Tottenham Hotspur hosted Jose Mourinho, Alexis Sanchez, and Manchester United on Wednesday and ran them out of Wembley, winning 2-0 in a game that was incredibly fun to watch. Every single Spurs player played well, though some players did more gooder than some others, because otherwise what would we argue about in the comments?
So, I’ll be honest — I got the idea for this player ratings theme from Incredeleble Tekkers, and it’s a good one that I’ve been sitting on for a while. But, since this is Tekkers we’re talking about here, I’ve pretty much abandoned all of the rankings he suggested and substituted them with ones that are infinitely better.
With the Super Bowl coming up this weekend, many of you will be going to Super Bowl parties. At those parties will be food items, and invariably there will be dips for you to put other food items into. So let’s rank those dips. For science.
The king of dips. Fatty, salty, savory, herbaceous (if you include cilantro), citrusy, delicious. Avocados are good in virtually all contexts, but mashed, with lime juice, onion, salt, and spice on a tortilla chip? Divine.
Tottenham’s Social Media Manager: I don’t know who is running @SpursOfficial on Twitter these days, but whoever it was deserves a fat raise for their incredible trolling throughout the deadline day leading up to Lucas Moura’s signing. Every single tweet about Kane, or United, or any other random thing that wasn’t #BemVindoLucas prompted replies from outraged and frustrated Spurs fans. It was glorious. They were the real MVP yesterday.
I know what you’re thinking. But a good fondue is a molten mixture of cheese (gruyere, emmenthaler), garlic, and white wine in which you dip pieces of good French bread. There is literally nothing to dislike in this. Unless you’re lactose intolerant. Sucks to be you, sorry.
Christian Eriksen: It was very considerate of Christian to make up for missing the last two games by scoring within 11 seconds in this one. He was clearly making up for lost time and was trying to pack all of the awesome he WOULD’VE given us the past two games into this one. He was magnificent.
Mousa Dembele: This was vintage 2015-16 Moose again, who put in a domineering performance in midfield. He schooled Mata & Pogba on the regular and was one of the best players on the pitch.
Jan Vertonghen: Jan set the tone for the match by launching a fantastic pass from deep, setting up the first goal. Showed a creative side from the back that we haven’t really seen since Toby went down.
Davinson Sanchez: He just keeps getting better. His tackling and positioning were stellar, and even when Martial and Alexis tried to get half-steps on him he was able to put in several important tackles.
Hugo Lloris: Right after the early goal, United tried to steal back an equalizer, and Hugo bailed out the team with two important saves. Had another on a Lukaku blast in the second half. He might not have been tested as much as we thought, but he was up to every challenge.
Erik Lamela: What’s that you say? He only played “a few minutes”? Nonsense, he gets five stars for coming in as a late impact substitute, ostensibly to murder Alexis Sanchez, and immediately gets involved in handbags with a United player. That’s worth five stars irrespective of his actual performance. I’m in love, guys.
Phil Jones: What an amazing performance from the defender on Wednesday. He was everywhere, giving Spurs a much needed flourish in the final third. His movement gave United defenders fits, and his shot for Spurs’ second was clinical, yet insouciant. Simply outstanding; he won the day for Tottenham.
You think I wouldn’t include the spicy? All of the above are basically variations of a theme that includes a crap ton of chili pepper. The hotter the better. If it doesn’t melt your face off like you looked inside the Ark of the Covenant, you didn’t get the good stuff.
Dele Alli: One of Dele’s best league matches in a Tottenham shirt this season. His runs gave United defenders all kinds of problems, and had a clever flick to set up Christian for the first goal. He gets infinity bonus stars for being a pain in Alexis’ butt the entire game.
Ben Davies: Ben can maybe be faulted slightly for not getting forward as much, but he put in an excellent defensive display against United, marshaling Martial and helping support Vertonghen on the left.
Eric Dier: Wasn’t tasked with being a creator on Wednesday, which left him free to help contain Pogba, Matic, and (later) Herrera. Had a few nice forward passes into space, as well. This was as good as I’ve seen him play in a few months.
One is made with eggplant and the other with chickpeas, which makes it amazing that you can create such awesome dips with ingredients that in other forms many people hate. Mediterranean dips are delicious, and these are the two kinds at the apex of that genre.
Son Heung-Min: It feels weird to give Sonny a rating this low when he was buzzing around, dragging players out of position for the entire match. And goodness, it’s not like he was poor, but his touch and finishing did seem just a tad off in this match. Also, YOU GOTTA PASS TO HARRY SONNY JEEZ. Even so, his movement was very good and he disrupted United’s back line frequently.
Harry Kane: On a night where Kane didn’t seem to strike the ball cleanly all match, his holdup play and passing were exquisite. It’s amazing that even when he doesn’t score he still finds a way to be absolutely fantastic at football.
Kieran Trippier: Trips had a couple of scary moments in the opening 15 minutes but was rock solid from then on. Industrious going forward, solid enough defensively, and had some nice crosses. He exceeded my expectations in a big way.
Ketchup is the ur-dip. It is incredibly versatile, if slightly boring. Still, there are very few things that you can dip into ketchup that it does not at least marginally improve. It’s why young children love it so much. A solid 3-star dip.
There ain’t no ketchups on this Tottenham Hotspur squad.
It me, the bomb throwing troll. This will upset a lot of you, but the processed nacho “cheese” in the jar is just a trash dip. There’s no reason to use it except under very specific circumstances, i.e. at the ballpark or on top of equally trash nachos. Want cheese? Get some real gd cheese.
No Tottenham Hotspur players were nacho cheese.
Tobacco is bad, kids. Don’t use it.
No Tottenham Hotspur players were as bad as chewing tobacco.
Victor Wanyama, Moussa Sissoko (he was fine)