Tottenham Hotspur must brush up the crushing disappointment of yesterday’s 4-1 defeat to Leicester at the King Power Stadium in time for Tuesday night, where they take on A.C. Milan in the first leg of a last-16 Champions League tie at the San Siro, with the match live on BT Sport and kicking off at 8 pm BST.
Prior to yesterday’s mauling from the Foxes, Spurs had been enjoying a stable run of defensive consistency, sith three consecutive wins and three consecutive clean sheets, but the King Power defeat sent the Lilywhites back down to earth and Spurs’ task against the Italian giants has been made all the more difficult with several injury blows sustained over the course of the week.
Of course, we knew before the Leicester match that Hugo Lloris and Yves Bissouma would both be facing a given spell on the sidelines with respective knee and ankle injuries, with the latter requiring surgery.
However, Rodrigo Bentancur was withdrawn around the hour mark yesterday and we will find out the full extent of his injury in Antonio Conte’s press conference tomorrow, but he is expected to miss out. With Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg suspended due to an accumulation of yellow cards in the group stages, Spurs’ midfield options for the match are reduced to Oliver Skipp and Pape Sarr.
The news this morning that Ryan Sessegnon faces a spell on the sidelines has restricted Spurs’ options even further, but at least the backline is boosted with Cristian Romero’s return to the side, with his domestic suspension expiring and not even applicable to the Champions League to begin with.
AC Milan are in a bad way themselves, having lost three consecutive Serie A matches prior to a 1-0 win over Torino this weekend. They also face the prospect of being without influential trio Mike Maignan, FIkayo Tomori, and Ismael Bennacer, with Zlatan Ibrahimovic already not in their squad.
Yesterday’s display and the injury news that has been getting worse all week will not fill the travelling contingent with much optimism, but AC Milan are in a vulnerable position to be exploited themselves. The Lilywhites must not feel sorry for themselves and approach the game in the manner that they approached City last week, and put yesterday’s travesty behind them with an aggressive display here. We have the tools to hurt Milan, and with Romero back in the side, here’s hoping we avoid a repeat of yesterday’s defensive shambles.
Probable XI: Forster, Porro, Romero, Dier, Davies, Perisic; Sarr, Skipp; Kulusevski, Kane, Son.
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