Tottenham Hotspur Women 1 – 0 Leicester City: Spurs secure victory despite absent attack

Tottenham Hotspur Women defeated Leicester City 1-0 at home while somehow failing to register a shot on target. The win leaves Spurs in 6th place at exactly halfway through the season.

Robert Vilahamn’s first lineup of 2025 featured a variety of familiar faces, although some were missing. Notably, brand new signing Lize Kop started in goal against her former side, while Olga Ahtinen replaced Eveliina Summanen in midfield (who we later learned will be out with a hamstring injury for 5-6 weeks). The bench looked thin—no Amy Turner, or Wang Shuang, and no Oliva Holdt (who we should not expect for while longer while she recovers from the injury she sustained before she signed with us). There was, however a face some Spurs Women fans might find a little too familiar in Rosella Ayane, who returned from her unfruitful loan with the Chicago Red Stars.

The lone goal of the game came in the 4th minute—Amanda Nilden put a sharp cross into the box after a bit of good work by Maite Oroz to keep the ball, and Leicester City’s Janina Leitzig deflected it into her own net. Certainly not how Leitzig would’ve wanted to start a game against a side featuring her former backup, Lize Kop.

Photo by Paul Harding – The FA/The FA via Getty Images

There was uh, not much to look at after this. Spurs failed to register a shot on target and racked up an accumulated xG of (checks notes) 0.0. Not for nothing, Leicester City have the 5th best xGA in the league despite currently sitting in 11th. Their defense really isn’t too shabby, however, I do believe the 0.0 xG was almost entirely our fault because… what the hell? To my eye, the whole squad looked really far back on the pitch at all times. We only seemed to move the ball well within our own half. Once we crossed the line, disaster struck. I have to admit, this game put me so far to sleep I can’t even tell you exactly why this was happening.

If I had to guess, I’d say it was partially due to players who typically contribute to ball progression like Drew Spence, Maite Oroz and the fullbacks were busy covering for the giant gaping hole left by Eveliina. Perhaps they felt they needed to do more defensively, or in keeping stuff ticking in the back 1/3rd of the field—I’m really not sure. In the article I linked above, Vilahamn himself said he’s not too worried about covering defensive midfield during Eveliina’s absence. He probably knows more than I do, but after this game, I’m hoping he has a better solution (or at least tweaks to the existing one, which did after all get the job done).

Photo by Aaron Chown/PA Images via Getty Images

There’s also the other possible culprit—our strikers seem to have forgotten how to strike. Martha Thomas still hasn’t scored yet this season, and Jess Naz has only put away one. Beth England is leading the squad with 5 goals (one of which came from a penalty), but I think she’d be the first to tell you this is well below her best. They (along with Raso, Csiki, and other players we’ve seen more infrequently in attack), still seem out of touch with each other and the rest of the squad.

I think it’s possible our new signing Olivia Holdt helps with all this, but given she’s on her way back from a serious injury, I can’t say for sure. We won’t know for some time, and we certainly won’t know when we face off against West Ham in the Conti Subway Cup. You can tune in to the Rehanne Skinner Derby later today at 7:30 UK time/2:30 Eastern time and join me in trying to figure out what the hell is going on with our attack.

But I don’t want to get too gloomy. Spurs are sitting in 6th behind Brighton and ahead of Liverpool, which is uninspiring but alright! Perhaps this game was just a matter of rust, perhaps a few new signings will spruce things up. So welcome back to the WSL and Come On You Spurs!!!