Wolverhampton Wanderers (home) 13.02.2022

After that Spurs huffed and puffed without any real pattern to their play and failed to seriously trouble the keeper until the last minute when he was forced to tip Cristian Romero’s header from a corner over the bar.  Once again, there were defensive mistakes, emotional instability and a lack of a creative playmaker to create enough chances for us to threaten the Wolves goal.  None of this was helped by an ineffectual referee – this time it was Kevin Friend – whose inconsistency was the only steady characteristic of his officiating.  

The recent concession of goals has seen Spurs allowing the opposition too much space to move the ball around and when that happened around the box, it let the other side get efforts on goal.  Lloris had already saves from Neves and Dendoncker following a Wolves free-kick into the box, but the ball wasn’t cleared and it dropped to Jiminez ten yards out, having time to chest the ball down and loop a volley into the empty space to Hugo’s left that gave them the lead with just five minutes gone.  Hugo did well to save the first effort, but he might have felt that the wet conditions would have made catching the second treacherous, so elected to slap it away even though there was little power behind the shot.  For all the vagaries of the new footballs, surely goalkeeping gloves have been developed in line with this and the grip on them is far better these days.  Catching shots is something that very few keepers seem to do these days, when Pat Jennings used to do it week in, week out … and without gloves.

Anyway, the errors continued for the second goal after 18 minutes.  Doherty won the ball and played it back to Hugo.  He passes it out to Ben Davies, but put the ball behind him, almost going out for a corner.  Davies cleared, but it didn’t go far, with Dendoncker cutting it out.  He played it inside the right side of the box to Semedo, whose low pull-back picked out Podence.  His shot was blocked by Sanchez, bounced off Bentancur’s heel to take it onto the goalpost behind him and Dendoncker had continued his run to tuck the ball over the line from a yard out.  If it wasn’t so infuriating you would laugh, as the ball pinballed about with Spurs players all over the place.  For a team who don’t score many goals to be two up inside 20 minutes, it must have been heaven for the Wolves fans.

Spurs had got Lucas into a promising position early on on the right wing and having lost his man, he looked up to see no white shirt in the penalty box.  This was something that was a recurring issue throughout the match.  Moura wasn’t as effective today as he usually is and that was partly due to the poor performance of the team, but also in the referee allowing him to be dragged down by foot or hand without any deterrent to prevent it happening again.  When he did give a free kick to Spurs halfway inside the Wolves half, Spurs took it quickly, but got pulled up by the referee’s whistle as it hadn’t been taken from the right spot.  Throw-ins were taken yards from where they went off, so where is the consistency ?  A large number of other free-kicks were just thrown a few yards forward from where they happened with no recall.  All except those that occurred in the Wolves box, where the goalkeeper would place them very deliberately, then re-place the ball, then adjust his gloves, then make sure his hair looked good and then hoofed it upfield.  Warned about this in the first half, Friend told him again in the 70+ minute, but still he persisted, with not even the meaningless yellow card for time-wasting three minutes from the end.

Davies put a clearance upfield and Kane challenged for it, getting the ball as the defender looked around to find it and hit a 25-yarder that went over the top.  Meanwhile, back in the Spurs box, Hugo made a bit of amends with a fine one handed stop when Jiminez fired in a shot from the 18 yard line, but the substitution board was surprisingly held up with 28 minutes gone and Ryan Sessegon was replaced by Dejan Kulusevski.  It wasn’t a popular decision among the crowd and Ryan had been hooked early in a match we were losing 0-2 like Dier was against Olympiakos when Mourinho was in charge.  He was applauded as he made his way from in front of the East Stand and along the South back to the bench, where, at least, Conte put an arm around him and spoke to him.  It is a real shame that we do not play to his strengths and put the ball in front of Sessegnon to get him to run at defences.  Most of the time he receives the ball facing his own goal, somewhere around the halfway line and has had few opportunities to shine in the Tottenham team.

Son tricked his way to the dead-ball line and tried to pull the ball back across goal, but it was cut out at the near post by Sa and then when Wink’s forward pass was intercepted, Wolves moved the ball to the right side of the D and Podence hit a low shot from the edge of the box through Romero’s legs that Lloris did well to get down to his left to get a strong hand to it to keep the ball out.  Davinson Sanchez was on hand to clear the loose ball.  As soon as Sanchez cut out a forward Wolves pass and fed it to Bentancur alongside him, the Uruguayan swept a fine pass out to the left and Son ran it on before shooting low at Sa from a narrow angle.  

Just before half-time, Ben Davies made forward run and beat a couple of tackles to get in the box and win a corner, when his cross was blocked.  Unfortunately, Lucas wasn’t able to get his header on target at the near post and just before the whistle went and the boos swept down from the stands, Lucas crossed for Kane to have a header at goal, but 12 yards out, there wasn’t enough power in it to extend Sa.

Well, if Conte ripped into the team after Wednesday’s loss, I imagine that the paint must have been peeling off the walls after the first half performance.  The subs didn’t come out to warm up at the interval, so it must have been a message for all of the matchday squad, not just those who had played the first half.

