MAN ALIVE!
Lanzini’s rocket seals a miracle fightback and ruins Bale’s second coming
JOSE MOURINHO admitted his Tottenham players were not strong enough mentally against West Ham as Gareth Bale’s second coming descended into a nightmare. Manuel Lanzini scored a stunning 25- yard equaliser deep in injury time to snatch a point for West Ham, who had trailed 3- 0 after just 16 minutes. Bale came on in the 72nd minute and
GARETH BALE returned in the same way as he left seven years ago – as a man to turn matches on their head.
Tottenham were cruising at 3- 0 with just eight minutes to go when the Wales forward was patted on the back by manager Jose Mourinho and sent on for his first action since his return from Real Madrid last month. It meant he was very much part of the collective disbelief that descended so soon afterwards.
Manuel Lanzini thrashed the sort of shot Bale used to hit from 25 yards into the top corner of the Spurs net to level the score remarkably and spark wild delirium in the West Ham ranks at their remarkable and unlikely point. A script which had been playing out beautifully for the home team started to unravel the moment Bale stepped onto the pitch.
Just 46 seconds into the match, Son Heung- Min had opened the scoring after being sent clear on goal by more brilliant interplay with Harry Kane. The South Korean stepped neatly inside Fabian Balbuena to curl the ball inside the far post. Then Kane himself took a turn inside after eight minutes, nudging the ball between the legs of Declan Rice to make room for a shot from 18 yards which Lukasz Fabianski had no chance of stopping.
Another eight minutes and it was almost embarrassing – Sergio Reguilon’s deep cross finding Kane far too easily to head in his second goal.
Spurs took their foot off the gas and, to their credit, West Ham had the courage to reboot and start to play their football.
Indeed, it took a goal- line block from Kane, of all people, to keep Tottenham’s clean sheet as far as half- time. Then, five minutes after the restart
Pablo Fornals missed an easy close- range header and you could not help but think that, for all West Ham’s possession, this was going to be an easy progression for Spurs to – as the table stood at the e tim time i e – take second place.
Instead they finished ed the day sixth – and you u have to roll forward to o that substitution to o make sense of it all.
In almost ceremonial al fashion, Bale went on n to take a 30- yard free- kick. k
His shot avoided the wall but was so lacking in venom it bounced on its way into Fabianski’s arms. Things still seemed to be going to plan when Son squared to Kane in the 79th minute, only for the England captain’s sweeping left- foot shot to hit the outside of the West Ham upright. Three minutes later, Aaron Cresswell delivered the latest in a series of dangerous fre free- kicks and this ti time Balbuena headed in from close range. Another three m minutes passed be before, after good work by Andriy Y Yarmolenko l down the right, Vladimir Coufal’s cross was diverted into his own net by Davinson Sanchez.
Yet even now Bale had a chance to sign off the script with his own Galactico flourish.
With West Ham’s tails up, Kane sent Bale off on a counter- attack. Mesmerising footwork left Angelo Ogbonna on his backside, the ball sat nicely on his left foot 10 yards from goal – and yet somehow he pulled it wide.
Then Lanzini showed him how it was done to put a smile on the face of Hammers manager David Moyes, left.
When Bale signed for Tottenham last time, it was famously 23 games and nearly two years before he played in a Premier League win.
After today, you have to wonder if he is cursed.