Written by billythekid
Gary O’Neil has now suffered two defeats in his last two games without seeing his side score a goal. Against Southampton, their goalkeeper was only really tested once with a shot from leading scorer Philip Billing and on Monday night the West Ham goalkeeper wasn’t really troubled, he had an easy save from a Dominic Solanke effort in the first half which our striker hit straight at him. Besides the defeat and some talking points/controversial decisions, the bad news was we lost two important players during the game through injury in Neto and Solanke. AFCB go into this game trying to avoid a third consecutive defeat.
Our next game at Dean Court is going to be another testing one with Spurs the visitors on Saturday at 3 pm. Spurs come to Dean Court also on the back of two defeats. The Spurs manager is Antonio Conte, he will be remembered by our fans as the former Chelsea manager who was their manager when we played Chelsea in the Premier League in the 2016-17 and 2017-18 seasons. Conte joined Spurs on the 2nd November 2021 with them sitting in 9th position after ten games with 15 points. At the end of the season, they were 4th with 71 points. This was Spurs’ best league position since 2018-19 when they were in exactly the same position with the same number of points.
In the Summer, Conte’s club signed eight players permanently, including Richarlison from Everton for £60 million, Christian Romero for a reported £42 million and Yves Bissauma from Brighton for £32 million. They also have signed Clement Lenglet on loan from Barcelona. In their six away games so far Spurs have beaten Nottingham Forest 0-2 and Brighton 0-1. They have drawn with two London clubs, Chelsea 2-2 and West Ham 1-1. The two defeats have been against Arsenal 3-1 and Manchester United 2-0. At home, they have won five games and lost in their most recent game 1-2 against Newcastle United.
The last time Spurs visited Dean Court was in July 2020 which finished in a goalless draw, it ended a run of five successive defeats in the Premier League. With the discussion re VAR decisions in our recent games, the game back in 2020 had two VAR decisions go against both sides, one for Harry Kane who Spurs thought was pushed in the back by Josh king and King was also involved in the disallowed goal from Callum Wilson as his shot was judged to have hit King’s hand on the way into the net.
Our home record against Spurs in the league, AFCB, W 1, D 2, L 2.
In all competitions, AFCB, W 2, D 2, L 7.
AFCB v Spurs
AFCB Win
Draw
Spurs Win
AFCB Team News
Joining Lloyd Kelly and David Brooks are Neto and Dominic Solanke, which are both important losses to our side, especially Solanke up front. Will see a start again for Mark Travers in goal.
AFCB Player To Watch
With the loss of Solanke, Kieffer Moore will probably start, but he needs players alongside him to play to his strengths. Hopefully, we will see a start for both Jordan Zemura and Jaidon Anthony who have got pace and a good understanding between them and get more into Spurs goal area and give Moore a fighting chance.
Spurs Team News
Richarlison has been out with a foot injury, as has Christian Romero. Pierre Emil Hojbjerg and Dejan Kulusevski have thigh injuries.
Spurs Player To Watch
Harry Kane has scored five times in his last six league games. Powerful on the ground as well as in the air, this season so far he has scored 10 goals and has 1 assist and last season scored 17 goals with 9 assists. He is also good at creating chances for his teammates. The other danger is Son Hueng-Min, this season he has scored 3 goals (hat-trick) and has 2 assists. Last season in the Premier League he was the top joint scorer with 26 goals with Mohamed Salah of Liverpool, they both shared the Golden Boot award. Son also had 7 assists for the season.
The Referee
Anthony Taylor is the man in charge of this game. We had him for the 0-0 home draw with Wolves which was Gary O’Neils first game in charge of our team.
Your say…
northstandmark wrote…
I must admit to having been quite low this week.
When you’re beaten by a better side playing better football you can usually take some positive from it. When your players make a mistake you can vent about it and know it’s possible to improve the player or change the team. But the week after week of relentless crap we’re having to swallow from the officials at the moment is exhausting.
And outside of AFCB, nobody cares or probably even realises. Whereas Spurs have one thing go against them and it’s front-page sporting news. Liverpool have one thing go against them and the PL has to write and release a statement about it! – Join the conversation, click here.
