Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
CONTE NEEDS A MURACLE TO LIFT SPURS
Euro surrender shows how much work boss must do
AT least now we know how Antonio Conte will raise the cash for new signings.
Half the players who started here won’t be at Tottenham next season – and none can have any complaints. This was the kind of humbling surrender that cost Nuno Espirito Santo and Jose Mourinho their jobs.
Joe Rodon, Matt Doherty, Dele Alli and Bryan Gil, subbed nine minutes after half-time, are surely living on borrowed time. And Davinson Sanchez will very likely be shown the exit door too.
Ryan Sessegnon, unlucky to be sent off in the first half of a game in which he’d hoped to impress, might just get another chance. But the fact that Conte had to send on his A-listers to try to rescue his side from a humiliating defeat showed just how bad Spurs were against the Slovenian minnows.
The Londoners barely laid a glove on Mura in the first half.
Instead they once again showed just why Conte has already made two new centrehalves a priority in January.
Mura didn’t even have to wait that long to draw first blood. Midfielder Tomi Horvat raced down the right after 11 minutes, cut inside and, with Sanchez slipping, enjoyed the extra space to find the Spurs net with his left peg.
Sessegnon – back from a lengthy lay-off with the praise of his manager ringing in his ears – was sent off after half an hour for a second bookable offence. Without him, Spurs, feeling sorry for themselves, were lambs to the slaughter.
In fact, Mura midfielder Nik Lorbek would have put his side even further ahead, three minutes before half-time, had his curling effort not soared narrowly wide with Spurs keeper Pierluigi Gollini beaten.
A half-time team talk appeared to have made little impression on Spurs, who were just as bad after the break, and that forced Conte into wholesale changes.
He sent on Heung-min Son, Lucas Moura, Ben Davies and Eric Dier for Alli, Gil, Doherty and Rodon.
Seventeen minutes later, Harry Kane equalised. Moura threaded a delicious ball through to the England captain, who took his time before lifting over the keeper. It should have been the cue for Spurs, Champions League finalists in 2019, to stamp some authority. But authority is not a word you associate with Spurs, certainly not the Spurs defence.
Mura’s second goal, in the dying seconds, was a carbon copy of the first. Sub Amadej Marosa burst down the right, turned Sanchez inside out, and saw his shot deflected off the Colombian to beat Gollini. No wonder the Slovenians celebrated (above) like they’d won the Champions league
Former Chelsea boss Conte
(top) didn’t quite have this competition in mind when he spoke about bringing success to north London.
But he knows he can forget about even the most basic of targets without the character and depth in his squad to cope with assignments like this.
The cull between now and next season will be ruthless.