Elfsborg (Sweden) (Home) 30.01.20205

Shirts : – Yellow
Shorts : – Black
Socks : – Yellow

It was a fairly strong side Ange put out, but the bench was on the young side, with only Fraser Forster, Alfie Whiteman and Dejan Kulusevski bumping up the average age over about 19 and a half !  The fans who made it into the ground twenty minutes after kick off didn’t really miss much though.

Richarlison almost got onto a cross from Mikey Moore from the right side of the box inside the first minute but didn’t make contact and then he was inches under a cross from Pedro Porro.  On the other flank, Heung-Min Son was roasting Hedlund, who didn’t have a clue where the Spurs winger was going and that continued for the rest of the first half.  Elfsborg sat so deep with very rare incursions into the Spurs half, but when they did, Micky van de Ven and Ben Davies picked the ball off to set Spurs on their way back towards the Elfsborg goal.

Spurs had a couple of chances from corners.  Davies headed over, but the ref gave the Swedish side a free-kick for something and a ball skidded off an Elfsborg head taking it just over Micky’s head at the far post.

A loose ball back towards his own goal by Bergvall caused Brandon Austin to have to come 15 yards outside his box to head the ball away, but mostly, Spurs were comfortable in possession despite not always being able to penetrate the ten outfield players in the Elfsborg defensive third.  There was a lot of noise from the 3,000+ fans in yellow and black, but a break they had was won back by Richarlison, whose loose ball had started the move.

One of the Elfsborg defenders went down with a head injury, which wasn’t bad enough to stop him rolling himself back onto the pitch to receive treatment and then he might have been concussed, as he felt he shouldn’t have to leave the pitch after being seen to by the physio.  It gave the Elfsborg manager an opportunity to have a full-scale tactical team-talk on the side-line.

Just after the half hour, Son turned his marker close to the dead ball line and his ball into the six yard box was deflected to Pape Matar Sarr, whose shot was on target, but blocked by Hult.  After Sarr won the ball just outside the box, Porro turned a low ball into the middle of the box, but there were only yellow shirts where it fell.

Archie Gray was wrestled to the floor by Abdullai with a free-kick given and Spurs broke from that to find Son who played a pass inside into Davies’ run.  Ben stepped over the ball leaving it for Richarlison, who turned and tried to curl the ball into the far top corner, but it flew a yard too high.  38 minutes into the match, Son again ran Helmund to the line and he had the time to pull the ball back to Mikey Moore inside the six yard box at the near post and he got some power behind his side-foot shot but the keeper made a fine reflex save to push the ball away.  From the corner, Son tried to find the far top corner like he had done against Man United in the League Cup, but the keeper slapped it out.  Elfsborg broke away with Rapp running at goal, but Archie stayed with him and blocked the cross, winning a goal-kick as it came off the Swede last.

At half-time, Dragusin, Bissouma and Kulusevski came on with Van de Ven, Son and Bentancur taking a break, as Spurs started on the front foot again.  Dejan was soon leaving Hult on his backside and Ben Davies crashed a shot at goal from outside the box that was straight at the Elfsborg goalie.

The most trouble the Tottenham goal came under when Besfort Zeneli took a touch that took him past Dragusin, but his shot was deflected into the air, with Abdullai trying an overhead kick that sent the ball over the bar from inside the six-yard box.  It was a move that showed that however unambitious the Swedish side were, they could still grab a goal, which they did in their last two Europa League matches to seal 1-0 victories.

Porro pulled a cross back from inside the box and Lucas came diving in to throw himself at a header which unfortunately went straight at the keeper.  Yegbe was the Elfsborg long-throw expert and he took an age to walk to where a throw was conceded halfway inside the Tottenham half and then spent ages before he threw it, only to land the ball onto Richarlison’s head.

On the hour, Dragusin went to meet a long ball forward and was fine until Abdoullai knocked into him, forcing him to play the ball off, but his right knee was stretching and he went down, had a long period of attention from the physios and went off.  He was ushered back on after a few jumps and stretches, but he sat down more or less straight away and had to be subbed, with Dane Scarlett coming on.  This caused another re-shuffle in the Spurs defence, with Archie Gray having moved to left back, coming back inside and Pape going to left back.

Scarlett’s introduction upped the tempo and one touch inside the box almost put Kulusevski in on goal if it hadn’t been for an Elfsborg defender blocking it.  Richarlison chased back to retrieve a loose pass from the side in yellow and it started the move that led to Tottenham’s opener.  Porro and Moore passed between themselves son the right before Dejan curved a ball into the middle of the box and Scarlett made a great run to meet it between two central defenders and threw himself at the header to put in it to the keeper’s left.  It was Dane’s first goal for the club and from having to struggle to get a game under the new manager at Oxford United, he was scoring in the Europa League.

Straight after Moore drove a shot across the keeper, who just got a hand to it and four yellow shirts were there to clear where a white shirt should have been to finish it off.  Damola Ajayi had to wait a few minutes on the touchline with three Elfsborg subs before there was a break in play and the Spurs Academy forward could finally make his debut.  It came when Richarlison skewed a shot at goal well wide and was taken off with other games in mind.  The useless Abdullai was one of the players gone off for the visitors, with the lanky Per Frink leading the line, as the manager threw players forward as other results had dropped them out of the top 24 in the table so out of the play-offs.

As it was, the changes that were made benefitted Tottenham more than Elfsborg with Damola’s first touch playing a one-two-three with Porro before darting in off the right.  He played the ball into the feet of Scarlett, who had his back to goal, but put the ball back into Ajayi’s run, allowing him to take a touch with his right foot and then drive a left foot shot into the keeper’s bottom left corner to score a debut goal within four minutes of coming on !   Damola ran past three player and found the net just inside the post before lapping up the adulation of the crowd and his team-mates.

Bergvall picked up a senseless booking for dragging down Helmund, but nothing more nor less than Adbullai did in the first half.  As the fourth official showed four added minutes, Elfsborg couldn’t get hold of the ball.  Bergvall pushed a ball into Mikey in the box, but his first touch was heavy and went through to the keeper.  When a high ball was played forward by the keeper, Bergvall won the header ten yards inside his own half  and it went to Moore inside the centre circle just over the halfway line.  He shrugged off Zeneli, who had nothing left in his legs and ran at the remaining defenders, taking the ball just to the right of centre on the 18 yard line and pulled a shot back across the keeper to neat him past his right hand to find the bottom corner of the net.  It was a well-deserved goal, as Mikey was in danger of getting left behind by his former Academy graduates, but his display had been brave and the goal came nine seconds before the final whistle.

The match did replicate the Qarabag game, with a 3-0 win, but it was also a match when Dragusin went off (injured not sent off this time) and Spurs faced few chance son their own goal, although Qarabag were more attacking minded than Elfsborg, but they were up against ten men for most of the game.  At least this time it didn’t rain and although it took until the second half, the goals were well worth waiting for and the scorers give hope for the future generation of Tottenham’s players.

Terry Edmonds

• Damola Ajayi makes his Spurs debut.
• Dane Scarlett, Damola Ajayi and Mikey Moore all score their first Tottenham goals.
• Scoring his first Spurs goal v Elfsborg made him the youngest English scorer in European competition at 17 years and 172 days of age beating the previous record of Jimmy Greaves aged 17 years and 245 days for Chelsea in October 1957.
• It also made Moore the fourth youngest goal-scorer in the club’s history behind Alfie Devine, Andy Turner and Frank Saul.