As these words at typed Heurelho Gomes has just stuck out a telescopic arm to palm away Charlie Adam’s angled drive. Tottenham’s clean sheet preserved – for now.
If Spurs can keep Ian Holloway’s Seaside cavaliers at bay they’ll earn Fantasy investors in Gomes and Michael Dawson something rather special. A clean sheet, on day in which ten sides failed to deliver a single defensive gain, would be a precious commodity; a glittering prize for those who gobbled up Tottenham’s double gameweek bait.
We’ve rattled on for weeks on how defensive investment is being shaped by the potential of attacking returns. It’s the reason why the likes of Gary Cahill and Aleksandar Kolarov find their way in the Scout Picks; it’s even led to the endorsement of a Wolves defender. Things really are that bad.
Today saw both Cahill and Kolarov do little to justify the hype we’ve lavished on them. However, the fact remains that these defenders do offer attacking potential – they do have efforts on goal, they do provide creativity from open play and set-pieces. While they, along with every other defender today, returned zero points from their defensive efforts – they did at least get closer than most to rectifying things at the opposite end.
None of us can be comfortable with the situation – I for one hanker for the days when selecting a Chelsea, United and Liverpool defender took care of matters. The days when John Terry, Rio Nemanja Vidic and Jamie Carragher justified the outlay and left us to ponder tinkering our attacking assets. If today’s script is anything to go by, United and Chelsea will remind us again that those days are long gone when they collide at Old Trafford tomorrow.
This season we could almost taste the excitement generated by an out-of-position prospect – we’ve even seen the unproven talents of Seamus Coleman and Elmohamady create bandwagons of some significance. It’s a worrying trend, as Fantasy Managers are forced to hunt down goals and assists from dubious sources. A dirty business for dirty times.
