Curse of the Missed Red Card

Okay, this issue is a wee bit delayed, but at least we didn't have any midweek games to deal with. On the plus side, I got to watch the second half of the Men's U18's cup final earlier today, so I'll have a mini recap of that, too.

In this issue:  Brighton recap | Liverpool recap | U18 Premier League Cup final recap | Previewing the weekend matches

First up, the Women's team had a significant match against Brighton at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

Tottenham 2 - 2 Brighton

Not only was this game the complete opposite of the reverse fixture (an 0-8 blowout of Brighton at their home ground), it was only the second draw of the season for Spurs so far—and it couldn't have come at a worse time. We could have breathed easier in the relegation scrap with a full three points, but instead, the balance at the bottom of the table remains precarious.

However, Spurs had to make two comebacks even to secure a point, so I suppose we should take some encouragement from that resilience shown.

A few lineup notes:  Ash Neville was sent back to defense as Asmita Ale was benched (don't even get me started), and Rosella Ayane came into the starting XI to replace Ash at wingback. Becky Spencer got her third start in a row in goal. It was a little puzzling to see interim manager Vicky Jepson make a couple of tweaks to the lineup that drew (and nearly beat) a much more difficult opponent in Aston Villa. Ideally, we would have liked to see consistency with the lineup to try to build some actual form, which has been nonexistent this season.  

Brighton scored first in just the 10th minute, as Katie Robinson got past Kerys Harrop to cross a dangerous ball into the box for Elisabeth Terland, who saw her first attempt saved by Spencer but claimed the rebound and found the back of the net on the second try. Fortunately, Spurs responded just two minutes later with a goal by—who else—Beth England. Eveliina Summanen flicked on Harrop's corner kick to assist England's headed equalizer.

In the second half, Brighton's Lee Geum-min made an instant impact in two key moments. The first was a potential red card foul when she struck out at Summanen with her elbow. Then just a few minutes later in the 65th, Lee scored from another Robinson assist. She had way too much space outside the box in which to shoot. It does always seem to work that way—that a player who should have been sent off goes on to score a crucial goal. Spoiler:  it happened in the Men's game too.

Spurs were able to equalize once again to rescue a point. From our defensive third, Angharad James sent an incisive through ball to Kit Graham (a 59th-minute substitution for Drew Spence) at the halfway line, who quickly sent the ball through Brighton's high defensive line for England to run onto. She timed her run perfectly to stay onside and complete her brace in the 78th minute. Significantly, this marked Graham's first goal contribution since returning from her ACL injury. She's definitely made an argument to get her first start of the season in the upcoming match against Manchester United.

Despite not getting on the score sheet, Celin Bizet had a very strong game. It's becoming clearer and clearer every week why she continues to be one of the first names on the team sheet, seeming to create a chance or take one of her own on almost every play forward. It's helpful to remember that she's just 21 years old.

We also saw encouraging signs from Jess Naz, who has struggled with injuries this season but could play an important role in the final stretch.

But the happiest sight of the match was Ria Percival's long-awaited return from her own ACL recovery. It was a bit of a surprise to see her get minutes (albeit only eight) in her first game back in the matchday squad, but at the same time, it's not that surprising if you're familiar with Percival's work rate. If she is able to feature in a meaningful way in the last three games of the season—and is playing at the level we're used to from the Kiwi—she instantly improves Spurs' control of the midfield. We know she works well in partnership with Graham as well, unlocking her teammate to focus on playmaking while she locks things down on the defensive end. She's also capable of sending in an inch-perfect through ball of her own. I think it's fair to put so much hype and expectation on a player who was a key performer for the team in last year's 5th-place finishing team, but it remains to be seen whether or not her current fitness level would actually support such a high level of involvement in the last three matches. I can dream!  

With the draw, Spurs are three points ahead of the drop with a superior goal difference to 12th-place Reading, who lost on the weekend to Manchester City. Theoretically, we should survive since Reading have the more difficult remaining schedule—including a direct matchup with Spurs in a game that has been rumored to be played at the main stadium, though there's still no confirmation on that change of ground.

The two teams between us (Brighton and Leicester) both have a game in hand but don't have much easier remaining fixtures than Reading. It could truly go any way.

