Tottenham Hotspur’s Desperate Defence

The defending shown by Tottenham Hotspur hasn't been good enough this season. We're conceding far too many soft goals as well as giving away cheap penalties.

To be fair to our defenders, it doesn’t help that there is no consistency in front of them (in terms of team selection). Tom Huddlestone has been a long term absentee and is just regaining his form and fitness. Sandro is still finding his feet whilst showing glimpes of his huge talent and Wilson Palacios’ form has fluctuated wildly.

Our midfielders can often be lax when in possession of the ball, once the ball is turned over, our defence is often left horribly exposed. Therefore, the problem doesn't lie with the Spurs defence per se, the problem lies with the amount of pressure it is constantly under with the midfield giving the ball away.

That said, all of Alan Hutton, Vedran Corluka, Michael Dawson, Sebestien Bassong and Benoit Assou-Ekotto have all been caught napping at the back this season. Dawson as our left centre back hasn’t been a roaring success. Isn’t Gallas more suitable there? Gallas was deployed there whilst at Arsenal. It also hasn’t escaped my attention that Dawson and Gallas often swap sides during a game. This doesn’t help team cohesion, never mind cohesion amongst the back four.

We all know, that Heurelho Gomes can be shaky and brilliant in the same game. Such inconsistency from our No 1 goalkeeper, makes the defenders in front of him nervous and unwilling to rely on him.

Consistent bad defending from our back line as well as the entire team will continue to be our undoing. Once we’re able to field a settled line up, we’ll reap the benefits never mind the clean sheets.