After last week’s ignominious home defeat in the north London derby, things had become so fraught in the online world of Spurs fans that the club’s manager Ange Postecoglou suggested supporters should do a bit of yoga to calm down.
And here, just 24 hours after his wellbeing prescription, was the Tottenham Stadium rocking in delight, the fans chanting out loud and proud the very names of players whose characters had been traduced so recently. Though in truth it was less a mass downward dog that had eased the collective blood pressure. It was more the three goals and three points.
Mind, the visiting manager Thomas Frank may be rethinking his bold game plan of taking the lead before the opposition have woken up. For the second week running his Brentford team scored in the first minute, only to find themselves on the losing side. And just as against Manchester City last weekend, all that early onslaught did was apparently anger his opponents.
Infuriated by the speed, ease and efficiency of Bryan Mbeumo’s lovely volley almost from the kick-off, Tottenham responded with real aggression and resolve. Though Postecoglou, never willing to take the obvious line, suggested the early goal offered no spur to his team.
“To be honest, it was like it never happened,” he claimed afterwards of Brentford’s lightning strike. “The boys went at it as we thought we should. We knew if we put our own intensity in we could cause them a lot of problems.”
Maddison the epitome of intensity
And intensity was the word. Led by James Maddison, who epitomised the spirit of the side in the pace and aggression of his interceptions and the manner in which he always sought to play the ball forwards at pace, Spurs excised much of the memory of their tame surrender to Arsenal. For the majority of this game, they played exactly as their manager has always said they can.
Even more delightfully for Postecoglou, Dominic Solanke scored his first goal for the club, poking home the rebound after Mark Flekken had saved Maddison’s shot, while Brennan Johnson got his second goal in four days to suppress the tiresome online complaints about his commitment to the cause.
“He had a tough week last week,” said his manager of Johnson. “But that gives you perspective. He’s a much-loved member of the squad. Anyone who watches Brennan play, if they think he doesn’t work as hard as he does, I’d be very surprised.”
What made the win all the more satisfying for those of a Tottenham persuasion was that it came against a side who are no pushovers.
True, Ethan Pinnock’s woeful attempt to play out from the back led to the Spurs equaliser. But the visitors never stopped trying, creating plenty of opportunities, Mbeumo in particular seemed infuriated by his failure to accept a couple of gilt-edged invitations. And for all Spurs’ combative spirit, they were indebted to Guglielmo Vicario, who made two world-class saves to deny Mbeumo and the substitute Kevin Schade.
Lucky escape for Vicario
The irony of the keeper’s interventions is that they came after he may, in other circumstances, have been sent off. He appeared to handle the ball outside his area, but the referee John Brooks missed his juggling act and, as it did not involve a goal-scoring opportunity, VAR did not intervene.
“There is no doubt, he handballed it outside the box. But that situation didn’t define the game. It could have been a free-kick for us. But the probability of scoring from a direct free-kick is about 0.01%. And I think overall the referee had a very good game,” said Frank, who is becoming rapidly used to the role of the gallant loser.
But he was right. Ultimately, the incident was not significant. What was significant was Maddison’s performance, one which, you imagine, will have been noted by Lee Carsley ahead of the next round of England’s Nations League fixtures.
When the Spurs No 10 scored the third goal here, executing an audacious chip following a move that swept the length of the pitch, he tore off his shirt in sheer delight. It was a finish of such touch, delicacy and precision it really ought to be memorialised in a yoga move. The Maddison Winner: it is a posture that would relax many an overwrought football fan.