One final note about the Brighton match:  sticking with the same (non)promotion strategy for the Spurs Women games at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium is not working, and it's time to try something new. The club has avoided acknowledging the relegation fight Spurs Women are in at the cost of helping fans who do attend the games to understand the stakes of the football they're about to watch. Being upfront about the need to show some fight could galvanize the fanbase to turn up in better numbers to show some much-needed support to the team and be more engaged in the stands. Sadly, there's only one home game left this season, and whether it takes place at THS or Brisbane Road could be a moot point if it's not promoted properly.

Then on Sunday, the Men's team came close to pulling off a second draw in a row under interim manager Ryan Mason but were cruelly thwarted in the dying moments.

Liverpool 4 - 3 Tottenham

I guess we should have seen the close scoreline coming, if not the abundance of goals for both teams. In this season and last season, all fixtures between Spurs and Liverpool have ended in either a draw or a one-goal margin result in Liverpool's favor. In fact, there hasn't been a result between the two sides with larger than a two-goal margin until you get back to Spurs' last win in the matchup, a 4-1 home win in 2017.

And in many ways, this game followed the usual script. Liverpool got off to an early lead—okay, perhaps a much bigger lead than we've been used to in recent years. This was the third game in a row where we conceded a goal within the first seven minutes, and this time it was two goals, to Curtis Jones and Luis Díaz in the 3rd and 5th minutes respectively. I could describe those conceded goals, but I would sound like a broken record. Suffice it to say that nobody playing for Spurs came out of those goal concessions with any credit. And then for some fresh pain, Cristian Romero gave up a penalty, which Mo Salah converted in the 15th minute.

I think we were all having flashbacks to the early capitulation at Newcastle just a week prior and dreading just how much worse the situation could get. I personally was feeling disappointed that the fight shown in the comeback draw against Manchester United midweek seemed to have evaporated already. This wasn't supposed to happen to Ryan Mason's plucky lilywhite army!

Of course, it's always the hope that kills you, and we got a renewed dose of hope when Harry Kane got a goal back in the 40th minute. Oliver Skipp found Ivan Perišić on the left wing with a laser of a pass, who made a complete fool of Virgil Van Dijk as he cut back to pass into Kane's incoming path. Kane hit the ball with a flawless volley into the net. The finish was his 208th goal in the Premier League, tying Wayne Rooney for second-most in the PL all-time. As someone who first started watching the PL in Rooney's heyday, this felt like a staggering stat to me. We get to watch this guy play football every week, y'all, and he's one of the greatest of all time! Whether you think he's likely to leave the club in the summer or not, we need to be appreciating him in these special moments regardless.

We could have cut the deficit to one goal just a minute later when Dejan Kulusevski surged forward and chose to shoot instead of making the more favorable pass to Kane. Still, we went into halftime feeling at least a glimmer of possibility that we could get something out of the game, if only a draw.

The second half involved several frustrating blocked Spurs shots, not by Liverpool's defenders but by the goalposts. Son and Romero both fell prey to the curse. The two then combined for Spurs' second goal in the 77th minute. Son had cleverly doubled back momentarily to check his initial run and remain onside for Romero's central pass. Son made no mistake with his shot past Alisson and immediately ran to retrieve the ball from the net. The comeback was firmly on.

In the 80th minute, Diogo Jota (who had subbed on in the 63rd minute) kicked Skipp in the head with a dangerously high boot as Skipp went in for a header. Unbelievably, neither Paul Tierney nor the VAR official deemed it a red card offense, so Jota stayed in the game. Skipp was forced off with his injury. My immediate concern was how Mason would handle this situation, since it can't have been easy for him to see a reckless play like that go unpunished, considering his personal history of head injury. It's kind of galling that despite all the apologies the PGMOL (the body responsible for refereeing games in English professional football) has been handing out lately, Spurs didn't receive one for this miscarriage of justice—let alone a personal apology to Mason, which would have been appropriate in my opinion.  

