For Tottenham, there has been a lot of good news over the past two days.
Manchester United, who are ranked in front of them, lost a big player in Europe in midweek, bringing a lot of variables to their race for four; Third-placed Newcastle lost to Aston Villa, who have been in fairly consistent form recently, in the early game, dropping a crucial three points.
So this game against Bournemouth, the initiative came to the hands of Tottenham, as long as they win at home, they can close the point gap with the team in front of them, and can also avoid Aston Villa from impacting their position, but Bournemouth also have enough fighting spirit to need relegation, not to mention that at this time, it is time for the relegation maniac to come out of the hole.
As a result, the good thing of killing two birds with one stone turned into a bamboo basket after 90 minutes.
In fact, in the opening stages, Tottenham were quite good.
In this game, Strini continued the two-striker thinking of the previous game against Brighton, which is reflected in Son Heung-min's normal fall on the left edge when defending, and often gives the defensive responsibility of the penalty area corner to Skipper:
In attack, he will be actively involved, focusing on the space behind Bournemouth:
Under the deterrence of such a threatening striker, the Bournemouth perimeter of this five-back is naturally empty, so it gives Tottenham a lot of space to test in the middle and ribs:
So driven by the double forwards, Tottenham actually performed well in the opening period, and also scored a goal early, which laid a good foundation for the rest of the game under normal circumstances:
It must be said that Tottenham's two-striker approach was fine and the opening performance was obvious to all, but the problem is that Tottenham's performance is difficult to sustain.
Kane confrontation + ball, Son Heung-min impact + attack, is indeed a very complementary set of offensive partners, the data of the past few years and external wind reviews have long proved this, but the combination of complementary characteristics, more or less a little limited.
The limitation is that the order of operation of this combination is Kane first played, Son Heung-min can play, once Kane for various reasons can not play, Son Heung-min can not replace Kane's responsibilities, so that the two-forward combination will immediately fail, thus affecting the team's performance:
That's understandable, Kane himself is not a young player, and his injury history is quite long, so it is right to save a little, but for the coach, when Kane relaxes a little, he needs to find a way to continue his strength.
If it doesn't continue, Tottenham's backfield can't be reassuring.
Shortly after Tottenham's goal, in the 16th minute, Bournemouth came out from the back and played a quick attack:
Throughout the process, Dale's front head Solanke was one step slower, allowing the latter to create space and possession for the midfielder, while Polo was easily pressed in front of Viña in defense to give his teammates a chance to shoot.
With an attack like this, Bournemouth will gain more confidence and will have the guts to try more even if they are down away.
After all, they can already sense Tottenham's weaknesses in defence.
For Tottenham, this is of course a good opportunity to fight back, but if you can't punish the opponent with offensive efficiency first, the home and opponents play each other, it is still a loss for Tottenham, because Tottenham's backfield is not good, and the slightest mistake will lose the score advantage.
In the 29th minute, Dyer was even slower this time, allowing Solanke not only to easily pick up the ball, but also to turn and connect with the weak side, and Bournemouth fired another threatening long-range shot:
Although Dale can send such a long pass to Son Heung-min, he directly plays an attack:
But before this long pass, Lenglet was injured and Strini sent on Davinson Sanchez, which means:
There are more and more thunder at the back of Tottenham.
So shortly after this attack, Polo made a mistake in handling at the back and actually tried to get the ball out of the crowd, and after being broken, neither Davinson Sanchez nor Dale, who played at right center back, quickly realized that danger was about to arise between them:
During this time, it was already difficult to cooperate between Kane and Son Heung-min, the former needed to slow down, the latter could not lead the attack independently, and the upper limit problem of complementary characteristics was exposed.
The former can't play, the latter Redo will naturally explode, and even Bournemouth formed a siege at the end of the first half, from the side of Romero who changed to left-centre-back to form a continuous threat, Tottenham are not far from sending a penalty:
Faced with such a situation, there is nothing too good for Tottenham's side.
Son Heung-min is characterized by such a characteristic, unable to become comprehensive in a single game; Kulusevski will hopefully share Kane's responsibilities, but under the two-striker system, his defensive responsibilities are heavier than before; Redo is also difficult to replace at the back, not to mention that Tottenham have hardly played a back four in the past few years.
So you can only rely on the striker to help the backfield get out of trouble, so that even if Polo and others make mistakes, don't make mistakes in dangerous areas, maybe they can still have such offensive contributions:
But mistakes are inevitable at the back, and coming up front will only leave more room for Bournemouth. In the 51st minute, Bournemouth once again came out of the back and played a fast attack, and along the way, Dyer and Davinson Sanchez became the backdrop for Bournemouth's goal:
Trailing 2-1 at home, Strini decided to make a desperate bet.
He replaced striker Danjuma, who was already a substitute and made constant mistakes on the pitch, risked facing locker room problems to add weight to the attack, and in the 77th minute, replaced midfielder Skipper with striker Richarlison.
The intention and performance of the storm can no longer be obvious:
But even with such a pressure at home, in the face of sporadic defensive tasks, Tottenham Hotspur still inevitably made mistakes at the back:
At the end of the game, regardless of whether Tottenham's five strikers have a common routine with each other, there is still a chance to chisel one or two as the attacking pressure gradually accumulates:
But in the 5th minute of stoppage time, Bournemouth took advantage of Solanke's counterpoint on Polo to score the real killer goal by Ouattara:
This is the end of the game.
The whole situation of the game is actually very clear, Tottenham's two-striker system is indeed a threat, but there is not enough endurance, and Tottenham's backfield is indeed a lot of people, but it is not really safe and stable.
So when a double striker is online, Tottenham can play a threat, but as soon as Bournemouth starts, Tottenham will also face a threat.
The whole game, basically an open mutual stabbing situation, you give me a knife, I also stab you, nothing more than Tottenham actively and passively in this process to increase the offensive end, on the bench, and then replace the substitute, as if it seems to be a little confused in thinking.
However, the defender is injured, and it is no problem to change the defender in the position; Behind at home, it's no problem to pile up forwards; Replace the error-making Da Vinson Sanchez and replace the defense with an attack, which would have also been seen as the right hand if Richarlison's header had hit within the goal frame:
However, the score changed from a possible 3-2 to a final 2-3.
At the end of the day, Tottenham Hotspur has too many thunders. There were a lot of them in the starting line-up, forced to change to a defender, and found out that it was still Ray, which was very tricky for the coach.
Combined with the fact that all the factors have been added up, Tottenham's home win hopes can only be pinned on Bournemouth, but the latter seized all the opportunities.
So with such a performance, Tottenham don't talk about competing for four, to keep their current position, in addition to their own strikers to fill the hole of the defender first, in fact, they also have to pin their hopes on the opponent.