The all important six pointer against man City is all but here and if rumours are to be believed Harry is going with Defoe leading the line.

OK so it hasn’t worked the last 100 times we’ve tried it but hey, 101st time lucky eh.

I can see all the tub thumping ‘we’re gonna do it’ articles about and I sincerely hope this post comes back to haunt me but I’m now very pessimistic. Our massive strength (in the continued absence of a prolific forward) is our attacking midfield which requires a big guy up front who has good movement and can hold up the ball to bring them into play.

Now our whole game is going to be slinging balls through to Defoe who will be playing in nobody but just greedily snatching at everything because he is so desperate to impress, like he did when he was on his 100th goal and had that T shirt on. The frustrating thing is that we are at full strength and I would actually really fancy our chances, but this will adversely effect the way we play.

It drives me mad that we haven’t prepared for this by buying a striker to give us our first decent, permanent strike force since Berbatov and Keane (even try and buy back Berbatov if need be; we took Teddy back after all), but at least we should be playing Pavlyuchenko. I’m no great fan of the Russian, but he is the nearest thing we have to a like for like replacement for Adebayor. Defoe is effective playing off a big man like Pav or Ade and not as a lone striker.

I feel for Defoe. Van der Vaart hasn’t scored since October and he is still on the bench despite having a good scoring record this season (scorer of more goals coming off the bench than any other player in Prem’ history), but tomorrow is not the time to drop Rafa. He is a big game player and I want him on the pitch, but not behind Defoe. It doesn’t bloody work, it never has worked, and I doubt it ever will work.

If we see out this transfer window with no new, line leading striker and Adebayor gets injured then we will be stuck with this situation for the rest of the season and be fighting tooth and nail to hang on to fourth. Levy has earned a lot of respect from Spurs fans and rightly so, but with no Europe and teams in transition etc we have a genuine and rare chance at the title this season and few will forgive him if we throw it away.

COYS!

You can follow me on Twitter @RobertReedUK

Only three teams can win the league this season. Man City have the squad, Man United have the experience and we (despite Mancini’s protestations to the contrary) play the best football. The brilliant, attacking, free flowing football which can win us the title. The thing is, if our football is so great then how come Man United and Man City have scored a shed load more goals than us?

Our problem is a lack of goalscorers with only Gareth Bale having a decent strike rate for his position. Although they have great attributes Adebayor, Modric, Lennon and recently Van der Vaart have all been pretty woeful in front of goal. We need a prolific goalscorer who can lead the line and there are only a few realistic targets out there. We all know who they are, let’s just buy one already.

Our biggest game of the season approaches, in which we will be denied our vital man up front when we really need him. Nil desperandum however, because as luck would have it this massively important six pointer has landed in the middle of the transfer window enabling us to make a shrewd and much needed purchase in time to save the day!

That of course is the wise and indeed logical thing to do, so why the feck haven’t we done it? Unless we sign someone in the next two days we are facing a VDV and Defoe front line, which has never worked, against the league leaders. Either that or every club’s least favourite part exchange player Pavlyuchenko. Spare us.

As much as I love Daniel Levy, his brinkmanship does more harm than good. How many real bargains have we got with this technique? VDV was a last minute buy who paid off but we nearly always end up as the club without a chair when the music stops.

Our most impressive signing in recent years was Luka Modric. We came flying out of the trap and bought him at the start of the window, catching other interested clubs on the hop. He also didn’t cost a fortune as we offered a fair price to start with meaning it didn’t have chance to turn into a bidding war.

Why do we now keep coming up with derisory offers for players until their clubs get totally pissed off with us? They can see Levy’s double standards from what he expects to be paid for our players; £20m for Defoe? £15m for Pav? Gimme a break. We pontificate until eventually, inevitably, another club comes along and buys the player.

I’m not saying we should be bidding £35/£40m for players, there are few who are genuinely worth that much (Andy Carroll?) and those who are want wages we cannot realistically afford before we get our new stadium. We can however afford between £20/£25m players and that is the sort of money it takes to secure the kind of targets we are looking at.

