Sign up to FREE email alerts from Football London - Spurs Subscribe Thank you for subscribing See our privacy notice Invalid Email

A real lack of bite

To say Tottenham were toothless at Crystal Palace would be an understatement. In an attacking sense they resembled an 87-year-old man whose false teeth had been left soaking in the glass of water beside his bed.

Nobody seemed to want to shoot, everybody wanted to pass it off to someone else, handing over the responsibility, and if they actually dared hit the ball at goal - because there was nobody else to pass to - the effort was weak and without conviction.

Of course Tottenham were missing Harry Kane, Dele Alli and Son Heung-min, the equivalent of any of the others in the top six having their entire attack wiped out, but that's not to excuse those remaining.

Fernando Llorente is a World Cup and European Championship winner, a striker who has played for the likes of Juventus, Sevilla and Athletic Bilbao. Lucas Moura is a Brazil international, Erik Lamela an Argentina international and Georges-Kevin Nkoudou a player who should be desperate to show what he can do.

They could barely muster a shot to test veteran goalkeeper Julian Speroni between them.

That Llorente wasn't trying to grab the ball to try to score a penalty ahead of Kieran Trippier was criminal. Trippier missed and it was a poor penalty, but any striker should be desperate for a chance to score goals otherwise what's the point in being one?

Another issue was that the club's experienced, established players didn't exactly step up to grab the game by the scruff of the neck when called upon.

Neither Eric Dier nor Jan Vertonghen seemed to lead the way from midfield or defence alongside younger, less experienced team-mates when they needed them the most.

For Mauricio Pochettino it was about the bluntness up top and he was disappointed with the team's inability to put their chances away.

"It was a fair result because they scored and we didn't," he said. "I cannot say anything again about that. Of course we can talk about possession, we can talk about corners, about shots, about everything, but in football the truth is if you don't score you don't deserve to win games. They scored twice. Of course it's a fair result."

The Eriksen fear

This match provided another stark glimpse at life without Christian Eriksen.

Before the game Pochettino had revealed that the Dane was tired following all of his appearances since returning from his abdominal injury and needed a rest.

The manager thought, probably correctly, that Tottenham should still have enough to beat a Crystal Palace side who might have one eye on their midweek fixture against fellow strugglers Southampton.

Yet Tottenham without Eriksen lack fluidity and they also lose someone else able to pop up with important goals and assists as well as whip corners and free-kicks into the box.

The old transfer frustration that used to wind up Tottenham fans came during the Damien Comolli years when it was clear to everyone that Spurs had no balance to their squad because they didn't have a left winger. Nobody at the club accepted it was an issue and the issue was not addressed for years.

The current transfer situation that has lingered for far too long is the club's inability to bring in another player like Eriksen, a playmaker with a high workrate.

They're rare for sure but Eriksen has been at the club for six years now and it's clear that the Dane is absolutely vital to the way Tottenham play. When he conducts the club's symphony other players rise to the occasion.

Pochettino knows how important Eriksen is to his side and has made it clear on countless occasions in the past. The Dane is perhaps level with only Kane as the biggest miss to Tottenham when he's not available.

In Kane's case Spurs have tried and failed to bring in an adequate replacement with those coming in through the doors just not good enough. When it comes to Eriksen, they haven't even got that far.

The match at Selhurst Park was another stark reminder of a Tottenham side without their playmaker.

Eriksen's contract will have just a year left in the summer and there's the very real prospect that he could be sold rather than Spurs lose such a talent for nothing.

Moves for homegrown playmakers such as Ross Barkley and Jack Grealish have floundered in the past two summers.

If the club don't bring in a player to provide back-up and challenge Eriksen, it's poor recruitment and identification of an issue in the squad.

If the club are forced to sell Eriksen in the summer and have nobody ready to step in to the breach, then it's just woeful planning all round.

Nkoudou or Ncantdo?

Just when you think Georges-Kevin Nkoudou might be about to show a glimpse of something that hope is squashed flat.

The Frenchman sent in the perfect cross a week ago to allow Harry Winks to head home the match-winning goal at Fulham.

