Tottenham have beaten Arsneal 3-0 to close to within one point of us in the Premier League table.
The Gunners started the match on the front foot, looking dangerous for much of the first five minutes, but things didn’t stay that way for long.
Spurs first real dangerous attack saw them gifted a penalty, with Cedric Soares scrambling to get back on terms with Son before sending him flying with his leg. Admittedly some angles of the replay make the decision seem soft, but overall I think there is little to complain about on the decision.
Kane dispatched the penalty by sending Aaron Ramdsale the wrong way, and things gradually got worse and worse from this point onwards. Holding got himself a silly yellow card for trying to kick through the forward and received the ball in a scrappy tussle, before recklessly getting himself a silly second booking for raising his arm to use his elbow to block the run of Son, leaving us with slim hopes of any result.
Moments later Spurs lead was doubled when the corner was headed out to the back post where Kane was running into space to guide it home, putting the match out of reach before the 40-minute mark.
While there may have been a little hope that our manager could have got his boys firing with some magical teamtalk at the break, those hopes were quickly dispelled as Son made it 3-0 with the first attack of the new half.
There was very little to enjoy from this point onwards in all honesty, although Aaron Ramsdale did deny our rivals a fourth with a strong save, but the anxiety levels rose further when Gabriel Magalhaes had to limp off the pitch to be replaced, leaving us with a back four of Tavares, Xhaka, Tomiyasu and Cedric on the field, with Ben White seemingly not to be risked this evening.
Fingers crossed that White and Gabriel will be fit for the weekend with Holding now suspended, especially with our lead in the race for the top-four having been cut to just one point.
Holding is the obvious one to be picked on for today’s result, while some may feel that Arteta may have been playing into our rivals hands from the off by sticking with the back-four. There will be no time to dwell on what went wrong here however with Newcastle our next opponents come Monday, but today’s performance will need to be quickly deleted from our memories if we are to get back on the right track.
Was we already second-best before the initial penalty or red card?
Patrick