Kane pain as Spurs Euro dream ends
Pochettino’s dream is over as Dybala strikes to kill Spurs Euro hopes
ON the eve of a landmark game in his career, Mauricio Pochettino declared himself a dreamer.
It might have been fate that a nightmare awaited, a nightmare that played out in less than three minutes.
It was not fate though, of course. It was 169 seconds when concentration fled and anxiety gripped.
For the opening nine minutes of the first leg, Spurs were second best. For a third of that time here, they were second best.
That is all.
Yet, thanks to second-half strikes from Gonzalo Higuain and Paulo Dybala, they are out of the Champions League.
They really have snatched an exit from the jaws of the entrance.
For so much of this tie, they had Juventus on the ropes. They had them there right from the start in this one, with Heungmin Son leading the way.
He had a directness about him that clearly unnerved Juventus.
Likewise Harry
Kane, made to look unusually quick by the labouring
Giorgio Chiellini before unusually finding the outer rather than the inner of the sidenetting.
In fact, for all their fabled stinginess, Juve defended with all the desperation and nonsophistication of, well, the English.
Andrea Barzagli was reduced to a double-tread on a prone Son at one point.
That offence was not spotted by Polish referee Szymon Marciniak but, then again, not much was. And there is absolutely no doubting which team were most grievously wronged.
Marciniak’s failure, and the failure of his assistant and additional assistant, to award a penalty after Jan Vertonghen brought down Douglas Costa with left then right was one of the worst refereeing calls imaginable.
And such was Tottenham’s general vibrancy, it was always likely insult was always going to be added to official-inflicted injury.
Christian Eriksen made the initial incision, Barzagli’s tackle on Dele Alli sent possession out to a galloping Keiran Trippier and his pass across the area was met by one of the most priceless scuffs of Son’s career, a right foot somehow assisting a left foot to beat Gianluigi Buffon (left).
Juve anger was rightly directed at Marciniak as he headed off at half-time but the truth is they had been outplayed by Spurs for the most of three halves of football.
It was down to them to change that, down to them to put right their own wrongs and the wrongs of the referee.
As Spurs nerves began to unravel, they did just that. Suddenly, in one brief spell, that Tottenham vibrancy disappeared, to be replaced with an edginess that gave Juve hope.
At times in a disastrous period of play,
Spurs looked rigid with fear. They were certainly rigid when Sami Khedira met Stephan Lichtsteiner’s cross and looped a header on to the boot of Higuain, who converted from close range.
And quite what they were up to when Higuain was allowed to take possession, turn and thread through a simple pass for Dybala is anybody’s guess.
It is certainly not a goal Trippier, among others, will want to see back.
The only thing for which Tottenham defenders could not take the blame was Dybala’s firmly-clipped finish above and beyond Hugo Lloris.
Disbelief descended on Wembley before a late surge saw a Kane header hit the inside of the post before being hacked off the line by Barzagli.
It was a moment that confirmed Pochettino’s dream had somehow become a nightmare.