Tottenham Hotspur's 1-0 defeat to Manchester City on Wednesday night brought plenty of talking points and a big one was Ange Postecoglou's team selection for the match.
Erling Haaland's first-half goal ultimately decided a game that saw City dominate the opening 45 minutes at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium before Spurs controlled the second half and had enough chances to grab a point from the encounter or even all three had they been more clinical in front of goal.
Postecoglou chose to start the game with Son Heung-min, Dejan Kulusevski and the in-form Djed Spence all rested on the bench and when asked by football.london about that decision the Tottenham boss explained his reasoning.
"There's no point having a squad and I can't be sitting here bemoaning not having a squad and then not use it [when I do]. I think that'd be highly hypocritical of me, but we needed Destiny [Udogie], Brennan [Johnson] and Wilson to play today and get some minutes," said the Australian,
"Deki, Sonny and Djed have played an enormous amount of time, so having them have a little bit of a recovery and a breather, I thought was going to be helpful for us, but more importantly, now I've got three more players who are getting close to...I mean it's 90 minutes for Brennan, that's the first 90 minutes for quite a while. We're going to have some real options which we're going to need because we've got Europa and league back-to-back now and we need as many bodies available for that as possible."
We asked our Spurs reporters Alasdair Gold and Rob Guest what they made of the starting line-up sent out on the night in N17.
Alasdair Gold - Tottenham Hotspur correspondent
Rightly or wrongly, ultimately results and hindsight decide whether the team selected was the correct one or not. After a first half in which Spurs were fortunate to get to the break with only a single goal deficit, that same starting XI - following some choice words at the interval - looked far better in the second period and took the game to City.
Had Tottenham come away with even a point if Pape Matar Sarr's late header had crept under the crossbar rather than over it then the decision to rotate might have been lauded if the players brought in to get minutes all go on to impress in the cluster of four games in 11 days from next Thursday onwards. There's no doubting that Odobert, Johnson and Udogie will benefit going forward but was it at the cost of the points on this occasion?
If I'm a Manchester City player arriving at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Wednesday and I see a Spurs starting XI without Son and Kulusevski, who have given the Citizens nightmares over recent seasons, then I'm probably breathing a sigh of relief. That also goes for Spence's omission, with the 24-year-old Spurs' best-performing player and a threat going forward.
Kulusevski and Son did need rests and perhaps Spence after such an intense period of fixtures which his body had got unused to, but in a big match that came eight days before the Europa League tie in Alkmaar seems like an unlikely choice. It perhaps also lends itself to Postecoglou prioritising that game in the Netherlands - the competition does represent Tottenham's last chance of salvaging the season - over a match in which a defeat would not have sent shockwaves around the league.
Rob Guest - Football writer
Ange Postecoglou's Tottenham team selection against Manchester City was certainly a talking point before the game and it remained one after it. The decision to name Djed Spence, Dejan Kulusevski and Son Heung-min on the bench did not go down well with some fans but Postecoglou quite clearly had his reasons.
I've no issue with the changes the Spurs boss made but I think they should have come against Ipswich Town in the previous game instead, although a start at Portman Road would have come just too early for Wilson Odobert as he steps up his fitness. I get the importance of the Ipswich fixture to building momentum in the Premier League but Tottenham still had enough firepower in their team to win without Spence, Kulusevski and Son in the XI.
Kulusevski and Son have certainly needed a rest for a while and Ipswich presented the best opportunity to give them that, thus meaning they would be fresh to take on Manchester City. Postecoglou summed it up perfectly after the game when he said "there's no point having a squad and I can't be sitting here bemoaning not having a squad and then not use it [when I do]".
There's also no guarantee the trio would have made a huge difference in the first half as City dominated proceedings and Spurs really struggled to lay a glove on them. It's just nice for Postecoglou to have choice for once after going so long with limited options at his disposal.
Click here to listen to the latest episode of Gold & Guest Talk Tottenham.