| Match report
There was a whiff of Fairy
Liquid in the air as Spurs came out into a mist of bubbles that was
more 4 year olds birthday party than Halloween, although it turned
out to be a bit of a nightmare for the Irons. The defeat
leaves them with more grief to suffer and their fans started out
hating Tottenham, but ended up turning on their own players as they
surrendered to a 3-1 win for Spurs handing them an easy passage to
the quarter final.
It had all started off so
convivially. There appeared to be a big degree of familiarity
between the two sets of fans who were not too far apart. A
spurs fan said he knew the mother of one of the West Ham fans very
well and the Happy Hammers waved back cheerily with one hand.
What really set the cat among the pigeons was an early goal by
Heung-Min Son. With an expectation among the home fans to
avenge the recent 0-1 defeat at our hands, they attacked our goal,
with Antonio getting some joy against Kyle Walker-Peters, but he
made little of it and Spurs had the ball in the net after nine
minutes, when Dele prodded in Eriksen's low ball across goal, but
the offside flag had been raised to signal Christian had advanced
too soon. West Ham had a great chance with 14 minutes gone,
with Diangana chipping across to Hernandez, but he couldn't get a
good contact on his volley and it went across goal towards Antonio,
but Juan Foyth stretched out to knock the ball away.
Fernando Llorente, getting a
rare start, headed away a West Ham corner, before playing the ball
out to the left where Aurier knocked it inside to Eriksen. The
Danish midfielder drove a ball into Dele. Ogbonna was close to
him, but not close enough to stop his inventive touch around the
defender for Son to run onto it and sweep it high into the roof of
the net to Adrian's right and put Spurs 1-0 up. It was a well
well created goal, but there was a big hole in the middle of the
home defence that Sonny too advantage of to knock in his first goal
of the season from twlelve yards out.
Tottenham were moving
forward with ease and Eriksen had a shot at goal from 25 yards out,
but a Irons body got in the way and then just before the half hour,
Antonio cut inside from the left wing, as he got away from KWP and
tried to curl a shot past Gazzaniga, but he overdid it and the ball
was cleared away by Son. Spurs were looking comfortable on the
ball, with Foyth bringing the ball out from the back and Winks was
probing forward from further forward, while West Ham's passing was
off target a lot of the time and Felipe Anderson's delivery from the
corner kicks rarely beat the first man or got a foot off the floor.
The home fans were getting angry with their own players, with
Hernandez receiving stick for not chasing down a long ball that ran
out for a Spurs free-kick.
The tactic to stop Spurs
seemed to be to take them out after the ball had been played and
referee Attwell was letting it go, but they got into the box on our
left when Antonio beat Walker-Peters and looked to beat Gazzaniga at
his near post from a tight angle, but Foyth made a fine
challenge that took the ball off Antonio and the Spurs keeper made
sure the ball went round the post for a corner. The corner
cleared the goalmouth and Diangana played it back in, but Antonio
couldn't keep his header down. Another set-piece, this time a
free-kick produced a half-chance for Hernandez, but the ball to him
from the left oat the far post was snuffed out, when Gazzaniga came
out to quickly grab the ball before the Mexican had a chance to get
a shot away.
Dele had a mad couple of
minutes, where he was racing around looking to dive into a tackle as
he had been clattered late and the ref hadn't given a free-kick, but
his chasing back was important in putting pressure on West Ham's
players with the ball. A little too much pressure by
Walker-Peters saw him drag back Antonio and a free-kick again almost
get the home team back into the match, as Antonio got onto a flick
on from Diop's cross, but Gazzaniga was behind it to save and that
was it for the first half, except Winks had to have some treatment
before the whistle went for the break.
Some big flags being waved
on the pitch and some taunting between the fans passed the interval,
with West Ham coming out a bit more feisty, much like their
stewards, who had decided to eject Spurs fans - probably to even out
the early departures from the West Ham areas, as more of the the
white seats became visible as the game went on. Howeverr,
it was Spurs with the first effort as dele drove into Adrian's hands
from inside the box. west Ham had a good opening when Antonio
got inside Walker-Peters, but Foyth came across to cover and was
nudged over by the West Ham winger, but he couldn't gather the ball
and Paulo Gazzaniga came out to claim it. It needed KWP to
clear for a corner to make the ball safe and from it, the irons
couldn't make anything from the dead ball situation. It was five
minutes later when Spurs won the ball and Eriksen found Dele in the
centre circle. He drove a ball in the direction of Sonny, but
Masuaku was there. He couldn't sort his legs out and could
only let it bounce off his thigh as it went past him, allowing Son
to run through on goal, take it to Adrian's right and then slip it
into the net from eight yards out. Cue celebrations in the
Spurs end and bottles thrown from the West Ham fans in the adjacent
main stand, who had spent most of the game watching us rather than
the game (and I can understand why when you are watching West Ham).
So, Spurs were 2-0 ahead with 54 minutes gone and looking
comfortable, but then we thought the same at half time in this
competition last season.