I’m not sure what he said, but it made little difference, as Spurs toiled through the remaining 45 minutes, with Wolves happy to allow Spurs to come on to them having already established a 2-0 lead and having the second best defensive record i the Premier League.  We did make an early break from a Wolves corner that was ended by a crude foul on Son outside the box by Neves, who had been a serial offender, but not in Friend’s eyes.  When Spurs tried to play the ball away from the back, Davinson Sanchez let the ball run, took a heavy touch and it went to Cundle, who played it to Jiminez in the box.  Davies came across to get a foot in and then Lloris saved at his feet at the expense of a corner, which came in to the same striker.  His acrobatic scissor kick looked good, but only resulted in the ball heading towards the West Stand instead of the goal.

Kulusevski made a telling through pass to Son, but a combination of Semedo and Sa halted him on the edge of the box and then Son threaded a pass through to Harry Kane on the left of the box.  Whereas, he might cut the ball back onto his right foot, he went for the early left foot shot and Sa was equal to it.  Doherty was then alive to the fact that Ait-Nouri’s loose control let the ball run loose and he clipped it back for Kane and his two headers was saved by Sa, the first more difficult with an easier task for the second.

A 2-0 lead was not enough for Wolves, who regularly went down and stayed down to break up play and the surrounding of the referee and pleading for red cards was both unnecessary and unseemly.  When Bentancur ran in to challenge Saiss, the Moroccan went down holding his face while Neves ran in indicating that he had been elbowed in the face.  I’m not even sure if it was a free kick as it was two players coming together, with one intent on making the most of the contact.  It is not the first time that Saiss has done this in games against Spurs and I have seen him do it in other games.  With Podence going down injured in the Spurs half and play continuing, he got up, made it into his own half then went down again, wanting treatment.  Why referees put up with this I can’t quite understand, as a large number of people in the ground are able to see what is going on … just not the person with the whistle.  If he was able to get himself 35 yards from where he first went down, he could easily have been made to walk to the touchline to receive treatment off the pitch or carried off to allow the game to continue.

From that free-kick that came to nothing, Spurs moved the ball upfield and Bentancur was fouled at the right side of the penalty area, Son taking it.  It was cleared out and Harry Winks struck a low shot that fizzed off the wet turf and flicked off a defender for a corner off the post.   When the ball went into the area, it failed to cause any threat to the Wolves goal, but Winks was fouled soon after and Ait-Nouri went into the book.   Again, trying to take the free-kick quickly, Friend wanted it taken from exactly from the place where the foul took place (like he would know).  It is impossible to see what advantage the team with the free-kick get by these delaying tactics by the referee.  When it was finally taken, Wolves had enough players in the wall to block it and when Lucas tried to try to block Podence’s pass, Friend booked him for handball although he was only a yard away.  I would be surprised if he has booked other players in the same situation for close-range “handballs”.  When he did play advantage as we were on the attack, no advantage accrued, but he didn’t pull it back for the original foul. 

Ait-Nouri his a shot off target, pulling it across goal from the left when released into the Spurs box, with Conte deciding to replace Lucas with Bergwijn and shortly after that, Kulusevski got a yellow card for shirt-pulling.  Sanchez did well to block a Podence shot in the Spurs area, with play switching to the other end where Son shot wide from Kane’s cross, although he was offside anyway.  Kulusevski went close after Davies headed Winks’ ball out to the left into the middle of the box and it came out to Dejan, who pulled his shot just wide from the edge of the area. 

As Spurs looked to get something out of the game, Bentancur headed Son’s near post corner wide with ten minutes left, then Kane took a pass, turned his man and hit it over the bar, but Friend had not noticed that the defender had pushed Kane in the back before he got his shot away and that was why it flew too high.  The corners were totting up, but there had barely been a hint of danger form any of them and one in the 85th minute when Neves sliced a Kulusevski pass over the bar was no different.  However, it was recycled and Winks played the pass of the day for Spurs inside their left back for Son to run into the box, but his indecision over taking an early shot allowed Sa to save at the near post.  Neither Son nor Kane looked as sharp as they have in the past and maybe it is the reliance on the same players that is taking its toll with three matches in eight days.

Kane was alert when AIt-Nouri lost control f the ball again, Son played it to substitute Royal on the right and his low cross was headed at goal by Harry, but it hit Kilman and was cleared for a corner.  It was from this corner that Sa had to tip over Romero’s close-range header.  One last attack saw Bergwijn cross the ball but it came off Kilman and looked an easy take for Sa, just outside the six-yard box. Inexplicably, he dropped the ball, right at Kulusevski’s feet and while he couldn’t do much with it, with players in front of him, it came to Bergwijn, who looked to pass to Kane, but it was intercepted and cleared.  There had been moments of panic in the Wolves defence, like when Sa sliced a back-pass straight up in the air, but fortunately for him it went off for a corner.

For all the chances that Spurs created (or had presented to them), only 7 of 17 were on target and none of them unduly stretched the keeper.  With the rain having started before the match and having seen Lloris struggle with shots, we really failed to test the keeper, who was well-protected by his defence.  At the moment, Tottenham look like a side who are lacking organisation and players did not seem to want to take responsibility of shooting when we got near the Wolves penalty a rea, happier to lay the ball off to someone else … and not necessarily in a better position.  When we are in possession there appears to be a lack of options for someone to want the ball or even be in space to receive it.  While the fans criticise the player who has given the ball away or had it cut out, it is often the case that they are having to force the pass or try a pass that has the percentages against it, as there is nothing else on.

At least there are a six days before we visit Manchester City, so time to try and sort things out, as City will not sit back if they go 2-0 up.  It could be a long afternoon.

Keith Mendament