Scintillating Spurs stun Dortmund

● Son sets the ball rolling as a brilliant second-half display puts Pochettino men in the driving seat to reach last eight

Son 47, Vertonghen 83, Llorente 86 problem taking to the stage when the stars call in sick.

When defenders expect a tough night from a striker, it tends to refer to an Andy Carroll type bruiser or the lightning pace of a Kylian Mbappe.

With Son, it is the constant threat that he will pop up from nowhere and tackle them if they take more than a touch or two of the ball. He is a defensive midfielder in a forward’s body.

He has the pace, as well. And admits to actually running himself into the ground in every game. Oh, and the finishing isn’t bad either. Certainly for the goal last night.

The game was goalless until two minutes into the second half when Vertonghen swung a ball in from the left-handside.

You could tell it was going to be a good cross by the way his whole body arced away after he had struck it, and the way he watched it like a basketball player follows a three-pointer into the hoop with his eyes.

The Borussia Dortmund defender Dan-axel Zagadou is 6ft 5ins but the delivery dropped viciously over his leap by a few millimetres and into Son’s feet, and the South Korean side-footed a volley precisely past Roman Burki and into the left of goal.

Vertonghen was man of the match at left-wing-back, setting up the first then burying the second with a dash into the box onto Serge Aurier’s cross and a spectacular flying, sliding volley. That was on 83 minutes, and with four remaining Llorente, on for Lucas Moura, headed in Christian Eriksen’s corner to surely send Spurs through.

Much of the build-up had naturally centred around Jadon Sancho returning to England with Borussia Dortmund, the English teen who has become a beacon of hope for his peers who fear they will not get a chance in a Premier League first-team.

Sancho grew into the game from a quiet start. He could possibly have been on the scoresheet on 15 minutes when Juan Foyth lost the ball on the edge of his own penalty area, leaving Christian Pulisic one-on-one with Toby Alderweireld. Pulisic went on the outside and had he spotted Sancho free at the back post and rolled the ball across the teenager would’ve had a simple tap-in, but Pulisic went for the near one instead and Hugo Lloris blocked.

How differently the game could then have panned out.

By that stage, Sancho had seen little of the ball, but then he was on it frequently, snaking his way between a few opponents in the middle of the park, or twisting and turning Davinson Sanchez so much that the Spurs defender would still be unable to work out which way he will go, even after watching several replays.

It was Sancho’s superb cross which set up the only real chance of the first half in its final minute, and Zagadou met it with a header which 99 times out of 100 would’ve gone in.

But Lloris produced his own personal tribute to World Cup winning goalkeeper Gordon Banks, who died on Tuesday, with a leap and save which almost defied physics and sent Tottenham’s goalkeeper tumbling back into his own net.

Yet by the final whistle, nobody was watching the upand-comer: everyone was applauding the understudy and the man in the wings.

In last night’s other last -16 tie, Real Madrid will take a narrow advantage into the second leg after a 2-1 victory over hosts Ajax in Amsterdam. Karim Benzema gave the visitors the lead on the hour mark before Hakim Ziyech restored parity. Marco Asensio won it for Real. 2 Tottenham’s Jan Vertonghen celebrates scoring to make it 2-0 with Son Heung-min at Wembley last night. LAST NIGHT

UEFA Champions League first knock-out round, first leg: Ajax 1 Real Madrid 2, Tottenham Hotspur 3 Borussia Dortmund 0.

Sky Bet Championship: Brentford 1 Aston Villa 0, Ipswich 1 Derby 1, Leeds 2 Swansea 1, Preston North End 3 Norwich 1, Reading 2 Blackburn 1, Sheffield Utd 1 Middlesbrough 0, Wigan 0 Stoke 0.

TONIGHT (7:45pm unless stated) UEFA Europa League Round of 32 First Leg: BATE v Arsenal (5.55), Celtic v Valencia (8.00), Club Brugge v Red Bull Salzburg (8.00), Galatasaray v Benfica (5.55), Krasnodar v Bayer Leverkusen (5.55), Lazio v Sevilla (5.55), Malmo FF v Chelsea (8.00), Olympiacos v Dynamo Kiev (5.55), Plzen v Dinamo Zagreb (8.00), Rapid Vienna v Inter Milan (5.55), Rennes v Real Betis (5.55), Shakhtar Donetsk v Eintracht Frankfurt (8.00), Slavia Prague v Genk (5.55), Sporting v Villarreal (8.00), Zurich v Napoli (8.00)