With the Champions League places now almost certainly beyond Spurs’ reach, my hope for the remaining games of the season was that Pochettino would put some work into improving his defence. With that in mind, I suppose I can’t complain too much after this drab 0-0 draw.
Before the match much of the focus had been on how to solve the problem of Tottenham’s fragile back-line. Unsurprisingly Vlad Chiriches hadn’t featured in many people’s suggestions. The Romanian had a solid game filling in for a sick Jan Vertonghen.
With Hugo Lloris out and Walker replaced at half time by Davies, a makeshift defence did well – of course, Burnley’s lack of quality meant it wasn’t the sternest of tests. Chiriches and Davies both showed their versatility as the Romanian moved from the centre to right back, while the Welshman ended up partnering Dier.
The best chance of the match fell to the home side within the opening minutes as Danny Ings raced through after Ryan Mason was caught dwelling on the ball near his own goal. The now England midfielder will have breathed a sigh of relief as Ings shot straight at Vorm.
Most disappointing was the way Spurs were reduced to efforts from distance, lacking the subtlety to move the ball in the opposition area. Burnley out-shot us 15 to 12, and 10 of the Tottenham efforts were from outside the box.
Pochettino had handed the captain’s armband to Kane, a recognition of the fact his performances this year have not just been about scoring goals. Here, the Spurs forward struggled to make much of an impression and often had to come deep to find space as Burnley’s two banks of four held strong.
There’s not much more to say. Maybe the quality of the match was predictable. One team tired after a long campaign, the other under pressure, the threat of relegation hanging over their heads, happy to get a point. Let’s hope Spurs season doesn’t just peter out from here on.
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What did you think of the game? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.
Anything But Penalties 
There is a problem with Spurs about never being able to win key matches and thus disappointing their fans all the time. This match against Burnley was a ‘must win’ for us in order to move well above Liverpool into the 5th position and better our chances for a 4th spot. Sadly, they let us down by not playing with any passion and firm desire to score and win.. They showed apathy and sluggishness throughout the match without any creativity whatsoever. Their performance was, indeed, very poor but so was that of the Manager, Pochettino, who, as usual, did not make a good job of proper selection and proper substitution. Why keep on the pitch poorly performing players while better players remained on the bench? As the game wore on, it was obvious that we were not able to score, so why did he not bring in an additional striker? Since Kane was tightly marked, it would have been desirable to have another striker to draw away the opponents from him and facilitate scoring. There was therefore no attack at all on our part. Burnley were the better team and we can consider ourselves lucky to have picked one point but that was not good enough. We have dropped two most valuable points and finishing 4th is now almost impossible….
Liverpool losing had given us an opportunity. It was a real shame we didn’t take it.
The substitutions were a little underwhelming. For me there were chances out wide but we kept trying to play through the middle and take long shots.
Just when i thought Paulinho has turned a corner and can start delivering, he’s back to his old self… From a tactical perspective, Poch understandably crowded the midfield to get an edge other Burnley but it does not work if the midfielders are not pushing forward and pressing…
Glad that Vlad was given a chance. his passing and decision making are still suspect but he played well, same as Vorm.
Finally, Nabil and Mason need a break. let Stambouli and Dembele play!
We are much too slow with the ball and never move fast enough into attack, giving time to the opponents to organise themselves. This is why we could not score against Burnley..
I would love to see Stambouli given a go.
I have a soft spot for Vlad despite going to the home game against Besiktas where he put in one of the worst performances I have ever seen!
Stambouli would have certainly done better than Paulinho. Pochettino does not seem to know how to select his players or substitute them..