Athletic Madrid 5-2 Spurs: Three Tottenham Talking Points

1. The Kinsky Episode

‘All action, no plot’ barely covers it, which is saying something. After the succession of fresh disasters that were Newcastle, and then Woolwich, and then Fulham, and then Palace, each somehow a lower ebb than the previous one, even the finest creative minds in the land would have struggled to magic up some new depths for our lot to plumb.

However, if four decades of disbelieving shakes of the head and rubs of the eyes have taught me anything it’s that Tottenham Hotspur’s capacity for disaster should never be under-estimated. Accordingly, just when it seemed the barmiest, most bonkers plot-lines had been exhausted, we somehow dredged up this nonsense with Kinsky, resulting in the substitution of a goalkeeper after 16 minutes having already shipped three goals. Only at Spurs, what?

First up, a few brutal home truths. Of course, supporting Spurs is not for the faint-hearted anyway, but nevertheless, it’s probably best at the point to insert one of those parental warnings that one sometimes sees paraded before a particularly edgy announcement.

And with that in mind, 3-0 down after 15 minutes is pretty first-rate bilge in anyone’s books. No PR company in the world can shove a positive spin on that and expect it to land without a few raised eyebrows about the place. Moreover, it creates a rather awkward narrative for whichever poor lemon happened to be between the sticks at the time. Concession of three of the finest in the opening quarter of an hour is not the bullet point anyone wants on their CV.

However, once this latest debacle had been digested, and on observing poor old Kinsky being yanked into an early departure, AANP donned the monocle and gave the whole thing a spot of scrutiny.

The first goal, it seemed to me, came about because Kinsky lost his footing. Not a great look, of course; but equally, not an event brought about by a particular level of ineptitude. To add a bit of meat to this argument, I direct you towards the second goal, for which VDV similarly lost his footing. Again, one no doubt turns the air blue at witnessing it, but it hardly goes down as a mistake on the chap’s part. Nobody suggested removing the chap from the premises.

Of course, the third goal was entirely on Kinsky, as he became all left feet and somehow tackled himself, in what will go down as one of the great adverts for the fate that will befall a man who takes his eye off the ball at the crucial juncture.

Nevertheless, by my count, that amounts to one mistake. An absolute rip-snorter of a mistake it was, granted; and one that compounded already farcical matters, no doubt; but only the one mistake nevertheless. Kinsky slipped; and then VDV slipped; and then Kinsky made a bona fide clanger – but I don’t particularly see how that one mistake merited a substitution of the chap.

At best it seemed an odd managerial decision, and it worst it lay somewhere between rash and petulant. Having brought the young whelp into the XI – and without uttering a word of explanation why, dash it – the decision to hook him was tactically rather rummy. Whether Tudor was admitting not to know the quality of his players, or admitting that he made a gamble and decided after just 15 minutes that it had failed, or was simply over-reacting, he doesn’t seem to emerge particularly well from this latest lilywhite farce.

By the by, I heard one of the bods on the tellybox burble about the substitution being disrespectful. This AANP does not give too many hoots about. Substitutions should not be paused for fear of hurting the feelings of the squadron, dash it. Take the hit and get on with life is just about the sum of the AANP take on that, and if they still feel disrespected then they count every last pound coin in their enormous salary envelope for distraction.

But as tactical, managerial moves go, I thought Tudor worked himself into a jolly squiffy corner with that substitution.

2. Porro

A little leftfield perhaps, on a night when there were all manner of larger problems over which to stew, but far more than the glut of early goals pinging in from all angles, the issue that grated to the core over here was the ongoing nonsense from Pedro Porro.

Yes, yes, the chap scored one and created another – and credit where due, he executed both with a dash of quality.

But Porro is first and foremost a defender, and just once I would like to head back to base with praise for his defensive contributions falling from my lips. Instead, we were treated to the usual display of Porro’s defensives negligence. Wing-back or not, his repeated insistence on shrugging off his defensive duties, and leaving the Madrid forward to enjoy the freedom of the left wing was maddening.

The biscuit was then well and truly taken by that astonishing sputtering of the Porro motor en route to the Madrid fifth, when he entered into a solid foot-race with Alvarez from halfway, gradually ran out of steam and then completely gave up altogether, dash it all. He simply abandoned the chase! It was left to Spence to motor along from a completely different postcode to try to add some respectability to the scene, but by golly, to see an international footballer puff and wheeze his way across the turf as if treading quicksand, was enough to drive one to distraction.

I noted too, that as soon as Alvarez had deposited the thing in the net, Porro immediately started devoting his energies to spinning around and waving his arms at anyone who caught his eye, as if to suggest that the fault for all this lay elsewhere. Honestly, if I’d been anywhere near the blighter I’d have wrung his neck and happily taken a stretch in a Madrid cell for the privilege.

And all this followed similar nonsense against Palace, when he again gave up the ghost when supposedly chasing down a forward before berating Vicario after the concession of one of the goals. There are a few rotten eggs about the place, on and off the pitch, but Porro cheeses me off no end.

3. What Might Have Been

As an afterthought, another irritation about the whole bally spectacle was that once the initial three-goal lead had been gifted to the other lot, our heroes actually plugged away with an element of decency for the remainder.

The obvious caveat here is that having given us a thrashing inside 15 minutes, the Atletic players were clearly laughing their heads off. One can listen to all the post-match interviews in the world about doing a professional job and whatnot, but AANP knows a team taking its foot off the gas when it sees one, and last night’s tormentors were a doing exactly that.

Nevertheless, I was actually taken aback by quite how many half-decent opportunities our heroes carved out. In addition to a couple of goals, we hit a post and had a pretty straightforward point-blank header saved, in addition to one or two other vaguely presentable opportunities. As ever, the bar is low, but this was a damned sight better haul than we’ve been used to in recent months.

It makes the opening 15-minute car-crash all the more galling. No knowing how things might have turned out if our lot could just have been normal for the opening stretch, and we might well have been hammered even without the slips and slides at the back. But having made a fist of things over the remaining 75 minutes, it is a wistful AANP who wonders “What if?” on this occasion.