Brighton 0-2 Tottenham: Romero, Kane power Spurs to win at AmEx

Tottenham Hotspur is all about patterns — Antonio Conte’s passing Patterns™, and win-loss-win patterns. According to the pattern, Tottenham were due a win on the road at Brighton & Hove Albion and that’s exactly what they got. Cuti Romero “scored” his first Premier League goal on a Dejan Kulusevski shot that deflected in the net off his butt, Harry Kane added a second half insurance goal, and Tottenham rolled to a fairly comfortable 2-0 win over the Seagulls to keep their top four hopes on life support.

Here are my notes from this match.

Reactions

• That early Kane chance — whoof. It was a great play to press and close down the keeper and then pick his pocket, and yeah it was a really acute angle but come on Harold, you HAVE to finish that. Same for Deki’s breakaway just before halftime. Tottenham could’ve been up 3-0 in the first half, but you gotta score the easy ones, gentlemen.
• I’d like to say Maupay was lucky to not get sent off for elbowing Dier in the face, but they never showed a useful replay so it’s impossible to say. But I’m a Spurs fan so... send him off, ref ffs, etc.
• Spurs pretty well dominated this, I don’t have the xG numbers at the time of posting but I expect it to reflect that. Spurs didn’t really allow anything from Brighton going forward and Spurs screwed up a bunch of big chances.
• Kulusevski was lambasted for his perceived lack of speed, but he knows how to get around dudes and drew at least two fouls for being fast.
• We’ve been waiting this long for Cuti Romero’s first goal and it came in the stupidest way possible off of a heavily deflected shot from Kulusevski. Cuti had no idea that was coming. That first half was so bad, it was the goal this match deserved. (Still counts though.)
• Telling you right now: Cuti gets the Erik Lamela award for that hilarious late tackle on MacAllister. What a shithouse king.
• Tottenham’s second was just good awareness and shows how dangerous they can be on the break. Excellent vision and pass from Bentancur to Kane. That goal set a Premier League record - Kane broke Wayne Rooney’s record for away goals scored in the Premier League with 95, and he did it in 104 fewer games.
• Such was this match that I actually missed about ten minutes of it so I could commute home midway through the second half (stupid time change) and I don’t feel like I missed anything, really.
• Good matches from Kulusevski, Kane, Romero, and Bentancur. Bad matches from Doherty and Son, who is WELL off the boil right now. Reguilon was better, but still not exactly good.
• The W-L-W pattern holds, and if it REALLY holds then we’re due for another W against West Ham this weekend before losing home to Newcastle. Look, I don’t make the pattern.
• We are all Liverpool fans right now (who are currently playing Arsenal).