‘Leave him out’ v West Ham – Ex-Spurs Scout: Five things I learned from Tottenham draw with Manchester City
Tottenham News is delighted to welcome aboard our brilliant new columnist Bryan King, the former goalkeeper who spent six years as a senior scout at Spurs and 28 years in total in first-team scouting roles. Bryan also spent eight years on Everton’s recruitment team and 11 years scouting at Aston Villa across two different spells.
A depleted Tottenham earned an impressive point away at Manchester City on Sunday (3 December) as Dejan Kulusevski scored a last-minute equaliser in a six-goal thriller.
Son Heung-min gave Ange Postecoglou’s side an unexpected lead after six minutes when he was played through on goal by eventual goalscorer Kulusevski.
An own goal from Son followed by a brilliant City team goal finished off by Phil Foden gave the home side a 2-1 lead at half-time. However, Tottenham fought back through Giovani Lo Celso in the 69th minute.
When Jack Grealish put City 3-2 ahead with just over 10 minutes to play it looked like Spurs were set for a fourth consecutive defeat, but Kulusevski was the hero, stepping up to score his third goal in as many visits to the Etihad Stadium and level proceedings late on to earn Postecoglou’s men a valuable point.
Ex-Spurs scout Bryan King was watching on for Tottenham News and detailed five things he learned from the impressive draw.
Tottenham showed character
I thought the character in the second half was great. This is what is getting Tottenham through, they have a good atmosphere in the club and a good feeling in the team and after a tough few matches that feeling came through once again in the second half.
They worked hard, they showed a bit of guts and I enjoyed watching them. Everyone was saying before the game that this was going to be the fourth defeat on the bounce, but they got a point out of the match and they finished the game strongly.
This will give them a lot of confidence now going forward. This is certainly a different Tottenham to the one we saw last year, they could have lied down and got beat but instead, they took the game to City and caused them problems.
A game of two halves
First 45 minutes, Tottenham were lucky to only be 2-1 down, it was men against boys. They were very fortunate, but in the second half it was a totally different story, the attitude and tempo changed and they were matching Manchester City, it was suddenly men against men.
When it got to 2-1 in the first half with another 15 or 16 minutes to go I was worried it would get embarrassing for Spurs, City were dominant.
I am sure that Postecoglou told them to get their fingers out at half-time and asked the players if they wanted to get a result or not because if they continued playing that way it would have been a long journey home empty-handed.
He would have told them to step up to the plate and they certainly did that in the second half, they were giving City a lot of problems and at 2-2 I thought they could go and win the game, to be honest.
Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg should start against West Ham
Postecoglou changed things at half-time by bringing on Hojbjerg for Bryan Gil and I thought the midfield looked much more balanced with Hojbjerg in the middle and Kulusevski out wide.
Lo Celso also played well, he is a good player, he has quality, his passing was good and it was a great finish for the goal. With him and Hojbjerg in the middle, I think Tottenham looked much better.
Overall I liked the midfield in the second half, and if they can play like that again I would start Hojbjerg against West Ham without a shadow of a doubt.
Brennan Johnson and Kulusevski star
The two of them out wide are as good as there is in the league at the moment, they both work so hard and Kulusevski attacked the ball so well coming off the right for the equaliser.
As for Johnson, I have been impressed with him ever since he came into the team and he impressed me once again in this match. He certainly has room to improve, but he is a good crosser of the ball and he is very good when he is running with the ball, which is always the sign of a good wide player.
Yves Bissouma disappoints again
Bissouma was poor, he didn’t get into the game at all. He gave the ball away in dangerous areas, especially in the first half, and he also didn’t pick the runner-up for City’s second goal. If I was giving points out I would have given Bissouma a four.
I have no idea why he was trying to beat three or four players inside his own half, you just don’t do things like that in those areas, and when City scored from his mistake I really thought that was it. I would leave him out against West Ham.
In other Tottenham news, Gary Neville has harshly blamed one 100 per cent Tottenham after the draw with Manchester City.