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Jacob Steinberg has filed his match report from the PreZero Arena:
A bit more time enjoying Hoffenheim’s hospitality and all of Tottenham’s problems probably would have faded away. After all Christian Ilzer’s struggling side certainly seemed intent on doing everything in their power to ease Spurs back to good health here, displaying such incompetence in defence that it would not be wise to conclude that Ange Postecoglou is out of the woods just yet.
What to make of a neurotic victory over the team sitting fourth from bottom in the Bundesliga? The positive for an injury-hit Spurs is that they were stylish at first, going 2-0 up with goals from James Maddison and Son Heung-min. They also saw off a fightback from Hoffenheim after half-time, Son sealing the points with a clinical strike, and were resilient enough to boost their chances of avoiding a two-legged playoff to reach the Europa League knockouts by surviving a nervy finale with four teenagers on the pitch at the end.
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And that’s all from me. Bye!
Jacob Steinberg has filed his match report from the PreZero Arena:
A bit more time enjoying Hoffenheim’s hospitality and all of Tottenham’s problems probably would have faded away. After all Christian Ilzer’s struggling side certainly seemed intent on doing everything in their power to ease Spurs back to good health here, displaying such incompetence in defence that it would not be wise to conclude that Ange Postecoglou is out of the woods just yet.
What to make of a neurotic victory over the team sitting fourth from bottom in the Bundesliga? The positive for an injury-hit Spurs is that they were stylish at first, going 2-0 up with goals from James Maddison and Son Heung-min. They also saw off a fightback from Hoffenheim after half-time, Son sealing the points with a clinical strike, and were resilient enough to boost their chances of avoiding a two-legged playoff to reach the Europa League knockouts by surviving a nervy finale with four teenagers on the pitch at the end.
Much more here:
“It could be a remarkable season for Tottenham. They could win a couple of trophies,” says Owen Hargreaves on TNT. I’ll have what he’s having.
And here’s Ange Postecoglou!
Credit to the boys. Outstanding first half, played really well. We looked a bit tired in the second half but we hung on. We had the schoolboys out there at the end. It was a great victory.
In the context of the game we knew if we could score early it would allow us to get a real good foothold in the game. Son was brilliant. The senior boys all stood up. They needed to, playing away in Europe with such an inexperienced team.
I’ve just told them to enjoy it. Irrespective of the situation we’re in, winning away in Europe gives us a good foothold in those top eight spots which will give us a week off, of respite from the schedule we’ve had, and we’re probably going to need it.
There was some encouragement here for Spurs, more than anything in the performance of Richarlison, who only once this season has played as many as today’s 58 minutes, worked pretty hard, and looked bright in the first half-hour before fading a bit. Davies brought height and nous to their defence. Players returning from injury makes a pleasant change.
In their final league game next week they host Elfsborg, who are currently 26th. A win sends them cantering into the knockout rounds, leaving playoffs for the riff-raff.
The latest Europa League table looks like this:
Scott Murray will type you through Manchester United v Rangers, if you’re up for more:
Manchester United v Rangers: Europa League – live
Nearly final scores: Two games (italicised) are still ongoing, with the one at Qarabag deep into stoppage time and Fenerhahce still just about in normal time. Here are the scores as they stand:
Alkmaar 1-0 Roma
Bodo/Glimt 3-1 Maccabi Tel Aviv
*Fenerbahce 0-0 Lyon
Hoffenheim 2-3 Tottenham
Malmo 2-3 Twente
Porto 0-1 Olympiacos
*Qarabag 2-3 Steaua Bucharest
Viktoria Plzen 2-0 Anderlecht
90+6 mins: It’s all over! Spurs were not at all convincing, but they are victorious!
Dejan Kulusevski, Ben Davies and Tottenham teammates applaud their fans after the match. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
90+5 mins: Akpoguma belts a long diagonal pass out of defence and into touch. Spurs are nearly there.
90+4 mins: Spurs break, and Kulusevski takes the ball to the corner flag but can’t keep it there long. Hoffenheim have a goal kick, with a bit under a minute to play.
90+3 mins: Chaves drives a cross into Archie Gray. He appeals for a penalty for handball, but Gray’s arm couldn’t have been any closer to his body and he isn’t getting one. There will be a corner, mind.
90+3 mins: Spurs are clinging on now. Kramaric’s cross doesn’t quite drop to a team-mate, but still Hoffenheim have the ball.
90+2 mins: The ball goes out of play for a Spurs goal kick. Whistles and jeers ring out as Austin takes his time over it.
90+1 mins: There will be five minutes of stoppage time, or thereabouts.
90 mins: Porro steals the ball from Nsoki on the edge of the Hoffenheim area, but he obviously feels some contact in doing so and goes down, and a potentially tasty opportunity is lost.
90 mins: Spurs bring Callum Olusesi on for Maddison.
Game back on! It’s a great cross from Kramaric on the right, and it dips onto the head of the substitute David Mokwa, who heads in from the far corner of the six-yard box!
Hoffenheim’s David Mokwa Ntusu sets up a tense last few minutes for the visitors. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
87 mins: And back to the keep-ball from Spurs.
86 mins: Lovely work from Kulusevski in midfield to take him past a couple of opponents, ruined by the terrible pass at the end of it that has no chance of finding Lankshear.
84 mins: The shape of the game has changed again since the goal and the substitutions. Spurs have just kept the ball for the last couple of minutes, not showing any great ambition but not letting Hoffenheim anywhere near it.
