The things £8million can get you (first blogpost!)

Sometimes, all you can do is wonder. After six matches, four goals and one assist, Rafael van der Vaart has played himself into the hearts of Tottenham supporters. Being dubbed as “the best buy since Gazza” on various forums, the dutch playmaker has set himself up for a terrific season at Spurs. If he keeps free of injury, hitting 20 goals would not surprise anyone after seeing his current form.

So why is Rafa doing so well at Spurs? One may argue that he, as a world-class player, should settle immediately in every team in the Premier League, but it is rare to see a player dominating that much after a few weeks in his new club. By the looks of it, he's found his most effective role already, playing just behind Peter Crouch, supported by Modric and Huddlestone or Jenas from midfield. This allows him to roam, link-up (sorely needed as Spurs' strikers are generally poor at this), and doing what makes him so effective, namely:

Getting into positions
Crouch has been somewhat unconvincing in some of his games this season, and hasn’t scored since his hattrick against Young Boys. What he has done, however, is striking a partnership with Tottenham’s no. 11. Crouchy’s knock downs have resulted in a total of 4 van der Vaart finishes, three of them hitting the back of the net.

The Englishman’s standard move is to get himself in position at the far post before crosses. This was exploited one time by Robbie Keane last season against Sunderland, but with VdV it seems as if Spurs has finally got a player that gets into the right areas for Crouch’s knock downs.

Here’s a picture of the lead up to the first goal v. Villa:

As he’s already inside the box, VdV continues his run to the back post, smart as Friedel would have caught an eventual knock down right in front of goal.

Two pictures this time: VdV misses the target after an excellent header by Crouch

1: VdV has just offered support for Lennon, who decides to cross instead of playing him.

2: Crouchy knocks it down into VdV’s path, but great work by Stilian Petrov to close him down leads to van der Vaart missing the target.

Quality strikes again 

The last goal can be seen here (about 9.00-9.40).

Here, VdV drops deep to link up play with Jenas, then gets it back from Bale, runs into position. Lennon gets the ball, crosses for Crouch at the far post, knocks it down and great dummy by van der Vaart to set up the volley.

If he can continue this link-up with the midfield and Crouch, van der Vaart could be the player Spurs have longed for since Berbatov’s departure. With wide-players such as Gareth Bale, Aaron Lennon, Hutton and Assou-Ekotto, we might see this combination several times in the coming weeks.