2014

Tottenham v Newcastle Player Positional Tracker

By Antonio | October 26, 2014
2014

Tottenham v Newcastle Player Positional Tracker

Tottenham 1 vs 2 Newcastle Newcastle upset the odds with a come from behind win at White Hart Lane on Sunday afternoon. Here is our visualisation that shows the smoothed positions of players around the time as indicated. The locations are identified with reference to actions as identified by Opta. Comments from Zubair Arshad appear below the PPT: TOTvNUFC  

  • This was a real "game of two halves".
  • Main comment for Spurs was their narrowness of Chadli/Lamela occupying the same space as Eriksen, therefore making it a bit easier for Newcastle to defend. This can be seen in the PPT. Lennon was introduced in the 75th minute to address this but Pardew reacted by bringing on Haidara to play in front of Dummett on the left.
  • Newcastle struggle to establish any dominance in the game (especially in first half) without Tiote. Anita is the furthest possible replacement for Tiote that we have. He received 4 passes and made 4 passes in the first half therefore no surprise to see his "dot" very erratic and small. It was difficult to pinpoint NUFC's structure (mainly because they barely had one), with Sissoko and Colback high up the pitch to try and support Perez but NUFC overall had very little possession in the first half. (21%).
  • The second half was a different story. Clearly the Ameobi goal changed the game, but there was a lot more structure to Newcastle's midfield. Cabella, Ameobi and Gouffran interchanged between the lines and flanks, with Sissoko and Colback sitting a little deeper frustrating Tottenham in the middle of the pitch.