Job done, as Joe Hart would not say. This win does not heal the wounds opened by the dismal loss at Arsenal and Thursday’s humiliation by Dinamo Zagreb, but it showed that Spurs still have at least some players who can do “the basics of life”, which José Mourinho condemned certain members of his team for failing to do in Croatia.
Mourinho has never been a manager who it has been easy to pity, not even when presenting himself as the victim of chicanery by referees, directors, journalists, opponents, football associations or an international humanitarian agency. But going into the game at Villa Park there had been something pathetic about him, and not just because he declared himself to be “more than sad” at his team’s performance in Zagreb. There he seemed angry at his players’ refusal to carry out orders but also almost resigned to his own impotence, like a weatherman shaking his fist weakly at clouds for bringing rain after he forecast sunshine.
It made one wonder which is worse for a manager: to have players who cannot do what he wants, players who do not listen to him or players who listen to him so that they can do the precise opposite to what he wants? In any of those scenarios, the manager knows he is in a bad place. But if Mourinho’s inability to connect with at least some of Tottenham’s players has been cited as evidence of his obsolescence, it must also be remembered that Mauricio Pochettino, no dinosaur, suffered similar frustration during the end of his reign at Spurs. And Hugo Lloris’s post-match comments on Thursday revealed splits in the dressing room, suggesting that some players have been as exasperated as the manager with the attitudes of others.
The questions at Villa Park, then, were to what extent can Mourinho still influence events? Do Tottenham have enough players willing and able to play as he demands? It turns out that they do.
Aston Villa were fitting opponents given that Mourinho said they are the team he has most enjoyed watching in the Premier League this season. Granted, he said that in January before Jack Grealish’s injury deprived them of magic but, even without their captain, Villa have generally been dynamic, solid, spirited and ambitious throughout the campaign. A good example for Spurs, in other words. It was interesting to see which players Mourinho chose to face Villa after a week in which Spurs flopped in two matches with almost two different lineups.
Apparently illness ruled out Serge Aurier and Toby Alderweireld, but Mourinho made other, unforced changes to defence, a sector where unreliability has been the one constant for Spurs this season. Eric Dier was left out, while Joe Rodon and Davinson Sánchez formed the fifth central defence pairing Mourinho has used in the league this season – and they did fine after an iffy start. Japhet Tanganga was reasonable at right-back, while Matt Doherty was not even among the substitutes.
Carlos Vinícius got a rare start up front, while Giovani Lo Celso came into midfield, with Dele Alli and Gareth Bale left to contemplate the meaning of life on the bench. Two 16-year-olds, Alfie Devine and Dane Scarlett, were alongside them because Mourinho wanted “to prove to the other guys that we are looking to the future too”. That suggested that when Mourinho underlined after the defeat in Zagreb that Spurs were “my team”, it was not a show of humility and shared blame: it was a warning that he has no intention of being driven out, and that players who do not like his ways better learn to accept them or look elsewhere. We will find out whether that is a war he can win.
The initial signs were not promising at Villa Park, as Spurs started sluggishly. There were a few honourable exceptions, especially Lucas Moura, whose burst from midfield in the ninth minute enabled Tottenham to stretch Villa’s defence for the first time. Apart from that, Spurs posed no threat.
Villa looked to be in charge but if there is one thing in which Mourinho has never lost faith, it is the capacity of other teams to goof, giving his side a chance to exploit. Villa have eradicated a lot of the individual mistakes they tended to make last season, partly because Emi Martínez has bred confidence from the back, so it was a surprise when the goalkeeper made the mistake that turned the match in Spurs’ favour. Moura made the most of it, beating Matty Cash to Martínez’s loose kick before exchanging passes with Harry Kane and presenting Vinícius with an easy invitation to tap in his first Premier League goal.
Spurs did not need to be anything more than competent after that – and, in a welcome development for Mourinho, they rose to that modest challenge.
They even increased their lead thanks to cynical trickery by Kane, whose clumsy touch confused Cash but gave the striker a chance to go down over his leg. Martínez went the wrong way for the penalty, and Spurs got back on the right track. For now.