Pellegrini responded by
bringing on Arnautovic and Lucas Perez, having taken off the hugely
disappointing delicate Anderson at half-time for the more
agricultural Snodgrass. They took a couple of minutes to have
an effect, during which Son caused problems in the box before being
dispossessed, but Arnautovic put a cross in that Foyth had to deal
with at the expense of a corner and Dele got that one out. The
ball was now around our penalty box more often and tackles by
Sanchez and Foyth, who both played very well, had to put in good
tackles to prevent any further progress by the Irons. Then
there was a corner that lead to a game of pinball in the box, with
Arnautovic having a shot blocked and then Gazzaniga did well to get
down to his right to save from Ogbonna, but an offside flag would
have wiped it out anyway.
Spurs had brought on GK
Nkoudou, making a rare subs appearance on for Dele and he caused
problems on our left, with his pace and ability to bring the ball
away as an out ball. Diop tackled him as he ran in on goal and
it fell for Son, but Adrian was behind his effort with a low save,
but West Ham pushed forward and Son needed to stop Snodgrass as he
got into the area and then Arnautovic was played through by
Fredericks and looked like he was lining up a shot, but Foyth
produced a perfectly times crunching tackle that stopped him getting
the shot off and gave them a corner. From it, the ball
went to the far post, which perhaps Spurs had been lulled into a
false sense of security by thinking they weren't able to do that,
leaving sub Perez alone to head down past Paulo to close the score
to 2-1. The worry that getting a goal back might give the home
team the impetus to go on and score more was always a worry, as we
had not been putting our opportunities away. With 19 minutes
left it was a possibility, as they had looked more lively since
their double substitution.
With VAR in operation, the
goal had to be checked out, so the delay saw the teams line up for
the kick off before the decision came through and this is one of the
main problems with the review system.
Nearly the whole gamut of football experiences was rolled out for
this game, with only a penalty, an own goal and a sending off
missing … usually key ingredients of a match against the Spammers.
A pitch invader came in from opposite the main stand and it took
five stewards to get him off the turf before Spurs could take a
corner that had been won by Nkoudou, who worked the ball down the
line with Eriksen. Whether it distracted the WHULFC defence or
whether they are not very good, but their foothold back in the game
slipped from under them, when Tottenham scored from the corner and
it was Fernando Llorente, who had been doing OK up front, who was
left unmarked in the area, just outside the six yard box to volley
in with Ogbonna getting to him too late to prevent the goal. Four
minutes had elapsed since the home team’s goal and the boost they
got from that was wiped away by the front man’s finish.
Antonio, who had been involved, but was rubbish curled a shot from
Arnautovic’s cross well wide of Gazzaniga’s goal and was being
treated to the hairdryer treatment by his own supporters. The third
goal seemed to knock West Ham and they were chasing the ball, with
Tottenham passing it around comfortably. With six minutes of the
regulation 90 remaining, Spurs took off Christian Eriksen, captain
for the night and brought on 18-year-old Oliver Skipp for his Spurs
debut. It was a big moment for the youngster and he didn’t look out
of place as he showed good energy and awareness on the ball. Victor
Wanyama took over with the armband.
There was one moment of anxiousness when Arnautovic burst into the
Spurs box, but Sanchez held him off and Gazzaniga took the ball. A
late Snodgrass free-kick somehow went across the face of goal and
was played back in by Diangana, but Spurs smuggled the ball away.
The closest to another goal came in the final minute of added time
when Sissoko was into the area on the right and looked as though he
was going to shoot, but produced a disguised pass square for Nkoudou,
but the winger had just strayed offside.
A 3-1 win was the least Spurs deserved for this controlled
performance that saw them dominate and despite the odd breach of our
defence, West Ham rarely looked like threatening. Two wins over the
Irons in eleven days was brushed aside by a massive West Ham fan on
the train after the match, who said “So what ?” when ribbed about it
by a Spurs supporting friend of her daughter’s. Well, it was three
points and you are knocked out of the Carabou Cup. “Yeah, but
Tottenham are crap.” On that
reasoning, what does that make West Ham ? Then, just to reinforce
any stereotype you had of West Ham fans, the boyfriend of her
daughter’s passed his mobile phone to her to look at something and
the daughter said, “The password’s 1966.” I think that speaks
volumes. Others on the way back to the station said, “It was only
the Mickey Mouse Cup” and “Glad we lost ‘cos Arsenal will thrash
Spurs.” I suppose their lack of success means the only joy they get
is from the travails of others.
On the marathon march back
to Stratford station there were the normal skirmishes and few Police
around. At one stage there was a line of about six stewards holding
hands between the two sets of fans ! Having seen the lack of
attention in the stadium by stewards, who failed to deal with
persistent standing, bottles being thrown and some foul language
that seemed to be worthy of being thrown out if you were a visitor,
but if you were a season ticket holder, then it is acceptable.
Confusing, but then there is not a lot that isn’t about the stadium
and the club that inhabit it.
Job done by the fairly strong Spurs side that allowed some fringe
players to get some playing time and most of them impressed in the
win that takes Spurs through to another London derby at
Arsenal. They have been playing weakened sides against the lower
level opposition they have faced, but there will be more of a
familiar look about the side that turns out against us at Highbury.
Charlie Mason |
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