Spurs closed the gap to Arsenal at the top of the league to one point and moved level on points with Manchester City in second following a 2-0 win over Everton at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. As has often been the case this season, Spurs were made to work hard for the 3 points, but as I always say, there are no easy games in this league.
After Wednesday’s win over Eintracht Frankfurt, Antonio Conte made 3 changes to the starting XI, bringing in Matt Doherty, Ivan Perisic and Ben Davies for Emerson Royal, Ryan Sessegnon and Clement Lenglet, while retaining the 3-4-3 formation he has so often utilised this season.
Spurs started on the front foot, with Everton defending deep and ceding possession and territory as had been expected, and created the game’s first chance with a Harry Kane header that was inadvertently blocked by James Tarkowski.
That would be the last that the hosts would see of the Toffees’ goal for a while, however, and the visitors were unlucky not to emerge with the lead as the first half advanced, with firstly Demarai Gray and then Amadou Onana blazing promising opportunities over the bar with only Hugo Lloris to beat.
Spurs huffed and puffed but to no avail, and ultimately had nothing to show for the half bar an excellent piece of skill from Harry Kane that saw a close-range effort smothered by Jordan Pickford.
6 minutes after the restart, the game changed dramatically – Richarlison couldn’t continue after picking up a calf injury, and Yves Bissouma’s entrance at his expense saw us revert to a 3-5-2 formation that Everton couldn’t cope with.
The hosts ramped up the intensity and barely 7 minutes later, a decent but ostensibly harmless effort from Doherty was spilled by Pickford, who brought Kane down in the area as he pursued the rebound. Penalty given, and Kane allayed any fears that he’d miss a third penalty of the season by slotting in to Pickford’s right.
Spurs kept possession expertly throughout the remainder of proceedings, with Everton bearing no threat whatsoever despite the entrance of Dominic Calvert-Lewin from the bench. The hosts’ dominance was ultimately rewarded with a goal from Pierre Emile-Hojbjerg following some outstanding link-up play from Harry Kane and Rodrigo Bentancur.
A banana skin of a fixture out of the way, another three points, and our 100% home record continues. Takeaways to follow…
Easy 3 points. Comprehensive win. Good to see Bissouma on pitch. Gives others freedom.
Utterly ridiculous to give Spence 2 minutes of added time. Didn’t even touch the ball. Stupid substitutions and totally demoralising.
WW …. I don’t think the aim was to give anybody time on the pitch. It was more about wasting some time to see out the game …. a fair enough strategy.
The game was much easier than I anticipated so no complaints from me.
Our GD suggests we have scored a nice amount of goals and that we have defended well. Can’t be bad.
Spurs go rolling on!
Spurs were better in 2nd half, and jordan made a couple of great saves, so good he is ok for england WC squad, yet stopped us getting 4 goals… So 3 points were well earned, and the forecast I said on pre match thread was correct .. 🙂 COYS
I have no problem with the substitutions in the ultimate moments of the match. As Geof said, it ran down the clock by a minute, and it lets the players know that he still remembers their names.
Not an exciting match to watch, but one that competently followed the manager’s instructions. We’re still among the elite clubs in the table, and the result kept us from falling into mid-table. Mid-table is depressing. In its odd way, even a fight to avoid relegation provides more excitement than being in mid-table.
I hope that before I’m too old to notice that we have a team again that is exciting to watch.
Talking about our aging group, anyone know anything about Frank? Long time…
TK we have been waiting for spurs to win silverware since 2008…POCH had managed to get us to finals of cups and 2nd to leicester in PL 2017 and CL final v Liverpool but… the team / squad lacked that bit of top quality players and attitude / determination of wining . We are better now with a manager who knows how to win, but still one or 2 players needed, as fans and conte know.
Hopefully Jan transfer window will get the one or two players we need, and a push onto wining silverware long overdue. Conte to stay 1 year longer on his old contract..or..new contract for 2.5 yrs. especially if Levy / Joe sign a stadium name deal with Google / Amazon which gives spurs more funding for our need of top quality players mentioned COYS
block (off the old chip) 108:
I’ll sing praises to Mr. Conte if and when he brings home the silverware. Until then, he hasn’t got us playing as exciting a style as did Poch. But what the hey. We can’t always get what we want, but if we plead sometimes…
I sincerely hope your optimism turns out to be merited. May the Conte era bring us a string of championships of the merited kind. Seven PL championships, two CL championships, a sprinkling of FA Cups. and a Carabao Cup just for some comic relief from the brilliance.
In truth, I’m much happier with the situation today than I was at the end of Nuno’s abbeviated visit not all that long ago. I’m not really thrilled with the style of out play under, HeyTony, Conte, but I’ll have a huge grin on my silly face–even if it’s hidden under an N95 mask, if we win something like the PL or the CL, or the FA Cup. Something like the Thai soft drink Cup, not so much.
But to really put a thrill into me, we need to win something significant while playing in a brilliant style.
Am I too greedy? Or am I merely asking the club to maintain the standards that attracted me in the first place? Winning while thrilling!
Don’t blame me. I got it from the mouth of Danny 4 Blanchflower. He’s to blame, not me. lol.