Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou lauded his players for beating Liverpool
Tottenham Hotspur ended their four-game winless run on Wednesday evening by beating Liverpool 1-0 in the first leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final.
Ange Postecoglou’s side put in a solid performance against Liverpool and they carry an advantage into the second leg of the tie at Anfield at the start of February. Lucas Bergvall put in a strong display in the middle of the park, capping off a fine night by scoring the winning goal. New signing from Slavia Prague, Antonin Kinsky performed extremely well in goal on his debut and kept a clean sheet against an excellent Liverpool attack.
However, the game was marred largely by a nasty injury to Rodrigo Bentancur in the opening stages. The midfielder landed awkwardly when trying to stoop away from the goal while winning the header from a corner kick, and in the process, he hit his head hard on the turf and became unconscious. The good news is the South American posted a reassuring message on his Instagram account, thanking the fans and his well-wishers.
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Going by the lows and highs suffered in the game, Ange Postecoglou couldn’t have been any more proud of his boys for beating Liverpool in the first leg. When asked to describe the performance, the Tottenham boss told the club’s official website:
“The ability of this group to deal with adversity. We’ve two 18-year-olds in there, a goalkeeper making his debut, Djed playing left-back and, through this whole period, they’ve just given everything they possibly can, without getting the rewards of a victory.
“I’ve said all along, it’s been tough for us, it’s been poor form, but I really feel I’ve seen growth in some of our players and when we get our other players back, we’ll have a really good foundation for the team we want to be.”
Indeed, Spurs’ squad depth was inferior as compared to Liverpool, whose boss Arne Slot brought on the likes of Luis Diaz, Darwin Nunez, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Wataru Endo and Ibrahima Konate off the bench. Big Ange was forced to make a change in the opening stages of the game following Bentancur’s injury, while Timo Werner replaced skipper Son Heung-min in the second half.
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Tottenham entered the fixture with as many as 10 players unavailable due to injuries and suspensions, so one could imagine how Big Ange has been dealing with the limited resources at his disposal in almost every single game. Of course, once the likes of Richarlison, Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven, Destiny Udogie and Guglielmo Vicario recover from their respective injuries, things will look a lot brighter for the North Londoners.
With the second leg at Anfield scheduled on February 6th, Big Ange will hope to get some of his injured stars back in time to go all guns blazing and advance to the Carabao Cup final.
