Having suffered an unfortunate defeat to Tottenham Hotspur early on in the season, earlier today we welcomed them back to Villa Park and hopes were high that we could help ourselves to a little bit of revenge.
Having started the far brighter, we took the lead when Toby Alderweireld found his own net from an Anwar El Ghazi cross, but by the half hour mark, he had made up for his error and got them back on level terms. Spurs started the second half brighter and took the lead through Son Heung-Min who nestled from a penalty rebound, but we battled back and Bjorn Engels restored parity and made up for his controversial penalty error in the 53rd minute.
It was certainly an entertaining game, but four minutes into stoppage time Heung-Min grabbed his brace to send all three points disappointingly in their direction. Arguably we deserved a point and despite his goal, Engels will no doubt get some criticism for his performance. We just have to take the positives, and we continue to sit outside of the relegation spots and that’s long been our aim.
Speaking to the BBC following the game, head coach Dean Smith said of the match.
“We have to try and take the positives. The last two games we’ve scored late winners here, so now we know how it feels on the other foot. We had chances to win the game but we weren’t clinical enough. They have a front four that can hurt anyone, that’s why we had to get forward and defend on the front foot. On the whole, I thought we dealt with them really well but we’re disappointed with the goals we conceded. We probably gave away too many chances from counter attacks, which they’re good at, but we didn’t deserve to lose that. It was a good performance against a team that are fifth in the league but we deserved more than that.”
Rather tellingly, Jose Mourinho also commented.
“I thought we deserved to win but I think they did not deserve to lose. Villa played to win.”
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Villa Park
Premier League
16/02/2020 3:00 pm
Attendance: 41874
Referee: Atkinson
| Aston Villa | Tottenham Hotspur | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alderweireld (og 9), Engels (53) | Alderweireld (27), Son Heung-Min (45+2, 90+4) | ||||||
| Reina | Lloris | ||||||
| Konsa | Aurier | ||||||
| Engels | Alderweireld | ||||||
| Hause | Sanchez | ||||||
| Guilbert | Davies | ||||||
| Drinkwater | 60 | Dier | 60 | ||||
| Douglas Luiz | Winks | ||||||
| Targett | Lucas Moura | ||||||
| El Ghazi | 70 | Alli | 83 | ||||
| Samatta | 83 | Bergwijn | 96 | ||||
| Grealish | Son Heung-Min | ||||||
Substitutes |
|||||||
| Taylor | Vertonghen | 96 | |||||
| Nakamba | 60 | Lo Celso | 60 | ||||
| Hourihane | Gazzaniga | ||||||
| Trezeguet | 70 | Ndombele | |||||
| Baston | 83 | Skipp | |||||
| Nyland | Carvalho Fernandes | 83 | |||||
| Elmohamady | Tanganga | ||||||
Game Statistics |
||
| 18 | Goal attempts | 23 |
| 4 | On Target | 10 |
| 12 | Corners | 7 |
| 12 | Fouls | 10 |
| 2 | Yellow Cards | 0 |
| 0 | Red Cards | 0 |
| 55 | % | 45 |