Aston Villa dumped Tottenham Hotspur out of the FA Cup on Sunday
Tottenham Hotspur and their fans witnessed another low on Sunday as Ange Postecoglou’s side were beaten 2-1 by Aston Villa in the FA Cup fourth round.
The Lilywhites conceded in the first minute at Villa Park as Jacob Ramsey was afforded so much room to power his effort at goal, which shot-stopper Antonin Kinsky failed to keep out. Kinsky atoned for his opening-minute howler by making a flurry of saves to keep his team in the game, but Morgan Rogers eventually doubled the Villa lead in the 64th minute.
January signing Mathys Tel pulled one back in the stoppage time, but it was too little too late as Spurs bowed out of the FA Competition. This comes days after Ange Postecoglou and Co. were knocked out of the Carabao Cup following a 4-0 humbling at the hands of Liverpool in the return leg of the semi-final, losing the tie 4-1 on aggregate.
Before the FA Cup tie, Ange Postecoglou promised improvement in his team’s display, yet Tottenham were simply second best in every department against Unai Emery’s side. The Greek-Australian coach has now given his assessment of Spurs’ performance in the 2-1 defeat to Villa.
“Obviously disappointed we don’t progress. It wasn’t a great start, that’s the last thing you want, and we really struggled to get some control. Then we had an enormous chance at 1-0 we didn’t take to equalise,” Postecoglou told BBC One.
“We got a better grip of the game but unfortunately fell short. When you go a goal down it gives the opposition momentum and confidence. You want to wrestle control early and we didn’t do that.
“We were still in the game [at half-time]. We just needed to hang in there. The second half was a lot more like ourselves. The second goal sort of made it a bit more difficult but I always felt we were a threat – unfortunately just not enough.
“We still scored, we had opportunities to create more chances. We were always still in the game but conceding an early goal and a second makes it hard.”
Tottenham players were driven by the cup competitions but days after getting eliminated from the Carabao Cup, Villa piled further misery on them. The North Londoners are now only alive in the Europa League competition while reeling at 14th place in the Premier League table.
There is obviously doom and gloom surrounding the club after being knocked out of two cup competitions in the span of only four days. They were realistic chances of ending Spurs’ 17-year-long trophy drought whilst fulfilling Big Ange’s promise of always winning silverware in his second season.
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Nonetheless, the Europa League competition is still there to win and get a direct entry into the Champions League next season. But Big Ange needs to pick up results in the Premier League to buy time for himself and be in the hotseat when Tottenham resume their Europa League knockout rounds in March.
