take them six weeks to recover from when the Premier League is more important.”
Injuries to Rose, Defoe, Lennon, Chadli and Capoue have forced Andre’s hand with selection and it’s certain that the likes of Tom Carroll, Adam Smith and maybe even Ryan Mason and Alex Pritchard would have featured had they not been out on loan.
By the time the FA Cup comes around, Spurs may well have been eliminated from tonight’s competition but the Europa League looks set to continue. Can the club really be expected to fight on all those fronts?
Yes as long as the squad is utilized
Soldado for League
Defoe for Europe
Ade for Domestic Cups
And Lamela/Townsend/Lennon/Eriksen/Holtby/Chadli/Sig are all rotated regualrly for the forward 3 positions
Sandro/Capoue/Paulinho/Dembele + Vertonghen/Dawson/Chriches/Kaboul need to rotate at the spine.
I honestly cant think of 1 player in our whole squad who really lets the team down…..last year it was Livermore, Gallas, Parker and at times Adebayor but this year we have nobody who is a complete waste….
totally agree we should be going for everything, why wouldn’t we, great squad, attitude and manager!
COYS
I laugh at our fans some times not in a mocking way all our fans are special we all love the same Club. No what makes me laugh is some of the statements what we lacked last season was a finisher a 20 odd season strikers Well we had one but he was plotting is dream move for the last two seasons after Modrat left. We had Ady Defoe we started with Lloris benched and Defoe has the lone striker we won 3 lost 2 drawn 2 . The trouble was our defense let Goals in at the other end we lost points with late goals against Norwich and West brom. But a few games down the line Lloris came in and Defoe found himself benched and Ady came into the team with Bale moving to second striker. This is where my rant at our fans starts Defoe hasscored Hatrick in pre season South China a Brace twice in Ufa yet he cant get a start in the prem. W e paid 26 million for a so called proven Striker in Spain and for is Country Spain when he plays but not in the most competitive and Money laden league in the World. This is the problem Soldado is a fine player but is job is not to look good but score the goals that win the points for our team. Last season Defoe scored 15 goals 11 in the premiership most of them has a sub plus he was injured for a spell . My argument is this if AVB persists in playing one striker and having two proven premiership ones sat on the bench or in ADY case on the naughty step all we will get is trouble no matter who we buy. The only players who will sit and wait is young kids if your main striker is not scoring like Soldao then he has to give way to one of the others till he finds form 2 pens in five games is not good enough no matter how classy you look without Pens Erickson and Pualino our start 0-0-0-0 0-1 2-0 0-0. How many of those 12 shots on target would Defoe score and why is Soldado not where Paulinho was or Siggy both tapirs any striker should be back stick. This is not just having a dig at Saldado like i say hes quality but without competition for a prem start he wont have the threat of not scoring and losing is place. If Rose is missing i would play both strikers and go 352 Loris Walker Kaboul Dawson Vertonghan Lamela Paulinho Erickson Townsend Saldado
Should be Defoe with Sadado