Frank remaining positive as Spurs end week of home games in dramatic fashion

Tottenham Hotspur (0) 2 v Manchester United (1) 2

Premier League

Matchweek 11

Talking Points

By Kaz Mochlinski at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium

It was very, very nearly an unforgettable match. Equally, it was almost a game of great concern for Tottenham Hotspur. Ultimately, they did not do enough to deserve to end their three-month home run without a win in the Premier League.

Manchester United scored two goals from their only two attempts on target. Spurs struck twice from two deflected shots. In truth, neither team entirely earned the three points which would have taken them up into second place in the table.

From the Tottenham perspective, a draw might not be a bad result considering that United came to N17 as the favourites if anything, despite having famously lost four times to Spurs last season, including most recently in the Europa League final.

Ruben Amorim’s side had put together an unbeaten sequence of four matches, while Tottenham had only managed three wins in 19 Premier League games at home. That became three out of 20 on this Saturday lunchtime.

And it has been exacerbated by this season’s winless series in the league on their own pitch now stretching to five matches. In an eight-day period Spurs have played three home games, losing and drawing in the Premier League while winning the other one.

That is very typical of their campaign so far. And a win, a draw and a loss is an exactly average set of results. However, it is insufficient at home. Especially when defeating only København in the Champions League, but failing to beat Chelsea or Man United.

It is quite hard to know whether the focus should be on the positives or the negatives. Thomas Frank is still staying optimistic as, in his first season as head coach, Tottenham remain reasonably well-placed in the Premier League and Champions League tables.

“I take the positives out of this game” insisted Frank. “That’s what I believe - and how I believe in building a good team, and keep adding layers to it. Overall, a fine / good performance against a good Man United team which is definitely on a flow.

“We are talking a bit about our, how can you say, level of defensive / attacking threats. And how to play against a Man United side that play with confidence. With Cunha, Mbeumo, Amad. And Šeško coming on.

“And we kept them to five shots. It’s just another example… that it’s not that easy to create in the Premier League, even though they had all their big boys out there. Second half I was extremely happy with our response.

“We are playing at home, and of course we all want to win and don’t talk too much about home form and all that. I know we need to win before we don’t talk about it.

“The way we turned it around to stay in the game, kept doing the right thing throughout the second half - very happy with that. So close to winning it. On any other day, we win it.”

A lot of credit has to be given to Frank for the fightback by Spurs, and for the fact that they kept persevering until at last being rewarded just six minutes from full-time. Plus his substitutions were exceptionally effective.

The two Tottenham goals both came about through shots by subs sent on from the bench, in Mathys Tel and then Wilson Odobert. For Tel it was finally his first goal in a home match - nine months after initially signing for Spurs on loan.

Having made the transfer from Bayern Munich permanent for a reported £30 million ahead of this season, Tel had not scored for five weeks. Seven minutes later, Richarlison ended his own, even longer goal drought of seven weeks.

Quirkily, both of Richarlison’s most recent goals have happened through getting in the way of teammates’ shots. At Brighton & Hove Albion he had blocked Mohammed Kudus’s strike, but reacted rapidly to drive it into the net.

And against Manchester United it was Richarlison’s right shoulder which was responsible for redirecting Odobert’s effort for a somewhat fortuitous goal, in that instant an apparent winner in stoppage time.

Richarlison’s joy was multiplied by having endured 10 goalless games for Tottenham, and 12 in total for club and country when including his involvement in Brazil’s latest fixtures under their new coach, Carlo Ancelotti.

Spurs’ two unexpected goals from unexpected sources - despite being scored by two forwards - compensated for and made an immense contrast to their utterly barren first half performance with not even one attempt on target.

It was worse than can be simply dismissed as due to the disruption of being forced by the visitors to play towards the single-tier South Stand before the break rather than in the second half as they have always preferred.

In two consecutive halves of home league matches, against Chelsea and Manchester United, attacking the end where their most passionate fans gather, Tottenham did not have any shots on goal or require the opposition goalkeeper to make a single save.

The similarity of the first half against Manchester United to the dismal display versus Chelsea was perverse. In both contests, Spurs fell behind just after the half-hour mark, in the 34th minute one week and in the 32nd minute the next.

Tottenham’s xG at full-time facing Chelsea was a record low of 0.05. At half-time in the game with Manchester United, their xG was almost equally bad at 0.07. They were hurtling towards a crisis - until the recovery and relief of registering a draw.

Even then there was more misery for Spurs supporters to endure. Cristian Romero had to be taken off late on with an apparent thigh muscle injury, having only just returned from a month on the sidelines.

Frank dismissed suggestions afterwards that the absence of the captain was a factor in United levelling right at the end of the encounter. But at the very least the team leader would have been involved in organising Tottenham’s defensive set-up.

With and without Romero, Spurs should not have conceded two goals from two headers, the first of them by one of the smallest players on the pitch, Bryan Mbeumo. Yet even that will not be their biggest regret of the afternoon.

There will be nightmares lingering for several weeks about letting in an equaliser in stoppage time, against 10 men, from a set-piece. Especially when successfully defending one last corner would have provided that long-awaited home league win.

Unusually, Matthijs de Ligt had the final touch for both equalisers, with his 96th minute goal making up for deflecting Tel’s strike - and for the second week in a row giving United a 2-2 away draw, having led at half-time then needed a late leveller.

At Tottenham, large numbers of home fans missed most of the drama, having given up hope and left with their side still losing 0-1 going into the closing minutes. Spurs may be relieved that after the international break their next matches will be away.

On the schedule is the small matter of a trip across North London to Arsenal for the biggest derby in the capital, before heading over to play Paris Saint-Germain. Just the Premier League leaders and the Champions League holders to face then.

But at least it will not be in N17.