Spurs aren’t notoriously fast starters under Ange Postecoglou and often are struggling to score, despite creating some fantastic chances to do so in first half’s. It is usually the opposition who go 1-0 up from a counter attack and often it stays 1-0 at HT. Tottenham then sometimes turn to the bench and the substitutes change the game to turn the loss into a win, and other times Ange Postecoglou’s team talk alone does the trick. With the way Tottenham play their football, it is hard for the opponents to keep up with chasing after Tottenham pass the ball around looking for openings and eventually opponents tire which is partly why Tottenham are prolific from the 70th minute mark and have scored many late goals – especially at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. The Luton game followed the same pattern that the Brighton, Sheffield United and Crystal Palace games did where Tottenham went 1-0 down and scored late goals to save the day.
Son was the hero at the weekend, against Sheffield United it was Kulusevski, Brighton it was Brennan Johnson and Crystal Palace it was also Son. It makes games exciting but also nervewracking, and it certainly shows good character.
It makes you question why Tottenham start slowly and are unable to find a goal. Part of it is being unlucky, like the weekend where Werner’s shot was a fraction wide and then Son’s effort hit both posts and Sarr’s rebounded shot was blocked on the line, but sometimes we just aren’t good enough in the first half and then in the second half it’s like something has clicked and the missing piece of the Ange ball jigsaw has been solved.
But when you don’t start the second half strongly, it leads to an embarrassing defeat as we saw at Fulham, so you cannot always rely on second half supremacy, especially away from home where you have given the home fans optimism of getting a positive result against us.
Kulusevski is a good creator, but him being slow on the ball at times, and coming inside too often hurts the system as Ange wants his wingers to stay wide. Brennan Johnson is more of an Ange like winger, which is no surprise given the Australian’s heavy desire to sign the Welshman. Kulusevski could move into a number 10 role alongside Maddison; but this has not been tried yet and could be seen as risky. If if was down to me I think a few games on the bench for Kulusevski could be a reset for him and we should play Werner and Johnson on the wings as both players will stay wide and enable us to create more chances from those positions, with no one potentially getting in the way of central men James Maddison and Heung-Min Son.
This is an example of how we could work going forward at this current time to ensure fast starts, and to try and limit games where we unnecessarily go a goal behind to have to stage a comeback.