He'd earned a chance to show what he could do in the FA Cup game and Pochettino made it clear that that was all he wanted from Nkoudou - to take his chances when they come.

Unfortunately there's a theme to the 23-year-old's opportunities when he's started for Spurs.

He's started just four competitive matches for Spurs, in the League Cup against Liverpool, an FA Cup tie against Wycombe, the dead rubber Champions League game at Wembley against Apoel Nicosia and more than a year later this match at Selhurst Park.

The theme? He's hasn't been great when he starts. He barely touched the ball against Liverpool, was subbed at half-time against Wycombe and scored and injured himself against Apoel late on to mask what had been a performance that lacked any end product until that point.

Then came the start at Selhurst Park. One reason Nkoudou hasn't fitted into Pochettino's plans is that the Spurs boss wants his attacking midfielders to be versatile, players who are as comfortable playing out wide or running through the middle and operating behind the striker.

The Frenchman is very much a rigid winger and that has always made it hard to fit him into a Pochettino system - a failing of the scouting department who identified him.

At Fulham, with Kyle Walker-Peters out wide as a wing-back, Nkoudou was naturally pushed inside and it was a chance for him to show he'd developed into a player who could handle a more central role.

Unfortunately he didn't. He struggled to keep the ball with his back to goal and he struggled when out wide.

He still had four chances, two of them half-chances, two of them massive opportunities. The first was from a short free-kick from Trippier which ended with him losing the ball on the edge of the box, allowing Palace to start a dangerous break.

The next two came in very quick succession before the break. Another short Trippier free-kick found Nkoudou completely unmarked in the box. His first shot was straight at Speroni but the ball came back to him for another chance. However, the follow-up was sent in almost exactly the same place with the same result.

The fourth chance was a shot blocked on the edge of the Palace box as he hesitated at the culmination of a quick Spurs break.

Nkoudou was always likely to be on his way out of the club, but the recent injuries appeared to have given him a stay of execution until the summer.

The next four days will show whether his performance at Selhurst Park convinced Pochettino that someone else deserves his spot in the squad, whether that's from outside or from within.

One positive on the day

If there was one positive to be taken from the depths of defeat it was Juan Foyth.

The 21-year-old Argentina international was one of the few players who really looked like he wanted it at Selhurst Park.

Foyth is learning all of the time and you can often see him doing so during matches. In the early stages of Sunday's match the young defender was struggling to cope with Wilfried Zaha's pace and trickery, although he wasn't alone in that.

By the end of the game, Foyth had the upper hand when it came to the Ivorian. He'd begun to figure out how to deal with a player who is notoriously unpredictable in his play.

It wasn't just in defence though where Foyth continues to show improvement. His composure on the ball and ability to stride out of defence and sometimes even into the opposition's final third are something to behold.

Foyth won the penalty in the first half which Trippier blazed wide, having turned cleverly in the box and been tripped.

His academy years spent as an attacking midfielder at Estudiantes helped hone the ability to dribble past players and it will be interesting to see where his career goes from here in terms of his final position.

Will he become a Rio Ferdinand-eqsue marauding centre-back or will he eventually be taken back into midfield as an anchorman with a touch of flair about him?

Pochettino is a fan and telling the young player he wasn't in the Champions League squad for the knockout stages last season was one of the manager's most painful moments during his time at Tottenham so far.

Foyth's development this season means that the Spurs boss has already decided to give the one space created in the European squad by Mousa Dembele's exit to the defender rather than open up the club's transfer search to include foreign players, which is a big call.

The young centre-back is still learning and there will be downs to go with the ups, but there's plenty of potential there to work with.

Pochettino's trophy statement

Social media went mad after the match. It wasn't so much about the result, more to do with what Pochettino said in his post-match press conference.

"Again we are going to create a debate that to win a trophy is going to help the club to be in the last level. I don't agree with that," he said.

"Only that builds your ego because when you win a trophy you can say you have. In reality, at Tottenham the most important thing is always being consistently in the top four and playing Champions League.

