Hard-Earned Points

Finally, a matchday where both of our teams got to play--and earned favorable results against tough opposition.

The Women's team played their last match before the winter break, while the Men won't be getting a break any time soon as the holiday fixtures begin in earnest. Of course, the latter were just coming off an involuntary break due to COVID cases in the camp, so they will be happy to be back in action, and luckily don't seem to have suffered too badly from illness and the pause in training, if the performance on Sunday was anything to go by.

Let's dig into the Women's match first, since they had the early kickoff.

Jessica Naz scores the game-winner in style

It was definitely a game of two halves, with Everton having the edge in the first and Spurs scoring the only goal of the match in the second for a 1-0 win.

We invited too much pressure from the visitors early in the game and Korpela was called on to make several key saves. I am genuinely starting to wonder at this point if she has become Rehanne's first choice for keeper, and the gaffer's post-match comments seemed to confirm that suspicion. We can all agree that having competition for spots is a positive in an ambitious squad like this Spurs Women team. I do hope we see Spencer again soon though, because she's such a talent. Thanks to Korpela's timely interventions, we were able to enter halftime scoreless on both sides.

I was so thrilled to see Jessica Naz finally get back on the scoresheet for the first time since September--and what a thrilling goal it was! I'm always happy to see a well-worked team goal, but a stunning individual effort like Naz's curling shot is almost more satisfying when it's much-needed. While it wasn't a bad performance from the team as a whole, we weren't creating as much as we did in the last match, so it's crucial that Naz was feeling confident enough to take her chance when it came. As Mark Thompson noted in his WSL Weekly newsletter, Jess also scored the sole goal in our previous 1-0 win this WSL season, the home match against Reading. In the last few matches, she's really been on a strong run of form that culminated in this exquisite goal, and I expect to see her continue racking up the goals and assists when the team returns to play in January.

Check out the goal below if you missed the match!

Josie Green (donning her protective face mask again), Ashleigh Neville, and Rachel Williams (who notched the assist for Naz's goal) were the other standout performers on the day, but I also want to give a shoutout to Cho So-hyun. I think this was the best I've seen her play for Spurs, and it was great to see her getting more involved in the attack. Sometimes it just takes a while for a player to get bedded in with a new team.

I have to say I have a newfound respect for Everton Women, and I'm not looking forward to the reverse fixture! But a narrow win is still a win, and we enter the winter break with a two-point advantage over Manchester United for the 3rd place spot. The teams right behind Man U all had their matches postponed, as did Chelsea and Arsenal. Cheers to Leicester City (our upcoming FA Cup opponents) for finally getting their first three points of the season in an important relegation scrap with Birmingham City.

I won't do a full preview of our next WSL match since it's so far away (in soccer fixture terms, anyway), but I will note that January is going to be a tough month for the team. We play Chelsea away first up, then have a chance for revenge against West Ham at home, and play a potential six-pointer away at Manchester United. The FA Cup match at home against Leicester wraps up the month.

Since the League Cup match at Coventry United wasn't televised/streamed I didn't do a recap for that game, but Spurs won 3-2 with a game-winner from Rachel Williams after the early lead from Esther Morgan and Angela Addison was chipped away by Conventry. Other highlights from the match included Izzy Lane's first start for Spurs (she got the assist for Morgan's goal!) and a Spurs debut for Scarlett Williams, also an Academy prospect. It's great to see the youth players getting a chance in the cup matches and making the most of their opportunities.

Speaking of cup competitions, Spurs got a pretty favorable draw for the next round of the League Cup, at home vs. Liverpool. Liverpool are top of the Women's Championship, but the only other thing I know about them is that they have one of our former Spurs players, Rianna Dean! I'm sure she'll get a great reception from the home fans at the Hive.

Happy holidays to Rehanne and all the players! I hope they have a rejuvenating break and come back in January ready to advance in the cups and clinch that Champions League qualification spot.

You've heard of draws that feel like losses...