If we had bid £20m for Loic Remy at the start of the window before he’d scored two goals and destroyed Lille, I believe he would be a Spurs player now. Huntelaar has scored 26 goals in 27 games which is a fantastic strike rate even for the Bundesliga. He is no spring chicken but that is reflected in his rumoured £17m price tag. Llorente is a top player who can apparently be bought for around £20/£25m. Moussa Sow has agreed personal terms with Fenerbahce, don’t tell me we couldn’t have trumped them.

These are all the type of player we are looking for who can lead the line and score goals. They have all been around long enough to rule them out from being a flash in the pan, and none are living on past reputations like Torres. These can only improve our squad or even first team.

Don’t get me wrong. I know Levy is the man, and the best chairman in the Premier League in my opinion. I also do like the fact that he is a hard bargainer and always tries for the best deal for the club. I just wish that on certain occasions when the need is great he could just be a little less ‘Levy’.

COYS!

You can follow me on Twitter @ RobertReedUK

And who’s to be held responsible for this uncharacteristic damp flannel of a performance? Well I for one blame those breakfast cereal companies who’ve spent years trying to cover their muck in sugar and marshmallow to get the kids on board. But that, I fear, is for another day.

The weekend’s result is what it is. Or was what it was. Two points dropped against a team who’d struck money early and were more than happy to park their defensive big-rig across our penalty area and jimmy it into neutral for the remaining minutes. Despite the super-serious look on Alan Shearer’s face on Saturday night- telling us, in no uncertain terms that we’ve got nay chance, pet- it’s far from terminal for the chaps in Lilywhite. What’s that saying? One swallow doesnay make your career choices questionable? Erm, no that doesn’t sound quite right…

Talking of Wor Alan. Notice how his resolve about our lack of title credentials on MOTD were about equal to those which backed our chances on Football Focus a few hours earlier. It goes without saying that the man was dropped on his head as a child. And possibly numerous times since.

Right, this is boring. Who’s got some transfer gossip to share before we talk City?

Seriously, make something up.

Do a Twitter and I promise I’ll recycle.

Daniel Levy is the man. We all know that, but sometimes he is just a bit too…’Levy’.

The latest big name we are being linked with is Loic Remy. He is the most important player at his club, Marseilles, who have qualified for the knockout stages of the Champions League and have designs on finishing high enough to qualify next season also. Achieving that and staying in this season’s competition as long as possible will be very lucrative, so how does it make financial sense to sell their best player at this time?

This is a similar enough situation to the Modric/Chelsea saga for Levy to relate to it. He must realise that even if this goes to the wire he won’t get the player for less than something like £20m at least, and with the Man City game approaching with Adebayor ineligible this is no time to string things out.

Our chairman is dreaming if he thinks Pavlyuchenko can be used in part exchange, especially at the ridiculously inflated price he has valued him at. It’s reported that he wants £15m for the Russian who we bought for £13.8m. Bearing in mind that he has been something of a disappointment and doesn’t even get a game now we would be extremely lucky to get £12m for him. Most teams would be looking to sign him for nearer £8m.

I’m not trying to tell Levy how to negotiate, he is a master at it. What I would say though is that if ever there was a time to go against the grain and seek a more expensive deal which doesn’t go to the last day of the season, or more likely not happen at all until the summer, this is it. Remy is likely to star for France at Euro 2012 and if he is as good as a lot of sources are claiming we could end up being priced out of the move anyway.

Is he worth the money? Depends what we can achieve if we sign him. Should we be going for other targets before him? Possibly, but with Adebayor likely to leave in the summer we are likely to be looking for another front man anyway. Perhaps Damiao, although he has a buy out clause of £50m.

Up for that one Daniel? Hmm..

COYS!

You can follow me on Twitter @ RobertReedUK

The Gunners manager is only thinking about one team, and that is Arsenal despite people thinking that he might be thinking about rival club Spurs.

He also said that his players are not interested in what happens at White Hart Lane, even though Tottenham are now level on points with Manchester United, and only three points behind league leaders Manchester City.

There has been talk of Harry Rednapp’s Tottenham now being a favorite for the title, but when Wenger was asked he said.

“I don’t look at Tottenham frankly,” stated the Frenchman. “We look at the potential we have and then think that we gave absolutely everything to fulfil it.

“The attitude is right and I am confident that we can do that.

“Tottenham are a good side, they make points, but there is a long way to go.

