Soporific Spurs had Hugo Lloris to thank for only losing 2-0 at Old Trafford after a fizzing and energetic performance from Erik Ten Hag’s improving Manchester United. This time, Spurs definitely didn’t lose to Cristiano Ronaldo.
1. The calamitous nature of Spurs’ performance on a night when the Tory Party was collapsing in on itself in Westminster sort of demands a website like ours attempts some kind of amusing pulling together of these two strands, but we’re too exhausted to bother. So just imagine we did something like that here. It would go a bit like “an incoherent performance with baffling tactics that appeared to play perfectly into the oppositions’ hands, but enough about the Tory Party…” except, you know, less shit. Or more shit. Whichever’s funnier. Your expectations were confounded, and from thence the humour arose.
This by the way is comfortably the worst first conclusion in the long and mixed history of 16 Conclusions but we’ll say this: it’s still better than anything 10 of Spurs’ starting XI managed tonight so… alright?
2. “We didn’t lose against United, we lost against Cristiano Ronaldo.” That was Antonio Conte’s verdict before this game when asked about his last trip here with Tottenham in March, when a Ronaldo hat-trick condemned Spurs to a 3-2 defeat. It was pithy and reductive stuff from Conte, but not wrong: Spurs were much better that night and gave as good as they got in a game that could absolutely have ended differently. There was no Ronaldo tonight, and Spurs were outplayed in every conceivable way, individually and collectively, by a United team with better skill, better energy and a better plan. Tonight, Spurs definitely lost against United.
3. But as bad as Spurs/The Tories were, United were absolutely excellent. They’ve now beaten Liverpool, Arsenal and Tottenham in the early stages of Erik Ten Hag’s increasingly encouraging rebuild and this was comfortably the most complete and compelling performance of the lot. It was total domination almost from first to last, with Spurs (their outfield players at least) having absolutely no answer to United’s speed, intensity and movement.
4. Before the half-hour mark, United had racked up 16 shots. That was already more than in any other Ten Hag Premier League game. By half-time that number was 19. We all know Antonio Conte sets his side up to cede possession and territory in these games and look to hit on the counter, but not like…
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