
“If we were missing Son Heung-min or Xherdan Shaqiri, we wouldn’t have played like that.”
Even with ‘captain’ Son Heung-min (32, Tottenham Hotspur), it was a game that was far from a sure thing. Enzi Postecoglou admits that Spurs were honestly at their worst.
Tottenham lost 2-3 away to Brighton at the American Express Stadium in Brighton, England, on Sunday (July 7) in the seventh round of the 2024-2025 English Premier League (EPL). They dropped to ninth place in the league standings with 10 points.
Tottenham were again without Heung-min Son. Timo Werner, Dominic Solanke, and Brennan Johnson started up front, while James Maddison, Rodrigo Bentancur, and Dejan Kulicepski formed the midfield. Destiny Udogie-Micky van der Vaan-Cristian Romero-Pedro Foro formed the backline, with Guglielmo Vicario in goal.
Son Heung-min was left off the roster altogether due to a hamstring injury. He started the first leg of the 2024-2025 UEFA Europa League Phase 1 against Qarabag FK on March 27, but limped off in the 26th minute with pain in the back of his thigh. He asked to be substituted directly from the bench and was replaced by Werner, who left the field.
He never recovered from the injury.
He failed to make the starting lineup against Manchester United and Ferencvarosi, and was left out of the Korean national team’s call-up for the October A-Match. He didn’t even start against Brighton, as Postecoglou had predicted.
Still, Tottenham started brightly, winning the ball in the 23rd minute after pressing forward and Solanke played an exquisite forward pass behind the defense. Johnson finished with a precise left-footed strike to give Spurs the lead. It was Johnson’s sixth goal in six games in all competitions.
Spurs added another goal. On a counter-attack in the 37th minute, Solanke played the ball into the space in front of an incoming Werner, who held onto the ball and cut it to the side. Maddison finished with a right-footed shot that rattled the net.
Tottenham continued to press forward, 파워볼실시간 harassing Brighton’s buildup and looking for a wedge goal. Brighton also created chances through Kaoru Mitoma and Ferdi Kadiolu, but lacked the finishing touch. Spurs went into halftime with a 2-0 lead and looked to be on their way to victory.
However, the second half began with a bang. In the third minute of the second half, the Tottenham defense failed to clear a cross from Mitoma and it fell behind.
Yankuba Mintet headed it into the corner for the equalizer.
It didn’t take long to equalize. In the 13th minute of the second half, Mitoma played a pass to Giorginho Luther, who ran into the center of the box. Luther had the Tottenham defense in front of him and fired a left-footed shot that found the corner of the net.
Brighton were soon back in front. In the 21st minute of the second half, Luther broke down the right flank on a solo run and crossed. Danny Welbeck headed it home for a thrilling comeback. It took just 18 minutes for Tottenham’s two-goal lead to be overturned.
Spurs pushed forward in a desperate attempt to get back on level terms, but they were unable to break through Brighton’s defensive shift, and with less space at the back, their attacking options became significantly weaker. In the end, Spurs were unable to score any more goals and the game ended in a shocking 2-3 reverse.
It was a heartbreaking defeat.
A win would have extended Tottenham’s unbeaten streak to five games in all competitions and jumped them up to sixth place in the league. It would have been a best-case scenario for the team to go into the international break without Son Heung-min, which would have given them even more momentum when he returns in two weeks.
However, Spurs were completely unable to cope with Brighton’s tactical changes in the second half and conceded three goals in a row. Furthermore, Brighton dropped their defense as soon as they got back into the game, and unlike Spurs, they were able to settle down and play a steady game. Postecoglou’s insistence on shouting “attack forward” proved to be toxic.
After the game, Postecoglou was shocked. “It was the worst defeat since I arrived at Tottenham,” he said, according to the BBC. It’s frustrating, it’s a terrible feeling. It was an unacceptable second half. We were nowhere near the level we should have been. Maybe we got carried away,” he said.
Postecoglou added:
“We have come to accept our fate. It’s hard to understand because it’s never been like this since I came to Tottenham. We usually fight for everything when there is no price to pay.” ”It’s a terrible situation, a terrible loss. There is only one way to solve it. It’s up to me. We lost every duel, we weren’t competitive, and then whatever we do tactically won’t work,” he emphasized.
Some wondered what would have happened if Son Heung-min had been available. Although Werner had one assist on the day, his lack of destructive power in the attacking third made it hard not to think of Son Heung-min. Mikey Moore, who came on for Werner late in the second half, was also denied by the Brighton defense on numerous occasions.
Postecoglou was asked in the press conference if he would miss the injured Son and the injured Heung-min, but he was adamant:
“It has nothing to do with them. Nothing at all,” he insisted.
“If I missed them, I wouldn’t have played like that in the first half or in the last few games. So it has nothing to do with them,” he said, adding: ”We always have to have a certain level of competitiveness. We didn’t do that in the second 45 minutes. And of course we paid the price for that,” he concluded.
The bottom line is that Tottenham’s second-half performance was sub-par, with or without Son Heung-min. “We just weren’t competitive, we didn’t do the basic things you need to do at this level,” said Postecoglou. “I never felt the game was going to go that way,” he said, ”and we paid the price. I understand that when you go 2-0 up, they’re going to come out aggressive. It’s not the first time we’ve been in that situation. We’ve usually dealt with it well. But today we didn’t do what we needed to do,” he sighed.