Sunderland 1 - 0 Spurs

With seven wins out of seven in pre-season, was it too much to expect a result against Premiership newcomers Sunderland on Saturday - the answer would seem to be yes.

OK, so let's start by rolling out a few of the more legitimate cliches, sorry, I mean excuses:

• Tottenham are having a minor injury crisis in defence
• Playing away to a newly promoted team on the opening day of the season is never easy
• Playing a team who stick 10 men behind the ball is never easy
• Sunderland ran away with the Championship so they can't be that shabby
• Roy Keane is a good manager who played the right tactics and motivated his men

Well fine. They are all reasonable excuses, yet Martin Jol seems to be of the opinion that the fault lies squarely at the feet of his multi-million pound strike force.

"I can blame the strikers and I felt they didn't work hard enough or move enough. But on the other hand the midfield should have been more creative and they weren't."

Well I'm sorry Martin, I usually don't like to knock you, but this time you leave me no choice. If we are going to field what is commonly known as our "battling" midfield (Tainio, Zokora, Jenas and Malbranque) then it follows that the strikers are not going to have the service to be effective. The buck stops with you for fielding such an unambitious team.

This midfield combo is more what we expect to see when we need to go to Stamford Bridge and get a draw, it certainly isn't what we are expecting to see away at Sunderland. We played large amounts of the game in their half and the key to unlocking a 10 man defence is creativity and flair, not dogged determination and long spells of possession around the centre circle. Both Chelsea and Arsenal won their games with goals scored as a direct result of intelligent runs from midfielders, not with the hit and hope football which I was sure was a thing of our past.

After such a great preseason it's a huge disappointment, but hold it right there - a quick look down the team sheet and perhaps we can see why. Both Taarabt and Routledge were outstanding during the closed season, scoring at will and creating plenty for our boys up front, yet what was the point in blooding them if when the nitty-gritty starts they don't even make the bench? If they are good enough to play the best teams in Africa, why not Sunderland? Surely Jol could/should have predicted the fact that we were going to dominate possession, so why field so many ball winners?

Mr. Jol may have desperately tried to snatch something by trying various combinations of his strikers - and I applaud him for finally making substitutions on the 60th minute rather than the 80th - but I can't help feeling we went there prepared for a battle and hoping to nick something, rather than going there with the express intention of tearing them to shreds.

Defensively we have injury problems - or do we? There's not much we can do about the left-back situation, and to be fair to him Stalteri did not disgrace himself. Chimbonda was ok, but gave the ball away more than he usually does and is an automatic first choice anyway. Kaboul is a man mountain and a tremendous prospect, I have no quibbles with him starting every match. Robbo got off to a good start so that just leaves...

Gardener! Why do we play Gardener when Rocha is 10 times more reliable? Bambi was at fault for their goal by way of some lacklustre marking and an inability to jump properly and proves to us time and time again that he just cannot cut it at this level. He had already got away with several dodgy moments, but predictably could not concentrate for 93 minutes and 10 seconds. Still, perhaps Dawson will be back for the Everton game.

So there you have it. Off to a shambolic start and one caused by an over cautious approach to what should have been a comfortable opening fixture. Slack passing, the wrong team selection and some panicky last minute defending has left my prediction of 9 points from the first 3 games is in tatters, but it's not the fact that we lost that is hurtful, more the feeling that I have somehow been duped by my beloved into thinking she had changed.