Bodo/Glimt (Norway) (Away) 30.09.2025

An early Spurs free-kick was played short to Odobert and returned to Pedro Porro, whose ross was too long.  The next time the game was stopped was  because Berg pushed the ref into Lucas Bergvall, with the official’s head hitting the Swede’s shoulder.  Shaken, but not stirred the Slovakian ref continued with a dropped ball.  The next time Berg was involved, he struck a 25 yard shot that was swerving, so Guglielmo Vicario took no chances and punched it over the bar.

In the ninth minute, Bergvall’s run down the left produced a slow ball across the box, which the defender looked as though he would get to first, but he missed it and Richarlison coming in behind him failed to make a good contact, half unable to stop on the plastic pitch and half the ball getting caught up between his feet.

Bodo were having a lot of possession, but the Spurs players were getting back behind the ball to deny space for the home team to play through.  The bounce off the plastic pitch was helping neither side, with Hogh looking like he might have a goal-scoring opportunity until the ball wouldn’t come down from around his throat and then when Spurs cleared, Richarlison looked to try and hold the ball but it ballooned off the pitch over head high which meant he had no chance of controlling it.

A cross to the middle of the six yard box was met with a header from Bjortuft, but Vic grabbed it under the crossbar.  Spurs had started to make inroads into the Bodo half, with Johnson booting one shot out of the ground as it went high over the bar. Then Bjerkan made a run on the left and Rodrigo Bentancur dived in to bring the player down after he had released the ball and a penalty was given.  The watered plastic pitch hadn’t helped, but it was ana impetuous challenge, with Hogh blasting the ball over the bar from the penalty spot.

Kevin Danso was robbed of the ball as he tried to take it up-field, with the move resulting in Hauge having a shot that whizzed past Vicario’s right-hand post by a couple of feet.  Three minutes before half-time Fet skied an effort at the near post when he was in space when a low cross came into him.  A late free-kick looked like Tottenham might threaten the Bodo goal, but it was easily headed away as the first half came to an end.

Things all kicked off seven minutes into the second half.  Hauge found space in the right side of the box and drove into the net across Vicario without any pressure to put Bodo ahead, which wasn’t a surprise with Spurs trying to defend and then giving the ball away most of the time.  But, two minutes later, a free-kick out on the left wing was swung in by Porro and it went through everyone and bounced out off the far post.  Johnson drilled it back in and Bentancur atoned for his giving the penalty away by flicking it past the keeper to make it 1-1 … or did he ?  The VAR drew the ref to the monitor and the goal was rubbed out, with van de Ven adjudged to have fouled a defender as the free-kick came in.  

Auklend then hit Evjen from inside the box, when it looked like they might double their lead, but the ball was kept out although it led to a scramble that ended with the ball poked wide. Frank made substitutions with Johnson and Bergvall making way for Kudus and Simons, which sparked a little more of an attacking threat, but when Xavi passed straight to a defender, the break was on.  Spurs defended it but captain van de Ven passed back to Vicario too close to the ball going off for a corner, so he hurriedly cleared, the ball was turned over, worked left into the box and Hauge took it to his left before hitting a shot across Vic to make it 2-0.

You couldn’t really argue with the score as Spurs had been horrible up to this point.  When Berg was booked for a later stamp on Porro’s foot, the game was pulled back for a free-kick when it looked as though the ref had played on even though he had been flagged offside.  Pedro took the free-kick and running into the six yard box, Micky was unchallenged and thumped a header past the keeper to give Tottenham aglimmer of hope.

From a corner, the Bodo attack pulled Spurs around and Hauge had another clear sight of goal until Joao Palhinha made a crucial tackle to stop him getting a shot away.  Odobert under pressure threw himself at a cross from Kudus and the ball smacked against the angle of the goal and away.  The same happened at the other end when Hauge carried the ball away and his first-time shot hit the bar on its way over the top.  With the clock ticking down to 90 minutes, Spurs built from the back and Danso’s ball down the right was turned around the corner by Kudus to Porro, who played Archie Gray in on the corner of the box.  His low ball in to the near post was poked onto Gundersen by the keeper, and Sjovold, who didn’t actually made a challenge, so, without it being a great performance, Tottenham salvaged a draw with a minute left.  However, as usual, a long VAR looked into the goal and eventually ruled that the goal stood.

In the third minute of added time, Blomberg turned in the box to squeeze a shot inches wide of Vic’s left post.  Kudus’ late cross was headed back across goal by Palhinha, but while Spurs tried to set up a shot for someone, the ball just wouldn’t sit down  and the defence blocked the attack with the whistle ending the game when they cleared it.

It is hard to believe that UEFA allow this pitch to be used, with it rippling up close to the side-lines and not playing like a natural pitch in any way.  Last year, the match was played under different circumstances, with the Norwegians’ season not in action and Spurs visited there with a 3-1 lead from the first leg of the Europa League semi-final.  There was nothing to lose for the home side as it was a one-off match and having come back for 0-2 behind in their  first group match against Slavia Prague, the boot was on the other foot this time, as Tottenham managed the recovery.  There was perhaps an overly cautious approach adopted by Frank, with the deep-set Spurs team were hoping to defend against the energetic home side, but there has to be a way out of that low block.  Richarlison was too isolated to be able to do much, but his poor control meant that he couldn’t hold the ball up anyway.  Midfielders needed to get up around him, but pushed back so far, it wasn’t possible to give him much support.

Too often, passes were sloppy and that wasn’t always down to the pitch, which was heavily watered before kick off to ensure that any long balls would run on much further than on grass.  As it turned out the pace of Archie’s late shot confounded the keeper, who, like Vic on Saturday, could only push it out onto one of his defenders.  It was enough to rob a point from the home side but with both sides hitting the woodwork and Spurs having a goal disallowed, while Bodo missed a penalty, chances were spurned and we have found out often enough that a single goal lead isn’t always sufficient.  On this occasion we tied it up at the end.  On other occasions, it might be us who get caught at the death.  That is why it is all the more important that we don’t get into the situation where things get nervy with ten minutes to go.

• Richarlison made his 100th Spurs appearance.