Spurs 3-0 Qarabag | Ange’s verdict: “You have to credit our character and sheer work ethic”

Ange Postecoglou was pleased that the team stuck to our playing principles despite the circumstances of going down to 10 men after just seven minutes of our UEFA Europa League league phase opener against Qarabag at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Thursday evening.

Radu Dragusin received a straight red after being put under pressure and then bringing down Juninho - deemed as the last man, with Juninho through on goal, Radu was sent off by referee Willy Delajod.

Ange re-organised, Lucas Bergvall was sacrificed for Destiny Udogie as Ben Davies moved from left-back to partner Micky van de Ven centrally and, crucially, we struck soon after as Brennan Johnson slotted home after good work from Dominic Solanke after 12 minutes - his third goal in eight days.

It was somewhat of a shoot-out from there as our 10 men continued to push forward in an open game - efforts at goal ended 14-10 in the Azerbaijan champions' favour but we were more clinical with Pape Matar Sarr drilling home from a corner for 2-0 on 52 minutes and Solanke capping another fine display by following in and tapping home after Heung-Min Son’s shot was parried into his path by Mateusz Kochalski on 68 minutes.

At the other end, Guglielmo Vicario made a number of fine saves and Tural Bayramov blasted a penalty over.

Speaking afterwards to our Review Show, Ange said: “Not happy with the start, we were just really sloppy and passive in that opening seven or eight minutes leading up to Radu getting the red card. I don’t know if it was the delay in kick-off that affected us, but we wanted to start with high tempo, high intensity, our football, and that’s what happened, we paid the price.

“It was a good response, we had to work hard for the victory, but the most important thing, especially in Europe, is that you have to win your home games. Every away game is tricky. To do it with 10 men for literally 90 minutes, credit to the boys.”

Asked if playing 10 against 11 was something he prepares for, Ange replied: “What we try to do is stick to our principles, try not to change the way we play and that was the nice thing for me, the lads still tried to play the way we wanted to. The first goal came from us pressing with 10 men and we got the rewards for it. It’s in the lads’ mentality, regardless of what we’re facing, we tackle it in a similar way.”

It was also put to Ange that, despite the downside of the physical challenge of having to play with 10 men for 90 minutes during a run of seven games in 21 days, was a part of him almost happy to see the team react so well to that adversity?

He said: “No doubt you have to credit the lads’ character and the sheer work ethic they had to show out there. At the same time, it’s kind of self-inflicted, so, it’s different if we’re on the end of an unfortunate event, but we brought that on ourselves and it’s a bit of a lesson for us

“In the last three games we’ve showed different sides to our game - we’ve played some fantastic football, but, whether it was Coventry or tonight, we’ve also had to dig deep. That’s a good sign.”