When Harry Kane spoke in his post match presser, he described West Brom as ‘defending for their lives’ and here we see evidence that fully supports that. Tottenham were reduced to predominantly low grade attempts from distance, rather than higher quality efforts from closer to the goal.
Spurs had 16 attempts on goal, 5 of which were accurate, opposed to the Baggies’ 11 attempts of which just 2 were on target. When we turn these numbers into percentages, Tottenham were nearly TWICE as likely to score than West Brom with 31.25% versus 18.18%.
On too many occasions, José boys found getting through the final third virtually impossible. If we look at positional attacks that resulted in shots, Tottenham were twice as successful.
Whereas, if we look at West Brom’s positional attacks that resulted in shots, they were nearly as productive, but the quality wasn’t there and/we defended more successfully, 23.08%.
To provide context, if we find a game that Spurs ‘walked’, then when we beat Manchester United 6:1, our positional attacks that resulted in shots’ percentage was 46.15%
Here’s the real clincher; Spurs produced 2 shots on the counter, whereas West Brom failed to get a single shot away.
In summary, West Brom did defend for their lives, and this is why Spurs took 88 minutes to find a solution. West Brom were tougher to break down than Man United.
Instead of some fans moaning about what a torturous watch the game was, I suggest these ingrates get on to Interflora and send Mourinho a big bunch of flowers with a note of gratitude attached!