Tottenham had to be at their very best when they hosted the impressive Leicester City in the Premier League this afternoon and they were.
Jose Mourinho’s men entered this game knowing that anything less than a win would basically curtail their Europa League ambitions and that nothing short of a disciplined performance would do.
Coming into this game, the special one knew that his players would be up against a very good team even though Brendan Rodgers’ team has been decimated by injuries and he deployed a tactic that he believed would work against the Foxes.
Tottenham won 3-0 and it was a thoroughly deserved win.
After the game, he revealed that his team knew what would work for them and that if they can be quick on the counter, they would cause their visitors problems and they did just that to perfection.
He also hailed Hugo Lloris who made several saves to keep a clean sheet.
Speaking after the game Mourinho said as quoted by the BBC: “I think we were strategically good. We knew what worked for us. Brendan Rodgers did an amazing job since he arrived but in this moment he is in a little bit of trouble with injuries. I know what it is because I had similar problems at the other end.
“He is trying to compensate with the people he lost so we knew that in transition we could win the game. We tried to be very fast after recovering the ball. We did that very well in the first half and in the second half it was about being compact and getting the result.
“You always need your goalkeeper to make a couple of important saves which he did but we were phenomenal. They had a lot of corners and we defended well. I felt very comfortable in the game.”
That win is an important one in Spurs’ bid to end this season inside the Europa League places, they will now hope that other results go their way while they try to win their last game of the season against Crystal Palace.
There is a permutation that does see Spurs miss out on a Europa League spot even if they beat Palace but on balance, they are in a very good position at this moment in time.
Mourinho got his tactics perfect against Arsenal and Newcastle United and he did it again today. Things are starting to look very good.
Yup.
I make you right on that. Ive resigned myself to the fact it doesn’t matter who manages the squad with ENIC at the helm we ain’t ever winning anything.
Unless the manager is backed we won’t win anything of note. Poch wasn’t perfect and many times we lost games from winning positions.
However, Liverpool play on the front foot and win because they now have the players to do it because they’re owners investments in the team. This never happened to us. A tactical switch just ain’t gonna be enough…
It’s ok when required but I’ve yet to see us play any other way under him, that’s my point.
I wonder what those stats look like broken down over 2 halves? We were 3-0 up at half time and it seems to me that Mourinhos instructions during the break were ‘win 3-0, not 4-0 and not 3-1’. 45 minutes of shutting up shop may strike some as boring but defending as a team like this is good practice for when it matters.
Was thinking the same. A full stadium watching low block counter attacking football? At times yesterday it was like Manchester City were the visitors. Still it’s 13 points out of 15 so who can argue.
I think it will be a easy game🌚
Looking at their stats we’d be fuming had they been ours and we’d lost by the same margin.
The manager it seems is dammed if he does dammed if he doesn’t.
I got sick of the amount of times under Poch we had those stats and lost. Prime example of that was the game we had against them at home when they did us 1 0 in the 88th minute the year they won the Prem.
ENIC OUT !
Mad dog biesla gonna tear up the premiere league.
Pleased we won, the more of these wins will give credence to the idea that a defensive manager should be tolerated at Spurs. If we win loads of stuff playing like this then you can’t argue with it, but will we?
It seems playing boring is getting through to the players now. 29% possession of the ball at home? Good job no f*cker was in the stadium!
Palace game will be a tactical battle. Palace sit in are very compact and don’t give you space in behind them and are happy to give up possession of the ball so it will be interesting to see how Jose counters them.
🎼special Jose’s blue & white army. 🌚