Dom's double drives thrilling comeback against Villa

A stunning second-half performance saw us come from behind to beat Aston Villa 4-1 on Sunday afternoon, inflicting only their second Premier League defeat of the season.

Trailing to a Morgan Rogers goal at half-time, we quickly wiped out the deficit through Brennan Johnson before Dominic Solanke struck twice in four minutes to turn the game on its head and put us in control. And we ended the game in some style, James Maddison coming off the bench to hit a wonderful 20-yard free-kick past Emi Martinez.

That was our second successive 4-1 home win in the league following a similar victory over West Ham United at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium recently and moves us up to seventh in the table, just two points behind fourth-placed Arsenal.

Both sides were feeling their way into the game in the opening 20 minutes, goalmouth action hard to come by although we were the team in possession the most without troubling Martinez in the Villa goal. Pedro Porro and Rodrigo Bentancur had wild shots way over the bar, before the closest effort of the game so far in the 22nd minute, Bentancur’s right-foot shot from 25 yards skimming the top of the net on its way over. At the other end, Villa’s first real sight of goal came on the half hour mark, Jacob Ramsey’s effort flicking off Radu Dragusin and going a yard over before Guglielmo Vicario had to make a fine stop low down to his left from Amadou Onana’s header. But, from the resulting corner from Lucas Digne, Vicario saved after the ball hit Bentancur only for Rogers to slam home from close range.

Our response was decent as we got on the ball and played mostly in Villa’s half but the visitors were always quickly back in position with 10 men behind the ball, making it really difficult to break down. And they almost hit us with a second on the counter, Rogers playing in Ollie Watkins but he slid his shot wide of the far post. One last break from us brought the half to an end, but Solanke’s shot was blocked by Ezri Konsa and we trailed at the interval.

It didn’t take long for us to restore parity though, four minutes gone in the second half when the returning Heung-Min Son delivered a wonderful low cross to the far post where Johnson was on hand to poke home. That changed everything – the crowd were up, the players were lifted and that momentum almost brought about a quick second only for Martinez to produce a strong save to deny Solanke’s shot on the turn.

Unfortunately though, the game became very stop-start with injuries disrupting the flow which halted our impetus, although Pape Matar Sarr went close in the 67th minute with a right-foot curler from the edge of the box. Eight minutes later though, we did take the lead – and what a superb goal it was too. It started with substitute Ben Davies winning a big tackle on half-way, Sarr broke and played a pass in to Johnson who in turn found Dejan Kulusevski, his clever pass put Solanke in on goal and the striker produced a wonderful dink over Martinez for 2-1.

We wasted no time capitalising on the momentum this time, adding a third goal four minutes on when Sarr again led the charge, finding Richarlison down the left and his low cross was turned in by Solanke for his quick-fire second.

A huge 10 minutes of stoppage time was announced which gave the visitors hope and they pushed us back in search of that goal which would get them back in the game. But, while the pressure mounted, Vicario wasn’t called into action and instead, the final goal of the contest came at the other end as we finished with a flourish. Solanke was fouled on the edge of the area by Diego Carlos and up stepped Maddison to stroke a wonderful right-footed free-kick into the top corner of Martinez’s net. A superb conclusion to a superb win!

Match data

Goals: Spurs – Johnson – 49, Solanke 75, 79, Maddison 90+6; Aston Villa – Rogers 32.

Yellow cards: Spurs – Pedro Porro, Romero.

Referee: Craig Pawson.

Venue: Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.

Weather: Light cloud, gentle breeze, 14 degrees.

Attendance: 61,253.