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Soft defending… and a soft penalty

We looked in decent shape as the 55th minute arrived at White Hart Lane on Sunday.

Tottenham had put us under pressure, but the extra security of a back three had kept them at arm’s length. With both Manchester clubs drawing earlier on Sunday, we looked capable of matching our top-four rivals.

Then Dele Alli pounced on a loose ball to break the deadlock, and Harry Kane scored from the penalty spot within three minutes. Game over.

Here’s what Arsene Wenger said about the goals that killed off our chances of a win on our last visit to the Lane:

on the game…

I think it was a tight game until they scored the first goal and then we conceded straightaway a soft penalty. The 2-0 was a shock and gave Spurs big confidence and I think it took us time to recover from that. In the end, we created chances but were a bit lucky to keep it at 2-0. Then the last 15 minutes we dominated the game but without being capable to create clear-cut chances or take any chance we created. Overall I think you come to the conclusion than Spurs deserved to win the game - well done to them.

on whether he learnt anything about his players today…

Look, I felt that there was plenty of room in the first half especially to score goals, that we didn’t use well because we played with a bit of a restricted attitude. I felt that we lacked a little bit of freedom to play and desire to hurt them more than we did. I think the chances we created in the first half were clear-cut chances. We did not take them well. Not with enough conviction and not with enough determination.

on whether Ox should have cleared the ball for Alli’s goal…

Honestly, I haven’t seen it again. I have to watch it from the bench, it was not very clear. We just looked that we were not outnumbered, but we had six against two or three. It was soft defending.