Woolwich Wanderers (Home) 15.09.2024

In truth it was a crap match.  Not helped by the totally inadequate appointment of a referee who did not seem to understand the nature of the match and instead went to become the new record holder for issuing the most yellow cards in the first half of the match – 7 (seven).  It was just a shame that he didn’t make that 8 (eight) when Timber went over the top of the ball on Porro then engaged Guglielmo Vicario by grabbing the keeper’s shirt.  Surprisingly, it was only the Spurs number 1 who got a yellow card for that confrontation when Timber seemed equally as guilty of any offence that the Tottenham man was judged to have committed.  He constantly interrupted play to both sides frustration and always spends an inordinate amount of time talking to the wall at free-kicks, which should earn himself a yellow card for time-wasting.

In a match of few goal-scoring chances, one was taken from a set-piece, which you might say was good planning by the visitors (as many commentators claimed), but there were few other attacks of any note, as they organised their ten men behind the ball and squeezed the space for Spurs to play in.  For our part, the ball wasn’t moved quickly enough, players were too static so did not pull Woolwich players around and our crossing was poor.  Add to the fact that we have real issues defending set-pieces and it cost us.  Not that there was too much difference between the sides on this showing, as I am sure that they will settle for the win, but if they play like that all the time, they are going to come a cropper.

Also, I thought that there was a clue in the name of this game … Football, as it seemed that the Woolwich version involves a lot of use of the hands.  Whether they are up in the face, using them to run off with the ball or to pull down players before the ball even reached them.  Poor refereeing allowed these incidents to go unpunished, allowing them to freely recur.  Obviously, the comments that the South Londoners made about the referee before the game got into his head and he didn’t seem to want to upset them, while he was happy to book Spurs players for tackles, he allowed to go for them.

Within five minutes, Spurs had defended a corner well and then produced a save from Raya when Dominic Solanke and Heung-Min Son worked the ball well on the left before it was cut back to Deja Kulusevski, whose shot was pushed wide by the keeper.  Deki then brought another stop from Raya when a cross-cum-shot made him push it away for another corner.  The referee let Timber get away with an early drag-down when Brennan Johnson got away from him and then booked Saliba for running off with the ball after he had gone through the back of Solanke.  It was Tottenham’s pressing that was worrying the Woolwich attempts to play out, either winning the ball high up or making unforced errors from White, who showed England just what they are not missing by his request not to be included in the national squad.  He was truly awful all match and if he hadn’t been as tanned as he is, would have had an entirely beige game.

Spurs were not helping themselves with some nervy passing out from the back and it gave Woolwich the opportunity to get into the Tottenham boss, with a Havertz header striking Cristian Romero in front of Vicario, who grabbed the loos ball ahead of the Woolwich striker who went for it in the six-yard box.  The Spurs keeper should have been made to work harder when Trossard played Martinelli in beyond Porro, but his attempted curled shot went too close to Vicario, who caught it easily.  Then the yellow cards started to flow.  Udogie booked for a foul on Saka, which was a free-kick but barely a booking.  Bentancur for his second foul in a couple of minutes.  In between, Solanke stretched his neck backwards to head James Maddison’s cross towards goal and left Raya nervously scampering back to try to get close to it and fail, but was relieved to see the ball drift just wide.  Then the Timber incident happened before neither team could make anything from the corners that they won and as added time started, Johnson got a ball in front of him for once and he hit a shot from the edge of the box that flew too high.  Also in added time, there were bookings for Micky van de Ven and Dejan Kulusevski in the same move where the referee had allowed play to go on after the first foul and Kulusevski’s was for a few fouls, which Trossard had pointed out to the referee, which I always understood was a bookable offence in itself !

The second half was little better.  Tottenham had an effort on goal following an early corner when van de Ven headed it on and Raya had to dive to save it low down, then Jorginho was booked for his second foul and Johnson tried a low ground-shot that lacked power to trouble the keeper.  Porro took a Saka shot in the midriff before it went out for a corner, which they scored from.  Being at the other end of the ground, I didn’t have a great view of what happened, but the scorer looked like he had a free-header.  

Tottenham were getting the ball into the Woolwich box, but were unable to do much with it as the sheer weight of numbers would have made Mourinho proud and frankly that was why he wasn’t welcome at Spurs.  It may be winning football, but the Spurs defence had probably gone to sleep with all the time-wasting and tedious tactics they employed.  Their players who made the team didn’t look that fit, as they dropped to the ground, one after another, to get treatment that the referee failed to add adequate time on for at the end, although it was another match where we could have played all night and wouldn’t have scored.

Solanke was pulled down in the box, but the inept referee failed to act on it, then substitute Pape Matar Sarr tried a shot, but he failed to get enough behind it to worry the goalie.  Odobert had come on to run at Timber and fired in a shot at the near post, but the angle was against him and then hit another that struck an offside Werner.  Kulusevski went closest with a drive from just outside the box that was a foot too high.

As the final whistle sounded, the team from South London celebrated like they had come second in the league and we were left to try and work out why we didn’t get anything out of the game.  Coming away from the stadium, I heard “Fat Aussie Fraud” quoted by Spurs fans as well as “Levy sold Harry Kane and then just buys players from Burnley, Leeds and Bournemouth”.  It is always disappointing after a loss, but remember Harry Kane wanted to leave and without Champions League football, the club will face a little resistance from top players wanting to sign, so we have to bring in who we can.  The players mentioned have been given little time to settle in, so it will not be an immediate impact that these players have.  Bigger names have taken their time to show their best form when joining Spurs in the past.

The game had a lot of elements of the Newcash match, but the panic that seems to be setting in amongst the fringe Spurs fans and the media outlets appears to be extremely pre-mature.  If the other lot hadn’t scored, what would the reaction to the result have been ?  A good point for Spurs and a slating for the way that Woolwich played ?  We are four games in and the only like-for-like result that hasn’t matched last season’s was a draw against a newly promoted side.  Agreed that it doesn’t show improvement on the last season’s matches, but then again, in my opinion, it is early doors to be calling the manager’s head.

East Stan

• Dejan Kulusevski makes his 100th Spurs appearance.
• The referee set a new Premier League record by issuing seven yellow cards in the first half of a Premier League game.