Another foul flashpoint (in addition to the one that left Ben Davies bleeding just as badly as Skipp) occurred ten minutes later when James Milner, also freshly subbed on, put in a rough challenge on Kane to award Spurs a free kick. Son took the set piece with a kick into the box, and Richarlison rose highest after a sneaky run to head the ball into Liverpool's net for his first PL goal with Spurs. Seeing as he's a former Everton player, I was amazed that he went to celebrate with the Spurs away fans first before, naturally, taunting the Liverpool home fans with a shushing finger. His pigeon dance celebration with Son was even more delightful! Now if we could just get him to stop taking his shirt off after every goal and getting the de facto yellow card booking—at least the goal counted this time, finally.

We went from the delirium of the 93rd-minute equalizer to the heartbreak of conceding a winner to Liverpool in the 94th. This is the part where I have to admit a little part of my soul died when Ryan Mason subbed on Lucas Moura just before stoppage time. And sure enough, his inclusion in the match came back to bite us. In an absolute horror error the likes of which are rarely seen, his too-forceful back pass sent the ball directly into Jota's path for an easy finish. Eric Dier tried to put in a last-ditch tackle on Jota's shot but was unsuccessful. The camera caught Richarlison literally laughing in disbelief as his heroic effort was undone instantly. You have to laugh in order not to cry, as they say. And I definitely wanted to cry, because Jota should never have been on the pitch at that point in the first place. It's maddening to have that egregious decision not to send him off earlier in the match compounded by him scoring the game-winner.

Now, I have a theory about this goal. This issue is already delayed, so I'm not going to go so in-depth with my research as to look up actual past lineups for the Brazilian national team, but I did confirm that Lucas and Alisson's time playing for their national team overlapped for a few years. Did they play together often? Again, I'm not that invested in looking it up. But if they did, it would perhaps explain the uncanny seamlessness with which Lucas received the long pass from Alisson (I say pass because the way Lucas handled the ball did not look anything like intercepting a ball from an opponent, but rather receiving a pass from a teammate) and moved the ball swiftly along into Spurs' defensive third. Romero, being Argentinian, was not on the same page of course, and failed to meet the ball—only for Jota to swoop in and score.

If I was a true conspiracy theorist I would say this was overt sabotage from Lucas, who does seem to be on a one-man mission to do as much sporting damage to his own club as possible over the last two seasons. Instead, I will just resent him more than I already did, Ajax be damned. He seriously cannot play another minute for Spurs, and if he does, my appreciation of Ryan Mason will be seriously strained. Honestly, it's almost impressive how quickly Lucas has tarnished his legacy at Spurs, but he's had help from all the managers that continue to play him despite the evidence that his form has fallen off a cliff. I will never understand the insistence to give him minutes when there are other players more deserving of a chance to play.

I could have handled this being another draw of many in the history of this fixture, especially since it required a spirited comeback from the team. But to have lost it at the last moment in such unfortunate circumstances was quite crushing.

It's hard not to feel like we are doomed to continue dropping points unless we can pile on the goals, because the defense is simply not good enough to get the job done on that end of the pitch. And it is what is; there won't be fresh reinforcements until next season. Until then, we just have to hope the attack keeps firing like it has been and the mentality of the squad stays positive enough to allow for any needed comebacks.

I would like to point out a few more positives from the match to wrap things up:

• Son registered a goal and an assist—can we officially say he's back now? I think so. It doesn't feel like a coincidence that he's really hit his stride in the last two games under Mason's more permissive, fluid tactics.
• Richarlison broke his curse of always being offside (or having a teammate offside in the buildup) for all of his previous PL goal attempts that were chalked off. If he can add a few more to his tally before the end of the campaign, I will consider it a good sign ahead of next season.
• Besides the ill-fated Lucas sub, Mason has continued to make smart and timely substitutions in his second interim management stint. Now if he could just get the starting lineup to actually start playing from kickoff and not 20-30 minutes into the game...

At least we got one Spurs win this week, in the form of a Premier League Cup final victory for the Men's U18s.

Aston Villa 1 - 3 Tottenham

As alluded to earlier, I missed the first half of the game but did see the highlights at halftime. Spurs had equalized shortly before the break after Jamie Donley's initial pass into the 18-yard box was cleaned up by Rio Kyerematen.