81 mins: A couple of changes for the home side. Bischof and Hlozek, two of their more enterprising attacking players, go off and Arthur Chaves and Florian Micheler replace them.
79 mins: And that is the end of Son’s evening. Will Lankshear comes on to replace him.
N’Soki’s terrible pass gives Kulusevski the ball in the centre circle, and it’s swiftly worked through Moore to Son, who jinks his way into space before shooting low with his left foot beyond Baumann and in at the far post!
Son Heung-min fires the ball home to bag a brace. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
Son celebrates in trademark fashion. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
76 mins: It was always likely, given the number of injuries in both camps and the teams’ form, that this would end up being a battle between limited teams, and that’s what it has become. It’s all a bit messy right now, which has helped to give Spurs a bit of a foothold again.
74 mins: A fraction of a chance for Spurs. Porro’s cross from the right somehow bounces through to Son, but he’s as surprised by this development as everyone else and can’t control it.
70 mins: Tottenham have been absolutely execrable since half-time. They have had no idea how to turn possession in their defensive third into possession in their attacking third, and so have just repeatedly biffed the ball aimlessly upfield and gifted it to their opponents.
It’s been coming, and now it’s come! Stach starts the break with a fine pass out to Kramaric from his own half and from there he keeps running. Kramaric passes on to Jurasek, and his low cross from the left finds Stach six yards out. His finish is not at all convincing, but the ball spins in at the back stick!
Hoffenheim’s Anton Stach (second left) gets the home side back in the game. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
66 mins: Austin had also been shown a yellow card, and that decision is also reversed. It took the best part of five minutes to reverse that decision, but we got to the right place in the end.
65 mins: Austin gets his fingers to the ball first. And he also doesn’t foul Moerstedt at all. It would be an extraordinary penalty award.
64 mins: In fact, perhaps he has! Now the referee has been called to the replay screen.
64 mins: The VAR has not overruled it!
62 mins: A deflected cross from the right. Moerstedt and Austin both jump for it, the forward heads it over the bar and then the two collide. The referee gives a penalty, but it’s not at all clear to me who collided with whom. It seems a very generous decision to me, and perhaps VAR will overrule it.
Tottenham’s goalkeeper Brandon Austin and Hoffenheim’s Max Moerstedt go up for a high ball. Photograph: Michael Probst/AP
Austin seems as surprised to get a yellow card. Photograph: Heiko Becker/Reuters
60 mins: Bischof tries to chip Austin from the edge of the area, the ball eventually dropping a foot wide of the far post with the keeper helpless. It would have been a beauty of a goal.
60 mins: Somehow nothing is quite dropping for Hoffenheim inside the Spurs penalty area, but the visitors are hanging on a bit grimly at present.
58 mins: Spurs have a rare foray forward. It ends with Moor spotting Son sprinting unmarked into the penalty area, and the referee spotting that the reason he’s unmarked is that N’Soki is on the ground. He gives a free-kick against the Korean.
56 mins: Spurs make a change, Mikey Moore coming on for Richarlison, who was never going to play much more than an hour as he returns from injury.
55 mins: Now they make a chance! Kaderabek crosses from the right, Kramaric has a free header at the back post, and his attempt to send a looping header back across goal and into the top corner ends up hitting the top of the bar!
54 mins: Hoffenheim really aren’t attacking with great quality, but Tottenham’s attempts to break so far this half have been absolutely pitiful so they keep coming.
51 mins: Spurs have done absolutely nothing this half. A replay of that Kramaric penalty shout is pretty embarrassing for the Croatian.
50 mins: Kramaric goes down in search of a penalty, and stays there for a while after he fails to get it, but there’s nothing doing.
48 mins: Hoffenheim have started the half on the front foot. They’re not a hugely speedy or dynamic side, but they’re getting numbers forward and causing trouble as a result.
46 mins: Peeeeep! Football is once again being played. “This is a great matchup for neutrals like me who like to mash words together,” writes Peter Oh (brace yourself for what’s coming, reader). “I don’t care who wins, Hoffenham or Tottenheim, Hoffentotten or Heimham, Tottenhoffen or Hamheim.”
The players are back out! No halftimely changes by the look of things.
45+2 mins: And that’s pretty much the last kick of the half! Not completely convincing from Spurs, but in the circumstances they’ll take a two-goal lead and look grateful about it.
45+1 mins: Right at the end of stoppage time Hoffenheim make their best chance of the half, a pull-back that runs to Becker, in all sorts of space 15 yards out. He can pick his spot, and the spot he picks is Dragusin’s shin!
45 mins: Great save from Baumann! Spurs win a free-kick on the left, cross it into the area and Bergvall wins the header. He doesn’t head it cleanly but even so it takes an excellent diving stop to keep it out!
44 mins: Tottenham’s best move for a while is kick-started by Kulusevski and Bregvall exchanging backheels in their own half to beat the press, and pretty much ends when Richarlison’s pass, intended for Maddison, is hit straight into a defender.
40 mins: Hlozek’s shot is deflected towards Moerstedt. Dragusin absolutely throws himself at the ball but barely touches it with his head, and Moerstedt has a quick shot while off balance that Austin saves.
38 mins: The home side are having a bit of a spell. The win a corner, which is played short and then crossed straight into the arms of Austin. He spots Kulusevski on the halfway line and boots the ball down to him, and perhaps a goal would have resulted if the Swede were quite a lot quicker.
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