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When Tottenham beat Manchester City in November with their only two shots on goal and 34 per cent of the ball, it was seen as an incredibly effective counter display.
The subsequent stalemate at Chelsea was deemed an acceptable point. The victory over Arsenal, in which the Spurs had no shots in the second half and only 23 per cent of possession, was seen as an exercise to illustrate the impotence of their north London rivals.
Seven points from those three games more than justified the rapprochement and taking José Mourinho’s team to the top of the Premier League table sparked the dizzying talks about the title.
Four games without a win since then have quickly ended such hopes: The Spurs are now seventh if the teams below them manage to draw, let alone win their games at hand.
But perhaps even more significantly than that, recent results have undermined the idea that this team was simply adjusting to circumstances to eliminate its rivals at halftime.
Caution may have been the template for those previous successes, but now it has also cost them points. The 1-1 draw against Crystal Palace in mid-December, in which the Spurs led for an hour but barely seemed to be chasing the second goal, should have been a warning.
Instead, there was an even more dramatic example against the Wolves at Molineux on Sunday night when Tottenham had to settle for a point in a game they had led for 85 minutes.
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FREE TO SEE: Highlights from Wolves’ 1-1 draw with Tottenham
Again, if they had held out, some would have generously described this as a defensive masterclass, but the dearth of ambition against an out-of-form opponent was surprising.
Tanguy Ndombele’s goal in the first minute, which came after Heung-Min Son ran behind the defense 30 seconds into kick-off, should have been the perfect platform.
It is not the first time that this Tottenham team took it as their signal to back off and protect the lead. The Wolves defense, whose confidence presumably faltered after recently trading to a back four, was barely tested again. They were released. Invited to attack.
The wolves had more ball, but it wasn’t just that. When Tottenham had it, there was sterility in their approach game. There were times when Matt Doherty had room to run as a winger and the freedom to do so in his favorite winger role.
He turned.
Harry Kane sank deeper and deeper, seemingly embracing that ability to enter midfield with a bit of enthusiasm. Service to Son evaporated. There were no overlapping runs.
The Spurs went into containment mode from the middle of the first half and never quite got out. His last shot on goal came in the 21st minute. The only attempt in the second half was a free kick from Eric Dier. If Wolves teenage forward Fabio Silva had not mis-timed his injury-time header from close range, they would have lost.
While those previous victories showed the merits of a counterattack game in the right circumstances, these recent struggles have doomed it. Sometimes it works. This is often not the case. Tottenham have now lost nine points in the last 10 minutes of matches.
They have also given up the best chances in six of their seven games since the international break in November. Of course, that’s due a lot to the state of the game – Mourinho’s men have been leading much of the time in most of them. But if you play as if you are waiting for the opponent to score, sometimes they will.
As a consequence, Kane and Son, who are still statistically the most powerful combination of strikers in the Premier League, now seem a bit hungry for opportunities. The same expected goal data shows that since mid-November, only West Brom has created fewer chances.
All of which raises the question of who is responsible for the mindset of the team. Logic would suggest that this is an instruction instilled in the players by their coach Mourinho.
After all, he is preceded by his disdain for possession football and his reputation for winning games off the ball. But then he wanted to emphasize that this was not his directive.
“Our problem was that we scored in the first minute and we had 89 minutes to score more goals and we didn’t,” he said. “For me, that was the problem.”
When Mourinho has a message to convey, subtlety is not his style. Five times in his post-game press conference, he mentioned this line about having 89 minutes to score the second goal. He saw it more as a failure in attack than defense.
“It was not just about not scoring goals, it was about not being dangerous, not being ambitious. Of course, we can go to the corner and say that at Liverpool we should have won but lost with a corner, here we should have.” he won but tied with a corner. We can say that at Palace we should have won but he tied with a side free kick.
“I could even go to previous games. But I don’t think it’s very obvious to go in that direction and not go in other directions as well. For me, if you score in the first minute, you have 89 minutes to score more.” goals and we don’t “.
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José Mourinho could not hide his frustration with his side against the Wolves
The fact that Mourinho hired Steven Bergwijn to replace Sergio Reguilon just after the appointed time was proof to back up his claim that this negativity was not coming from the bank. That was a welcome change in a time when wolves were dominating the game.
In fact, he even suggested later that he had warned his players of the consequences of falling behind at halftime. It seems likely that he would have reminded them of what happened at Palace and urged his players to prevent it from happening again.
Could it be that the positive messages and experiences of shutting out Manchester City, Chelsea and Arsenal have led to misconfidence in their ability to rely on a clean sheet?
Or was it more of a tactical failure by Mourinho, with the change to five on the back robbing Kane and Son of more bodies to support them in the attacking phase of the game?
What is clear is that fifteen days after being at the top of the Premier League table, four games without a win – having given up the lead twice in the end – has altered the mood. Tottenham’s negativity must stop if they want to change momentum once again.
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