Mourinho's Dele dilemma despite Tottenham's triumph
- by Florence Jennings
- in Sport
- — Dec 26, 2020
Tottenham Hotspur manager Jose Mourinho scolded out-of-favour midfielder Dele Alli on Wednesday for a failed flick that lost his team possession and gave Stoke an equaliser in a League Cup quarter-final the Premier League side eventually won 3-1.
Stoke had come out of the traps with much more objective in the second half, and they got their reward when Jordan Thompson met Jacob Brown's cross at the back post to beat Hugo Lloris.
Alli, on his first start for over a month, lost the ball in the build-up to Stoke's goal.
The game opened up as Spurs lost a bit of shape, giving the hosts hope of securing a cup upset.
Mourinho was brought in by Tottenham previous year to end the club's long trophy drought and the League Cup, which he won with Chelsea - on three occasions - and Manchester United, has always been a title he targets. Instead of killing the game, we kill ourselves, "said the Portuguese coach in relation to Thompson's goal".
"To win other trophies you need to win more matches". While he was walking to the dressing room he told me immediately that he couldn't come for the second half. I think Mourinho's doing a great job and he's got the team all on side but, for me, it doesn't sit right with the way he keeps digging out Dele Alli.
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The Premier League side regained their lead halfway through the second half though, left-back Ben Davies seeing his sweetly-struck strike from distance skidding across the surface to beat Lonergan into the bottom corner. "I'm not sure as at that time I just wanted to reorganise the team and make the change", Mourinho said.
He said: "The teams that are going to be there are very hard".
Tottenham's most recent silverware came in the League Cup in 2008 and they remain in the hunt to end that drought after joining Manchester City and Brentford in the last four. "But it's very hard in this league to have consistent runs, because every game is very difficult".
United were beaten by City at the same stage of the competition last season and Solskjaer said: "We are in the semi-finals, so we are one step away".
A big factor in the control that Tottenham had over the game can be attributed to the return of midfielder Harry Winks, the Englishman was the provider for Bale's opener with a good cross in the first-half. Man City are very hard. Brentford, for me, the way they play they are not Championship, they are Premier League.
