Eriksen effect telling on Tottenham

Kane’s brace saves Spurs from stumble

LONDON: Harry Kane scored his first goals at Tottenham’s new stadium as Spurs came from behind to beat newlypromoted Aston Villa 3-1 on Saturday.

However, the England captain paid tribute to Christian Eriksen’s impact as a second-half substitute to prevent last season’s Champions League finalists suffering an opening day shock.

Tottenham trailed to John McGinn’s early opener when Eriksen was introduced off the bench by Mauricio Pochettino 25 minutes from time.

The Denmark midfielder’s future is far from clear after a summer of transfer speculation linking him with a move to Spain as he has just one year left on his contract.

However, Eriksen certainly did not appear lacking in commitment as he immediately offered the cutting edge Spurs had lacked for the first hour.

“We know the quality he has on the ball, his assists, his goals,” said Kane. “He dictates the pace of the game and for me it’s perfect. I can make my little movements off that.”

Eriksen played his part as club-record signing Tanguy Ndombele sparked the fightback by curling home the equaliser 17 minutes from time.

His cross was turned goalwards by Davinson Sanchez and after Tom Heaton made a brilliant save, the rebound was worked back to Ndombele who curled home from the edge of the area.

“Adding Christian fresh in the second half has helped the team to achieve the victory. We are talking about top quality players,” said Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino, who took responsibility for his side’s lacklustre first-half display.

“We were a bit confused and that is my fault, I’m the manager, but we made a lot of mistakes and didn’t work well in the first half.

“In the second half we fixed the problems, our positional game was completely different and we moved the ball better. Its very important for us to start with a victory, but we have a lot of work to do.”

Villa spent more than £100 million on 12 new recruits over the summer to try and stabilise themselves as a Premier League force again after three seasons in the second tier.

And there were plenty of promising signs for Dean Smith’s men, particularly in the first 45 minutes, before they wilted under Spurs’ relentless secondhalf pressure.

“We were really competitive in the first half and scored a good goal,” said Smith.

“But they reached the Champions League final for a reason so we knew it was going to be a tough baptism.

“You look at Tottenham’s physicality and I thought that was the difference in the last 20 minutes of the game.

“We know about their quality but physically they’re very strong and we kept giving it away. Ultimately it became a hard game for us in the second half.”

Elsewhere, there were big wins for Burnley and Brighton.

Brighton’s new manager Graham Potter enjoyed a dream start to his time in charge as the Seagulls beat last season’s FA Cup finalists Watford 3-0 at Vicarage Road.

Abdoulaye Doucoure’s own goal gave the visitors a half-time lead before Florin Andone and Neil Maupay on his debut sealed a highly impressive three points for a Brighton side that narrowly escaped relegation last season. Burnley were also 3-0 winners at Turf Moor as an Ashley Barnes double and Johann Gudmundsson’s strike condemned Southampton to a heavy defeat. Bournemouth 1 (Mepham 62) Sheffield United 1 (Sharp 88); Burnley 3 (Barnes 63, 70, Gudmundsson 75) Southampton 0; Crystal Palace 0 Everton 0; Tottenham 3 (Ndombele 73, Kane 86, 90) Aston Villa 1 (McGinn 9); Watford 0 Brighton 3 (Doucoure 28-og, Andone 65, Maupay 77); West Ham 0 Manchester City 5 (Jesus 25, Sterling 51, 75, 90+1, Aguero 86-pen)