Tottenham Hotspur were looking to move on quickly from defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers in the final clash of 2018, and we made the trip to Wales to face notorious clogger Neil Warnock’s Cardiff City side as we opened up the 2019 portion of the season.
With most fans hoping that Wolves was simply a blip and that given the injuries we have, it was a case of one game too far given our sterling form in previous matches and our winning streak, Spurs pretty much proved that as we strolled to a comfortable 3-0 victory on the day.
Harry Kane, Christian Eriksen and Son Heung-Min gave us a three goal advantage within the opening 26 minutes of the tie and then it was largely time to put our feet up and relax as Cardiff hardly troubled us for the rest of the game.
Speaking to the BBC following the game, manager Mauricio Pochettino said of the 90 minutes.
“We felt disappointed and we wanted to show our energy from the beginning. After 20 minutes we showed how we wanted to play and were clinical. We suffered with four games in 10 days. I want to congratulate the players. I’m so pleased with the effort. Today we showed great energy and maturity that we want. Now we need to keep that level and consistency throughout the season if we want to be there and fight for big things. It’s a crazy fixture list – it’s normal that in some games we can drop our mental energy. We were so relaxed and kept calm, it was so important. We showed Wolves was just an accident. The most important thing is to find a way to be consistent if we want to be a contender. We need to believe more in us. We are in a process of doing fantastic things.”
🗨️ Mauricio: "We need to understand that in 10 days we've played four games, of course we need to be very happy and pleased with the effort from the players and staff." #COYS pic.twitter.com/nbMOexwGnj
— Tottenham Hotspur (@SpursOfficial) January 1, 2019