Well that was ... something.
Tottenham Hotspur welcomed Southampton to White Hart Lane on Sunday and the two hours that followed were some combination of hilarious, horrifying, laughable, amusing, confusing and entertaining. It was a typical Spurs match, and one that ended with a 3-2 thanks to Gylfi Sigurdsson, who scored in the 90th minute to deliver Tottenham a win that seemed impossible when they were 2-0 down in the 30th minute.
The match started poorly for Spurs as they looked asleep in the early going and in the 19th minute, Southampton capitalized. A long goal kick should have been easily cleared by Kyle Naughton, but the right back misjudged his header, allowing Jay Rodriguez to run onto the ball and blast the ball past Hugo Lloris.
Less than 10 minutes later, Southamtpon doubled their lead and again it was Naughton who gifted it to them. This time it was a horrible giveaway by the right back and Adam Lallana pounced to make it 2-0 Saints.
Spurs should have been dead and buried at 2-0 down, especially considering how sloppy they looked. It was doubtful they would score a goal, let alone keep the Saints scoreless the rest of way, but the second goal seemed to wake them up and combined with Naughton ceasing to be such a giant dope, they worked their way back into things.
Three minutes after Lallana gave the Saints a two-goal lead, Christian Eriksen cut Spurs' deficit in half with a simple finish from five yards. Southampton whiffed on a Spurs cross, leaving the ball for Eriksen to bury and he did just that.
The goal brought Tottenham back into the match and they almost equalized several more times in the first half. Roberto Soldado played well, holding the ball up and creating chances for teammates, even if he never came close to scoring. One brilliant touch played Eriksen in on goal, but the Dane was unable to score so they went to halftime still down a goal.
The second half started just like the first, with Soldado and Eriksen combining, but this time they actually scored and it took them all of one minute to do it. Soldado pushed over a week Dejan Lovren, took the ball and crossed perfectly for Eriksen, who had to just tap the ball into the open net for the equalizer.
The next 45 minutes saw the teams play pretty even, with each team getting a couple chances, but it looked like the match would end in a draw. For Spurs, who were 2-0 down, that seemed a good enough result, but then Sigurdsson got involved.
With the match in extra time, the ball found Sigurdsson at 20 yard and he hit a hard, low shot through traffic that found the back of the net and ignited the White Hart Lane crowd. Just an hour earlier, Spurs were 2-0 down, but with the final whistle in the offing, they were set for three points. How Spurs.
Random thoughts
- Sigurdsson changed the match. He allowed Spurs to keep the ball and generally stop running around like idiots. That he scored the winner seemed only right.
- Nacer Chadli should never play in the center with Eriksen out wide ever again. That Tim Sherwood ever thought this was acceptable is indicative of a dependence on drugs.
- Naughton was drunk.
- Jan Vertonghen was almost as derpy as Naughton, but was lucky enough that Southampton didn't take advantage. I liked it better when he was good.
- If Spurs can play like they did in the second half for the rest of the season then we might get to keep faint Champions League hopes for a while longer and delay heartbreak until May.