Tottenham vs Everton Preview: Injuries and suspensions indicate intense tactical battle

Match: Tottenham Hotspurs v Everton

Venue: White Hart Lane

Air Date: 07-04-2013(Sunday) at 1830 hrs(IST) on Star Sports 2 and ESPN HD

With all the hype surrounding this race for the 3rd and 4th spot in the Barclays Premier League, there are some staunch Evertonians who still give the Blues an outside chance to reach the CL spots. For even the remotest chance in this regard, David Moyes’s side will have to grab a huge win in this 6 pointer at the White Hart Lane.

Stats say that there is no better time to catch Spurs off-guard than just after a Europa League game. And to top it off, Gareth Bale, Aaron Lennon and Jermaine Defoe got injured in midweek. Everton have issues of their own in terms of absentees as main men Fellaini and Pienaar continue their 2 match bans.

Moyes’s decision to play a 3 man defence

Very few teams in the Premier League go with a 3 man defense from the onset of the game; Wigan is the only team that comes to my mind to do so consistently. But David Moyes’ call to field a back line of Heitinga, Distin and Jagielka last weekend made sense only because the opponents were Stoke.

The main characteristic that lay out was that the height advantage that the 3 men provided against Stoke’s traditional onslaught of long throw ins. Everton were also finding an extra man in defense while Stoke attacked with Peter Crouch’s ever-present flick-on’s to the wingers.

Apart from countering the towering Stoke players, Everton’s 3-5-2 was productive mainly due to Stoke’s lack of wing play. Tony Pulis’s men do not believe in the traditional overlapping fullback and cut-in wingers. Hence, Baines and Coleman as Everton’s wingbacks were not going to face an overload on their wings.

Post-match comments by pundits raved about this approach by Moyes to be a one-off thing and no one could contemplate the sight of the Blues playing a similar game against a team with strong wingers. In other words, when a team like Spurs is the opposition, the likes of Bale and Lennon coupled with Walker and Assou-Ekkotu can run riot against exposed wing backs. But unluckily for Spurs, they currently do not boast any of those players in their ranks.

With Sigurdsson and Holtby likely to replace the injured Bale and Lennon on the wings, Baines and Coleman can be given the freedom to attack again. With Adebayor upfront against a 3 man defense, Dempsey and Dembele will have to support the Togolese striker mightily. For this support exactly, Moyes has the pair of Osman and Gibson playing in a much deeper role. Gibson, who is used to much more advanced roles, had a good game against Stoke and had the highest passing stats in midfield.

Mirallas plays behind the striker, if he is fit

Despite Fellaini and Pienaar dominating Goodison hearts this season, Kevin Mirallas has had an equally brilliant season. He has been used in a wing role till now by Moyes, but the Belgian shifted to a central attacking role in the 3-5-2 against Stoke. It was from this role that he became the leading scorer at Olympiacos last season and here again he can take this role due to the lack of width from Spurs.

Mirallas will be playing just behind the strike pairing of Jelavic and Anichibe, and apart from supplementing the midfield of Osman-Gibson, he also has the role to run the channels between the full-back and centre back. This is mainly due to the manner in which Jelavic and Anichibe operate; Jelavic is responsible to hold the ball up and Anichibe tends to attack the channels. So here, Mirallas shall be providing another outlet by attacking the left-back, in this case Kyle Naughton. Reports from the Everton camp indicate Mirallas to be battling for fitness; Moyes can only hope for his Belgian’s return as his seems to be the key role to continue using this formation.

Parker and Vertonghen will hold the key for Spurs

AVB will not be having many options to tweak around with, and the Portuguese’s only hope would be get a good game from his main men: Scott Parker in midfield and Jan Vertonghen in defence. Parker’s only worry in this game is going to be Mirallas’s antics in his zone.

With Dembele and Dempsey being matched in midfield by Osman and Gibson, Parker will not get any support to hold off Mirallas. This will lead to the Englishman moving much deeper into the defense and hence encouraging Everton’s towering front men to attack even more.

Vertonghen has been AVB’s only reply to be called a 1-man team. The Belgian has been brilliant in defence and equally clinical in front of goal. Usually, Dawson is the player who meets the goal kick to the striker upfront and Vertonghen is left to clean up the 2nd ball. So, now, his defending will come under scrutiny, as he will have to deal with the direct runs of Anichibe, along with the channel-runs of Mirallas.

Gylfi and Holtby not suited for lone-man Adebayor

Having Glyfi Sigurdsson and Holtby on the wings means that there will not be a lot of crosses coming in to the centre. Anyway, with 3 central defenders, Adebayor will not be expected to meet these crosses. Sigurdsson has often been seen drifting into deeper central roles from the left, and in this case on to Leo Osman. From this position, he traces out Bale’s or Lennon’s diagonal runs (as he did against Arsenal) behind the defence. We can expect neither Adebayor nor Dempsey to make similar movement off the ball and so Gylfi’s main trait does not come into play.

In case of Holtby, he has tended to move in and out of the No.10 role with Bale, and now he would be the sole suitor there. But here he would initially have to deal with the tracking by Baines and then the fact that all of the 3 Evertonian centre backs are pretty good tacklers. Also, with Adebayor still in front of him, Holtby would look for long range efforts due to lack of the striker’s movement around a deep lying defense.

Still, this right wing seems to be Spurs’ greatest threat, with Kyle Walker also looking to overlap against Baines.

Overall, this game is Part 1 of the season deciding duet of games, with Everton travelling back to North London for their game against Arsenal as the Part-2. David Moyes has a good chance to win at least this first tie in North London and thereby, in contrast, providing Arsenal a major boost. With all the talk about Spurs wings, this game will be determined on how Scotty Parker deals with Kevin Mirallas; and more importantly whether Mirallas in fact plays or not.

I do not see Spurs scoring from any part of the field, so:

Prediction: Spurs 0 – 2 Everton

Players to watch out: Lewis Holtby, Kevin Mirallas