I don't think that's quite the situation with Spurs Men's 2-2 draw at home to Liverpool, considering the opposition and the circumstances, but it wasn't far off. It was more that a win felt possible, despite the mood going into the match, and with a bit more luck Spurs could have secured all three points. A loss would have been absolutely crushing after how well the lads played. There was a lot of dodgy refereeing going on (for both teams), though, so we will certainly accept the draw. On pure entertainment factor, this was possibly the best Premier League match of the season so far.

A caveat:  I was watching the match with one of my best friends whom I hadn't seen in person since before the start of the pandemic, so I will admit that I wasn't observing with quite the same analytical focus that I normally do. But even though I was chatting happily away during the game, it was clear that the whole team put in a strong performance, with a few standout players and no glaring weak links. Royal was the only player I had any real concern about, but he had the very tough assignment of keeping Sadio Mané quiet, so a "just okay" performance is better in this case than "oh god, what is he doing?" like it could have been. Kind of like I was talking about with Cho on the Women's team, Royal is still finding his feet at Tottenham and that is understandable.

We actually had the lead after 13 minutes thanks to a goal from none other than Harry "Erstwhile" Kane. I should probably stop with the sassy jokes, because I can finally say that he genuinely had a good game. (It is about time though.) He looks like himself again. Thank. God! Kane is back, and hopefully for good. I do think he was lucky to not be sent off for his potentially red card-worthy tackle on Robertson, but to be honest, I'm not sure I'm even clear on what the rules are anymore. The same goes for handballs in the lead-up to a goal, as we saw with Salah before Liverpool's second goal. But I digress.

Liverpool were able to equalize before halftime through Diogo Jota, a seriously formidable player. I was relieved to see him subbing out later in the game. Both teams had multiple chances throughout the first half, and Lloris' superb goalkeeping was key to the eventual result, since we were unlucky in the finishing department.

In the second half, Andy Robertson pulled a Lamela and got sent off not long after he put Liverpool in the lead. Son had scored an equalizer, but we weren't able to capitalize on the nearly 20 minutes that the visitors were down a man to find a game-winning goal. It was a gift of a goal thanks to a rare error from Alisson, but congrats to Sonny for scoring on his 300th Spurs appearance.

Winks, Dele, Sessegnon, and Ndombele also deserve kudos for exceeding expectations and all being key contributors to the match. Ndombele put in an inch-perfect through ball to assist Kane's goal, Winks was involved in the lead-up to both goals, and Dele and Sessegnon both had their moments. They will, of course, have to replicate these performances a few more times before we can truly feel like they're "back," but it's a step in the right direction. I thought Winks deserved Man of the Match! The back-three trio of Dier, Davies, and Sánchez also deserves some recognition for another solid showing. Just, maybe don't let the focus slip next time there's a suspected handball, because VAR might not be coming to save the day.

Since I was honestly bracing for the worst before the match (considering that the team had barely trained and we didn't know what the squad's fitness level was like), I will take the draw with a smile. It's huge anytime we can get a result off Liverpool, home or away. But now that we've poked the bear, I'm sure the away fixture is going to be chippy and miserable.

Up next, we take on West Ham in the League Cup quarter-final. *deep breaths* At least it's a home game! Their last match was postponed, so they will be a little more rusty than Spurs, but also more rested... hmm. Hard to say who has the advantage there. Hopefully, Spurs can put the mental strain of that intense Liverpool match behind them. Before the Norwich postponement, West Ham had lost to Arsenal, drawn with Burnley, and lost to Dinamo Zagreb (yeah, them!) in the Europa League. We might be catching them at a good time.

I'm not sure if Coufal's red card suspension can be served in the League Cup (I know I've seen players miss out on FA Cup matches for red cards picked up in the PL before), so he could potentially be a miss for the Hammers. Otherwise, we should expect them to be playing their strongest team. We managed to limit them to one goal in our away loss back in September, and as long as we don't rely on Kane to defend Antonio again, I can see our defense pulling off a clean sheet. Confidence is so much higher under Conte than when we last played them. Believe!!!

I'll be back on Wednesday with a recap for that match and a preview of the Boxing Day home match against Crystal Palace.

COYS