Does Angeball Take a Psychological Toll?

A theory about what goes wrong when it goes wrong

There’s something going on with this Spurs squad that I’ve struggled to put a finger on. I admitted as much when puzzling over the second-half collapse at Brighton; I had that same feeling after the disappointing loss at Crystal Palace; and I’ve felt it since the dispiriting loss to Ipswich.

It’s hard to explain how we could dominate Brighton so thoroughly in the first half and then spend 20 minutes of the second half self-destructing. Likewise it’s hard to explain how we could go to Palace with so little intensity while still limiting them to .78 xG, creating (and missing) two big chances, and find a way to lose 1-0. The goals we surrendered in the first half against Ipswich were so calamitous you could practically hear Yakety Sax playing in the background.

What happened in the second half at Brighton is at least somewhat explicable by appeal to data. Spurs did something we’ve done a few times this season: either tiring out or letting up on our pressing intensity for a spell that begins toward the end of the first half and continues through the middle of the second:

Wyscout

This might help explain why Brighton were able to turn things around and get their goals in a flurry when they did, but it doesn’t explain the root cause of the drop in intensity. Usually we end up doing this a little later in the second half, roughly the 55th-70th minute, which happens to coincide with when we’d surrendered the most goals to that point in the season. The graph below accounts for all the Premier League goals we’d conceded—and when we conceded them—up to and including the loss to Palace:

But if we update this graph to account for all the goals we’ve conceded in all matches to date, a new pattern emerges:

In the graph above we’re looking at not one, but two outlier periods for goals conceded: the end of the first half (mins. 31-40) and the early-middle of the second half (mins. 56-65). Though I don’t have access to the Wyscout data at the moment, my conjecture is we’ll see a measure of intensity decline (for example, PPDA increase) to match these periods of high concession (if you have access to that data or similar, let me know what you find!).

It’s Probably Not Fatigue

Listening to Postecoglou’s interviews after our losses, one word stands out: intensity. The lack of it.

One way to explain that—indeed, others have explained it this way—is fatigue. Maybe our high-intensity pressing to start matches slows down by the end of the first half. Maybe midweek European games—Thursdays before Sunday Premier League matches—create a degree of both physical and mental fatigue, even for players who don’t play in Europe, given the demands of travel.

Surely there’s something to these conjectures, but they’re not entirely satisfying. We’ve seen this Spurs squad come back from behind several times this season, even going up a gear in the second half and leaving opponents in the dust. So it doesn’t make much sense to think a squad capable of doing that is so lacking in fitness that it can’t handle 41 minutes of pressing.

We've also seen Postecoglou rotate the squad pretty heavily in European and domestic cup competitions so far, relying on a greater number of players this season than last (indeed, he has a deeper and higher quality squad to rely on).

The question this raises is what, then, accounts for the momentary dips in intensity and the cluster-periods for goal concession, if not simple fatigue?

The Beginnings of a Theory

Spurs come out in the first half with a lot of intensity on a pretty consistent basis. More often than not, Spurs generate a lot of momentum in the first 10-15 minutes of games, in terms of territorial dominance and threat. Here are the momentum maps for our losses against Palace (top; Spurs light blue) and Ipswich (bottom; Spurs navy):

Notice that in both cases, Spurs come out with territorial dominance in the first 10-15 minutes but fail to convert this into goals. Notice also that the early bouts of Spurs’ territorial dominance give way to ‘sucker punch’ moments—sharp swings of territorial pressure over to their opponents after Spurs fail to capitalize on early opportunity. The sucker punch is of course much worse when it results in a goal at, say, the 31st minute.

This happened against Brighton as well, only in the second half. Brighton scored early from a Spurs defensive error, Spurs fought back and regained territorial dominance, but couldn’t find the third goal, then Brighton poured on the pressure:

These are observations about the timing of momentum changes and goals in these games, but they don’t yet amount to explanations. The theory I’m working with so far has to do with these ‘sucker punch’ moments, which we can define as moments of sharp counteraction by opponents after periods of Spurs dominance in which Spurs fail to capitalize.

In plain terms, it’s demoralizing for players to come flying out of the traps with high pressing intensity, high turnovers, high possession, lots of chance creation or threatening territory occupied, then to come away with nothing to show for it. It’s especially demoralizing when the sucker punch is not just an abrupt turn of tides, but an abrupt goal, usually from an individual defensive lapse. Psychologically, it’s about putting so much effort into dominating a match from the start, putting yourself in the position to reap the rewards of such dominance, but then leaving the rewards on the table for your opponent to snatch.

My guess is such moments of demoralization are happening toward the end of the first half and the middle-beginning of the second half because these are the periods during which the players are trying to pick their heads up after failing to capitalize on early dominance and intensity. Halftime artificially breaks things up and throws some variance into the picture, but it’s really that middle period of games, straddling the half, in which Spurs seem shocked into a lull, dropping off in intensity and seemingly struggling to come to terms with not having the goal advantage to match the statistical advantages they’ve generated through immense effort and conviction.

The Brighton loss is a partial exception in that Spurs did capitalize brilliantly on first-half dominance, but Brighton’s second-half strike was so rapid (48th minute) and so absurd (defensive error) that it took the air out of everything Spurs had done to that point (hence only a partial exception).

The Bigger Picture Issue

This raises a bigger-picture issue, which is the ability of this young squad to cope with the psychological demands of the way they play. Commentators have framed this issue in familiar terms, as an issue of ‘leadership on the field’ or similar, and even Postecoglou has alluded to leadership problems.

But I agree with Postecoglou’s assessment, at least with the implications of his comments in press conferences: The psychological demands of the way he sets this Spurs team up to play can’t be addressed simply by having a senior, shouty player on the pitch playing the leader. It really has to come from wholesale maturation of each player in this young squad. At some point soon, I think, these players need to hit the next level both of self-belief and system-belief, and Postecoglou needs to get them there. They need to realize that the next gear is always available to them, even if they let in a calamitous goal against the run of play in the 31st minute.

In more tangible terms, Spurs need to find a way to put away more of their early chances. It’s not just the psychology of bouncing back from a sucker punch that’s at play; it’s also just avoiding that kind of adversity in the first place by reducing individual defensive errors and, perhaps more importantly, being more clinical in the final third in the first half hour of games.

Would that I could help with these issues, but understanding how to accomplish all that is above my pay grade.