“At the moment it still looks very open and there is no one who dominates this championship.

“Let’s wait to see what happens at the end of the season.

“No matter who wins the league, whether it is us or somebody else, we will respect it and congratulate them.

“At the moment what is important for us is to come back and fight.

“We will fight with Man United, Man City, Chelsea, Liverpool, Newcastle – all these teams to go as far as we can.”

In a season like this there are many players to take the accolades, but one name which doesn’t immediately jump to mind is Brad Friedel.

If you are waxing lyrical about the great performers so far you might well say our success is mainly down to Modric, Parker, Bale, Adebayor or even King. Doubtless Harry Redknapp and Daniel Levy have been immense (for their ensuring a Scott Parker and Luka Modric midfield between them if nothing else) but on the field those are the names you think of. So why not Friedel?

Sure if somebody suggests the keeper then all agree he is a big factor, but he doesn’t get talked about as much because he hasn’t done that much to catch the eye but that, of course, is the key. The better the keeper, the more boring they are.

I can barely remember any particularly great saves he has made this season. One or two, but not many. Heurelho Gomes last season made plenty of fantastic fingertip saves which had the pundits drooling. He also virtually threw the ball in quite a lot.

Great saves do not make a great keeper. Knowing what you are doing, being in the right place, coming out at the right time and reading play so you rarely get in the position to have to make a super save to bail yourself out is what it takes.

Brad Friedel is not in any top ten in the world list, but he is a proper keeper with bundles of experience and has been absolutely vital to us this season. Who knows where we would be with an eye catching alternative like Gomes? I’d go so far as to say 9 points worse of at least, which would have us outside the top four.

So is Brad Friedel our main man this season? Who cares.  He’s boring.

COYS!

You can follow me on Twitter @ RobertReedUK

Ruddy nora and crikey hell! What about that, then? An absolute thunder-punt from everyone’s favourite Smart Car-driving, Oyster card-carrying Evening Standard columnist/community support worker/international superstar footballer/all round good egg. If I was describing it using the medium of retro beat ‘em, Street Fighter II, I would conclude thusly: sonic boom + flaming hadouken x hurricane kick= that goal. Deflected slightly, on closer inspection, but the type of person who’d want to take the gloss off of Disco Benny’s moment in the sun is the same person who, as we speak, is looking for a nice bridge to abandon that puppy they bought home for their children at Christmas. Sit back, press play and enjoy the sheer wonder of it all. Tottenham are joint second with Man United. Imagine.

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Then I realised Robbie Keane was at Villa and we’d rather been there before.

Everton at The Lane. That’s what the reports are telling me. Did anyone else feel a pang of sympathy for David Moyes yesterday after he spoke about his misery of watching Tottenham pull away from the Merseyside club? The Toffees have become unstuck from the teeth of the Champions League chasers in recent times and instead spiralled off into mid-table anonymity. Of course, a lack of bones was highlighted as the underlining cause for the club’s halted progress (there’s no denying the Scot operates with funds akin to that of a village hall’s pastry budget) but they struck me as words of a defeated man. I hope everything’s alright at home…

We’re not without our own problems, of course. Sure Tottenham are sitting high and handsomely as we speak but there’s definitely the whiff of crisis about our potential selection tonight. Sandro’s out, Parker’s almost certainly out. King, too, is buggered as is Gallas. Leaving us with a potential midfield pairing of Luka Modric and…erm. Well, let’s not dwell on the details, shall we?

Suffice to say, it doesn’t look good. I wonder if they’ll be any calls for some eccentric tinkering from ‘Arry tonight? Pushing Kaboul into midfield, perhaps, and slotting Bassong in beside Dawson? It’s risky- madness, some would say. But it’s exactly the kind of hair-brained genius that gets you noticed (not to mention the women). Alex Ferguson does this kind of stuff all the time. So, you know, it might just work.

In other news we drew Watford in the Cup. Not a bad little result, that. Not only did it see us miss some of the stickier trips of the round it’s also given me a tremendous scope with which to come up with some clever and more importantly hilarious headlines for the upcoming tie. Something about girls kicking hornet’s nests. It’ll need work but I’m pretty sure it’s a winner. Three points tonight, please.

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