"That is the realistic thing for Tottenham. That is going to help the club to achieve the last step. In the moment that Tottenham will be the real contenders and in the last level, yes that is the moment to try to win some trophies, to improve your titles and of course your ego.

"But today the club is doing fantastically. It's so successful because in the last four or five years, we've been fighting the big clubs in different ways to help the club achieve all that it needs, to be in the level of Chelsea, United, City or Arsenal or Liverpool."

Tottenham fans went berserk, United supporters went crazy at such a statement from their mooted next manager and Arsenal fans pointed out that Arsene Wenger was slated for similar views.

Pochettino's statement is probably true when it comes to Tottenham. With their financial situation with the new stadium, the security provided by getting into the Champions League every year probably will play a bigger role in their long term development than a domestic cup win.

The biggest problem with what Pochettino said was the timing of it - just when the fans were at their lowest ebb and when he'd rested two key players in Eriksen and Toby Alderweireld. There's also no real reason why Tottenham can't win trophies as well as aim for the top four.

As Pochettino says, winning trophies requires a certain amount of luck and it just happened to not be on Spurs' side at Stamford Bridge on Thursday night. They are close and capable of winning domestic cups, so he doesn't really need to dismiss them in that respect. It doesn't really serve any purpose to do so.

The Spurs boss is sometimes too honest for his own good and this was probably one of those occasions. He's said similar before but to repeat it less than 45 minutes after a painful cup exit wasn't really necessary.

His talk of ego also creates the situation now where if he does decide to up sticks and move to Real Madrid or Manchester United in the summer, then in his words he's purely going there to win trophies to boost his ego.

There are misconceptions about winning trophies of course. The idea that winning an FA Cup or Carabao Cup win would keep a player at a club is a daft one. Just ask Dimitar Berbatov and Robbie Keane about that. Both players were quick to move to United and Liverpool in the months after Spurs' 2008 League Cup win.

That trophy didn't help Juande Ramos either, who was sacked later that year. George Graham won the League Cup as well in 1999 and was gone less then two years later. Terry Venables won Spurs' last FA Cup back in 1991 and was also gone two years later.

Top players want to win Premier League titles or the Champions League and that's Pochettino's point. He feels the way to get to that level is to first become a consistent top four force and his three consecutive top three finishes show he's getting there, despite the gulf in spending between Spurs and their rivals.

There's also an opposing school of logic that trophies help breed a winning mentality. Of course that does happen in some cases, although Pochettino points to the likes of Wigan, Portsmouth and Birmingham as clubs who won their first domestic cups in years and it didn't jump-start anything. In fact they went the other way.

A cup exit to Palace doesn't erase all the good Pochettino has done since arriving at Tottenham, and in England, and it certainly mustn't cause people to forget the fire-fighting he's done with great success in a mess of a season at the club.

That Tottenham are third in the Premier League and in the last 16 of the Champions League is still an impressive feat so far

What he said does once again open up the whole debate over whether managers should be judged on trophies or what they achieve despite the circumstances surrounding them.

Since the Argentine arrived at Tottenham in 2014, the club have had a net spend of just £29m, compared to Manchester City (£518m), Manchester United (£466m), Arsenal (£225m), Chelsea (£200m) and Liverpool (£183m), yet he's finished about at least three of those sides for the past three years.

The problem for Pochettino is that he is at a club where its 1961 double-winning captain Danny Blanchflower famously once said "The game is about glory" and that message was adorned around White Hart Lane and now sits on the side of the club's new stadium.

Unfortunately for Pochettino 'The game is about somehow finishing in the top three for three years in a row while spending peanuts as others spend hundreds of millions' isn't quite as snappy.

Keep up to date with the latest Tottenham Hotspur news, features and exclusives from football.london via our free WhatsApp service.

Text NEWS to 07776197989 and then add the number to your phone contacts book as spurs dot london (case sensitive, with spaces) to receive daily updates and breaking news from Alasdair Gold and the team on Spurs.

Your phone number won't be shared with any other members of the group. Click here for more information on the service.