Abby Brammell

By Arindam Rej

What's going on? Roman Pavlyuchenko, Jermane Defoe and Tom Huddlestone look dejected following Wigan's winning goal


Now Tottenham are officially one of the big boys they had better be prepared for the little fellas coming to White Hart Lance and putting hordes behind the ball.

Wigan played a deep-sitting 4-5-1 formation on Saturday — and they won’t be the last side to use that tactic against Spurs, who last week qualified for the group stage of the Champions League.

Harry Redknapp’s team are often ruthlessly efficient on the break but the shock 1-0 defeat by Wigan proved that they have a problem against teams who pack the midfield and put men behind the ball.


Wigan used the same tactics and organisational approach against Chelsea the week before and got hammered 6-0. Spurs are incapable of breaking teams down as clinically as the champions, though.


Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp was happy enough to speak openly about the problem.
‘I have felt all along with us that we lack that bit extra when teams sit back,’ he said. ‘We need that bit of flair. We’ve got no real dribblers if (Luka) Modric doesn’t play.’ There is already talk of Spurs being a side that suffers Champions League hangovers.

Their dismal show against Wigan came just three days after a euphoric play-off win against Young Boys - and Redknapp admits that they need to learn from the other English sides who compete in Europe’s showpiece club competition.

‘Chelsea, United and Arsenal are stronger than us,’ admitted Redknapp. ‘We lacked ideas and, the longer it goes on, it becomes harder and harder. People have got to have the courage to come and accept the ball.

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‘People turn up and expect you to win, don’t they? But we knew it wouldn’t be that easy. I have never really mentioned Inter and Werder Bremen. I know how important it is to get a win against Wigan.’

Tottenham’s England defender Michael Dawson added: ‘They came here and got everyone behind the ball and we couldn’t break them down.

‘They had a good game plan. It happened a few times last year. Stoke came and did the same. Hull did it. Wolves did. Against Wigan, we didn’t create many chances. A few teams will come and do this again.


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‘We’ve got to get used to it. We were attacking and tried to get the ball into midfield but we were getting closed down. Then we tried to go a bit longer - and it wasn’t happening. We maybe left ourselves a bit open at the back. We wanted to go for the win and it backfired.’


Spurs tinkered with their tactics in the hope of finding a breakthrough but no formula worked. Most surprising was Redknapp’s decision to leave Robbie Keane on the bench.


With 20 minutes to go, and the score still 0-0, the situation seemed ripe for Keane to exploit. But Redknapp opted to bring on Giovani Dos Santos, indicating that Keane’s days at White Hart Lane are over with Newcastle poised to swoop, as revealed by Sportsmail.

Wigan were justifiably proud of all the selection and tactical headaches that they posed Tottenham, having lost 9-1 at White Hart Lane last season. The Lancashire side also came into this game in dire form, opening the season with a 4-0 home drubbing against Blackpool before the mauling against Chelsea.

Defender Emmerson Boyce was one of the few survivors from that 9-1 nightmare. After Saturday’s 1-0 triumph, he said: ‘Last year was definitely playing on our minds. We did it for our fans. Last year hurt us. Losing 9-1 is not nice. A lot of people took the mickey out of us. Coming here and keeping a clean sheet, we got some of our respect back.

‘At times, we’ve over-played this season and caused ourselves problems. The manager told us to keep it tight. We carried our gameplan out to perfection.’

Sadly for Tottenham, they won’t be the only team using that gameplan this season. It’s up to Redknapp to find the answers to it.


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source: dailymail