What a shambles that was at White Hart Lane tonight.
The weekend was a comfortable and relaxing win and really overdue given the way we've made hard work of most of our games this season. It's been entertaining but how I longed for a game such as West Brom on Saturday night.
Tonight, however, well the less said about it the better. But it probably needs to be said that Diego Cavalieri, Philip Degen and Andrea Dossena have a lot to do to resuce their careers at this club. Granted it was only Cavalieri and Degen's second games for the club but both looked so shaky and almost out of their depth it was embarassing.
Dossena, meanwhile, has been unimpressive all season. Tonight showed him at his very worst. Defensively his awareness was poor and he offered nothing going forward, something we were told he was going to be excellent at.
Degen was much the same but in fairness should have had a penalty in the second half at 4-2 and seemed a bit traumatised after Spurs' keeper Gomes was stretchered off following a collision with the Swiss full back.
Ryan Babel was poor. He didn't show enough to merit a place in the starting line up that some have been calling for. Lucas was our best player, working hard in midfield throughout and playing some good balls that others in the team should have made more of.
None of the youngsters showed much beyond what we already knew about them. They're all very good at reserve team level and distinctly average when they make the step up.
This may change with more games but these are the kind of games they should be shining in. Nabil El Zhar had a few good moments but was in and out of the game. Damien Plessis did well to pull it back to 3-1 but Emiliano Insua was fairly anonymous when he came on and young Stephen Darby didn't have enough time.
David Ngog looked very off the pace and may go the way of other previous French imports unless he starts to show a bit more potential at least.
Torres was off the pace but this was no surprise. His departure at 4-1 was a smart move by Benitez. The game was lost at that stage. No point tiring him out with some big games coming up.
Overall it was shite, but it was only the Carling Cup.
There are more pressing matters ahead but it's not been a good night and there are certain players who are on the fringe of the first team that would want to buck up their ideas if they have ambitions to progress any further at this football club.
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