Soaring Spurs capitalise on Woeful United

Momentum is building for Tottenham as they beat Manchester United at Old Trafford on Sunday. After a strong performance from Spurs, even with the absence of their captain  Son Heung-Min, the Lilywhites secured their third win of the Premier League season.

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Amidst a tough schedule, with Spurs travelling to Hungarian side Ferencváros mid-week, Ange Postecoglou has been required to rotate the configuration of his starting eleven regularly. However, this did not prevent muscle fatigue as Son was substituted against Qarabag on Thursday. There was uncertainty in Ange’s pre-match press conference on Friday surrounding the South Korean’s inclusion in the squad against United.

The Australian stated “Sonny, I don’t think is too bad. He wants to train tomorrow and we will see how it goes and make a decision from there.” Ultimately, he was left out of the squad and was replaced by Timo Werner, which was the only change to the starting eleven from their last Premier League victory against Brentford.

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It was a productive start from Tottenham as three minutes into the game Micky Van de Ven exhibited his pace down the centre of the pitch, capitalising on United’s weak defensive structure, passing Noussair Mazraoui and Manuel Ugarte. He took one final touch to escape Matthijs de Ligt and pass the ball across the face of goal to an abandoned Brennan Johnson who scored his fourth goal in four games – Diogo Dalot should have done better.

Tottenham were given chance after chance to double their lead in the first half, with Johnson hitting the post to deny him of a second, and an audacious scissor kick from Cristian Romero just going wide of the woodwork.

Just when United were looking like they were getting back into the game, towards the conclusion of the first half, Bruno Fernandes was sent off, with Chris Kavanagh believing that his challenge on James Maddison was serious foul play. It could be seen as a controversial decision as, on a closer look, Bruno could be seen to have slipped on the glass leaving his right leg suspended in mid-air. However, the connection to Maddison’s shin convinced the referee to maintain his original decision of a red card.

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At the start of the second half, Destiny Udogie was substituted for Djed Spence regarding a potential injury to his quad. In the post-match press conference Postecoglou confirmed that “he felt something in his quad” and that he thought at half-time there is “no point [in continuing], we’ve got to be careful about how much we push our players.” He also added that “Destiny had to come on pretty early on Thursday night”, following a red card from Radu Dragusin, “which wasn’t the plan”.

Two minutes into the second half, Tottenham scored again. Brennan Johnson sprinted with the ball down the right flank to whip a deflected ball into the path of Dejan Kulusevski in the centre of the penalty area, who flicked the ball around André Onana to double Spurs’ advantage.

Dominic Solanke secured victory in Manchester by scoring from a set-piece. Lucas Bergvall took the corner placing it in the path of a rising Pape Sarr who flicked the ball onto Solanke to end a fantastic 3-0 display at Old Trafford.

The busy schedule continues, with another two games in quick succession, including extensive travel arrangements to and from Hungary for Thursday's European contest. Tottenham will take on Ferencváros in the Europa League, subsequently returning to North London in preparation for their Premier League clash with Brighton and Hove Albion.