Only Tottenham Hotspur could win 5 games in a row and be 2-0 up on the day and still manage to ruin the feel good factor from those matches and performances going into the International Break. It was an embarrassing collapse on the South Coast in Brighton as Spurs went on to lose 3-2 featuring some horror defending.
Starting with the positive first half, we started well and showed intent within the opening minute as Dominic Solanke found Timo Werner brilliantly with a through ball but the cross from Werner was too far ahead of the in form Brennan Johnson where it should have been a goal, but it was an opening positive sign. As Spurs continued to dominate, James Maddison won the ball back and passed to Solanke who slotted in Johnson who struck clinically first time into the bottom left corner. It got better for Spurs as Maddison’s curling shot went underneath Verbruggen to make it 2-0. The darts celebration came out and things were looking good at half time with the Brighton threat kept to a bare minimum.
Straight from kick off in the second half the tide switched, and Brighton scored inside the first 3 minutes as Pedro Porro got beaten by Mitoma too easily and the cross from the Japanese winger fell to Minteh after Van De Ven slided in to block the cross without making contact leaving Udogie alone to defend the situation and the ball deflected off Destiny Udogie and fell to Minteh to strike home clinically. The calamitous defending got no better as Cristian Romero stepped up ineffectively and got done by a Brighton attacker before Rutter turned Micky Van De Ven and clinically dispatched past Vicario, who was the only blameless defensive player on the day.
Udogie’s positioning was poor in the build up and Bentancur was sloppy in the way he tried to see out the ball for the Brighton 3rd goal. Rutter accepted the invite to attack the ball in the box and made a brilliant sliding cross attempt aimed at Danny Welbeck who was marked by Cristian Romero in an earlier phase of play. Somehow Welbeck got away from Romero and had a free header from close range to win the game. It was awful defending from Romero who did not check over his shoulders to see where Welbeck was and looked more invested in the Bentancur and Rutter battle in the build up.
The leaders disappeared on the day and did not step up when required and when the younger players needed them to guide them, and the silence on social media from all players apart from James Maddison is telling. The minute we conceded 1 we needed Romero, Bentancur and Maddison etc to take the game by the scruff of the neck and they unfortunately did not.
Ange Postecoglou is not blameless either. He kept trying to play the same way despite the clear change in the game that Brighton showed, and despite the scoreline changing from 2-0 upto 2-1 to 2-2 to 3-2 Brighton, Ange still took ages to make a sub before calling on Yves Bissouma and Pape Matar Sarr. Mikey Moore got the last 5 minutes or so. I think Djed Spence should have come on as Destiny Udogie had a bad game, and Radu Dragusin for Romero who also had a poor game. There would have been no harm in bringing on Bissouma or Moore earlier.
International break now but that result will stew for the next 2 weeks but we need a reaction against West Ham in 11 days time. COYS