With a comfortable 3-0 victory in the first leg of the Round of 16 Champions League tie against Borussia Dortmund, Tottenham Hotspur knew the Bundesliga side would come out strongly in Tuesday evening’s second leg at the Signal Iduna Park as they looked to salvage some pride.
The German side did just that and dominated the telling statistics on the day, but a gritty, organised and determined showing from Spurs saw us get our reward with the clean sheet, and Harry Kane made it worse for them early on in the second half to ensure we took a 1-0 victory and sent ourselves through to the next round with a 4-0 aggregate scoreline.
Speaking to Sky Sports following the fulltime whistle, Christian Eriksen described the performance and victory as a ‘good first step’ for the club as we continue to seek further improvements in the 2018/19 campaign and for him, it showed that Spurs have ‘come a long way’ in recent years.
“We take one game at a time. We are through to the next round. We have had our experience from the last few games and the last few years in the Champions League and now we are this far. We have come a long way and we have done very well to stay consistent. Now we are further than last year so it is a good first step and I hope we go further.”
Spurs are of course through to the quarterfinals of the competition for the first time since 2011 and whilst some in the fanbase are frustrated with the recent back to back losses that ended hopes of a Premier League title run this year, this achievement should go some way to offset that.
Can we go further now? We’ll find out soon enough.