Donley scored himself about fifteen minutes into the second half, but the bulk of the effort for the goal came from Alfie Dorrington. The center-back made a smart interception in Spurs own defensive box and carried the ball the length of the pitch before calmly passing to Donley arriving at the edge of Aston Villa's box from the right. Donley took two slight touches to the left to get a clear view of goal past the Villa defender and struck very cleanly into the right corner of the net. Just five minutes later, George Abbott got free on the left after receiving a quick pass out of traffic and crossed the ball over the box to give Donley got another chance to score, but he whiffed his shot. Kyerematen once again capitalized on the loose ball to score his second of the game and the final goal for Spurs, a cheeky chip that ricocheted off the left post into the net.

Although goalkeeper (and captain) Luca Gunter had to make a few key saves, Spurs controlled the second half overall and were deserved winners. I don't get to watch the Academy teams very often, but I was glad to get this glimpse of some of the talent coming up through the youth pathway. Donley and Kyerematen especially stood out.

Plus, it was delightful to see Jermain Jones jumping around in celebration with the team after the final whistle.

Congrats to the kids! I wouldn't be surprised to see a few of them feature on the bench for the senior team next season if we do end up in the Europa Conference League.

A London derby and an all-but derby

The Men's team plays first this weekend, a home match against lesser London rivals Crystal Palace (no offense to the Eagles). There's not too much to speculate about heading into this match, lineup-wise, though I would suspect Pape Sarr will have to start in place of Oliver Skipp. Sarr played well for about 25 minutes as a substitute in the Liverpool game, so I have no doubt he'll be ready to start this game. Otherwise, we just have to hope the team can limit the defensive mistakes and keep the goals coming.

There's a lot of debate amongst the fanbase about whether it's better to finish in a European spot (almost certainly either the Europa League or the Conference League now, since Champions League qualification is all but mathematically out of reach) or miss out on European competition entirely so as to better focus on the league and domestic cups. I can see the advantages of both. For the former, it's a chance to give youth players an opportunity to play senior football in the group stages; for the latter, it gives the future manager more available training days in which to get his methods and tactics across to the squad. But personally, I can never actively root for Spurs to lose games, so I am content with hoping we finish the season as strongly as we can and will accept whatever table outcome that leaves us with. We can make lemonade out of whatever lemons we're given. Plus, I don't want Ryan Mason's reputation as a manager to suffer by way of the team actively "tanking," though I'm not sure that US sports term really applies here.

As for the Women's team, their match on Sunday away at Manchester United is somewhat of a free hit, in that we aren't realistically expected to gain any points from it—but it would be glorious if we could. And I don't just say that because of how valuable any and all points are for us during this stressful relegation fight, but also because it would be sweet to get a bit of revenge after how the reverse fixture went down at THS. Imagine the scenes if Eveliina Summanen scored a game-winning goal and celebrated by hiding her face. WSL Twitter would absolutely combust!

It would appear that the elusive Ramona Petzelberger is finally going to be back in the matchday squad for this game, so it will be interesting to see if she gets any playing time. I mentioned previously that I would love to see Kit Graham start and for Ria Percival to get as many minutes as possible. And please, for the love of god, get Ash Neville back in the attack! Whether that means starting Asmita Ale in place of Neville in a back four or coming into a back-3 in place of Kerys Harrop or Amy Turner, I don't care, but it needs to happen. Our attack is so much more deadly with Ash heavily involved.

We've proven more effective in games against the "top 4" when we actually attempt to put our stamp on the game and don't just bunker in, so I hope we see some attacking intent from the get-go. But we will need a strong performance from the defense as well to get anything out of this game; United are still firmly in the title race and will be aiming to win by any means possible.

Here's hoping for a better referee performance than in the reverse fixture, too.

COYS

Thank you for reading!

If you’re enjoying the newsletter, make sure to sign up for a free subscription to receive new issues in your inbox, or upgrade to a paid membership to unlock additional bonus content every month. You can also buy me a Ko-fi for a one-time tip. Your support keeps Spurs Across the Pond running and is much appreciated.

You can also find me on Twitter and podcasting at N17 Women and The Tottenham Depot.