Suffering Setbacks

We're almost a week removed from Spurs Women's demoralizing defeat to London City Lionesses, yet I still haven't quite processed everything that happened. How could all of the positive vibes and optimism from early on in the campaign evaporate so quickly?

Maybe that's being a bit dramatic—we're still in 4th place overall in the WSL table and retain a decent goal difference cushion despite losing by a five-goal margin on the weekend. The situation could definitely be worse heading into the first international break of the season.

But this result was certainly a rude awakening.

Sure, we have decidedly consolidated our position in the top half of the table and built on the foundation of attacking football that Martin Ho established in his first season in charge. We have some wonderful players with a lot of potential and plenty of room for growth.

That doesn't change the reality that we haven't bridged the gap to reach the level of quality consistently shown by the most talented teams—and I think we must now include London City in that category, purely based on the caliber of their squad. They have bona fide stars, while we have the stars of tomorrow (fingers crossed).

To subvert the footballing cliché, sometimes the match actually does play out the way it should on paper. Some of us just didn't want to see what was on that paper heading into the game. I am definitely guilty of that, though I do think it's also true that we didn't see the best of Spurs Women in this game; it was a humbling and an underperformance simultaneously.

In this issue: London City Lionesses recap | News from around the Lane

I'm going to take a big-picture approach to my match recap this week instead of agonizing over each goal concession in turn. Then there are a few news items to round up before preparing for the return of Spurs Men (ready or not!).

WSL MD 5 | Tottenham 1 - 6 London City Lionesses

Pelova 53' | Putellas 3' • 34', Diani 22' • 74', Van de Donk 52', Cascarino 90+4'

I think a big part of my disappointment around this result comes from feeling like those of us who did our best to hype up the fixture to newer fans were made to look foolish when it wasn't all that competitive in the end.

Although this performance was well below the standard we've come to expect from Martin Ho's team, people who are just starting to pay attention don't have that context and may be tempted to write them off just because of one lopsided loss. I hope that doesn't actually turn out to be the case, but sadly, it's an evergreen concern in women's football. Second chances and patience can be hard to come by.

But there's no denying that this result stings no matter how long you've been following the team. It's baffling to go from looking like the caliber of team that scores for fun against lesser opposition only to have the tables turned on us this matchday. It hurts worse because London City are supposed to be new rivals for Spurs.

Concerningly, they look to have leapfrogged us in several areas. The most pertinent advantage they had in this matchup was the sheer imbalance of experience in the two squads. Spurs' roster has gotten younger during Ho's tenure, but even the older players in Sunday's starting XI have limited experience in terms of playing in the most elite competitions or winning titles. They quailed under the pressure of facing two-time Ballon d'Or winner Alexia Putellas and London City's other renowned players like Daniëlle van de Donk and Kadidiatou Diani. In general, I think this Spurs team has displayed a strong mentality under Ho's management, but they did seem to be overwhelmed by the pressure on this occasion. There's no other explanation for why the individual performances lacked so much, almost entirely across the board (Signe Gaupset innocent).

One way that Spurs should have had an advantage was the home support at Brisbane Road, but the crowd was still far below the stadium's capacity and had a sizeable presence of London City fans (or at least Barcelona/Putellas fans). This is not meant as shade to the dedicated, faithful Spurs fans who show up every game, but rather a reminder that the club still has a lot of work to do to grow the fanbase and ensure these players get to play in front of a full crowd as they deserve. Unfortunately, this is another area where London City are already sneaking ahead of Spurs; while Spurs' total WSL attendance so far this season is 5,090 over three games, London City exceeded that figure in their home opener alone with 5,402 fans. And they are only in their second WSL season...

I really don't want to dwell on the goals we conceded, especially since most of them were made far too easy for London City by our own mistakes. As the final nail in the coffin, Delphine Cascarino scored a goal in stoppage time that epitomized the phrase "adding insult to injury," especially for Lize Kop, who had a rough game all around.

The team simply has to put this result behind them and regroup after the international break, since we have two matches coming up that are going to be equally—if not more—difficult: Chelsea away and Arsenal at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. The international break timing was far from ideal, but perhaps there's an opportunity for the players who do go out with their national teams to gain some confidence and be able to hit the ground running when they return to WSL play. Victoria Pelova seems to be approaching the international games with that attitude, already netting a hat trick for the Netherlands in their first game of the break.

Notable & quotable:

• Martin Ho made two substitutions at halftime, but only used three out of five subs overall.

• Opta giveth and Opta taketh away; we were on the wrong side of the stats fun fact this time: London City earned their highest margin of victory in the WSL to date and scored six goals in a WSL game for the first time.

• Martin Ho spoke honestly about the underperformance by Spurs:

We were nowhere near the levels we expect as a team. We know that, the players know that and as a collective, we have to own that.

But this has to be a wake-up call going into the next block of games after the international break because we need to find those levels again where we're competitive, we are winning first ball, second ball, but then we find that kind of speed of decision-making which weren't there also.

But it's frustrating to hear him say in a post-game interview with press that, "There’s a gap between the quality of the teams," contrary to his and the club's messaging prior to the big match. He also praised Signe Gaupset for her individual performance but admitted, "You can’t rely on a young player to take you through a game in the WSL." With the majority of our recent signings being young, up-and-coming players, that statement is a bit concerning and suggests the club undervalued experience in recent transfer windows.

News from around the Lane

• While I personally only watched two halves from separate games (one half of a Germany game, one half of the USMNT vs Canada) this Men's international break, there were plenty of milestones and achievements to note:

• Son Heung-min became the top goal-scorer of all time for South Korea with 59 goals. Nice one, Sonny!

• Andy Robertson made his 100th appearance for Scotland, and after making one more appearance this break, he will likely tie or exceed Kenny Dalglish's all-time Scotland appearances record of 102 caps in the next international break.
• In the younger age group for South Korea, the U23s (including Spurs loanee Yang Min-hyeok) won the Asian Games. Yang set up the game-winning goal in the final.
• Antonín Kinský earned his first senior cap for Czechia.
• Archie Gray captained England to the U21 Euro finals, while Mathys Tel and France also secured their berth in the competition. Tel scored a hat trick in their final game of the break.

• Sticking with celebrations, Martin Ho won the WSL Manager of the Month award for September. While Kirsty Hanson did not win the league's Goal of the Month award, she did win the fan vote for Spurs Goal of the Month. Congrats to them both!

• Xavi Simons is making the most of his extended injury layoff and taking a course with Harvard Business School.

• But enough of the good news, time to feel frustrated... The Guardian has reported that WSL Football will not commit to having full-time referees in the top tier until 2029. However, the WSL board did approve a funding increase for match officials.

• I'm going to throw in a bonus bookmark, an article from The Athletic on London City Lionesses' finances:

London City have signed star players from across Europe. How can the club afford them?

The New York Times

Basically, they haven't broken any of the WSL's financial rules... yet. But with a stark increase in wages this season, they will be under pressure to continue raising their revenue through avenues like matchday ticket sales and sponsorship deals.

Up next:

October 10 | Spurs Men @ Manchester United
Team news — Micky van de Ven and Jan Paul van Hecke are both available despite injury scares during the international break; Pedro Porro and Mykhailo Mudryk are both unavailable for selection due to hamstring and ankle injuries, respectively, with no confirmed timeline for their returns

Time to get back on the Spurs Men rollercoaster! Yay?

COYS

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