James Maddison has made an honest admission of Aston Villa after he helped Tottenham to a dominant 4-0 win at Villa Park. The England international opened the scoring just after half time by guiding home Pape Matar Sarr’s cross from close range with Brennan Johnson, Son Heung-min and Timo Werner
all on target later in the half…..
A red card for John McGinn midway through the second period also significantly damaged Villa’s hopes of getting back into the game. However Postecoglou’s verdict on the sending off certainly suggests he did not think it had much of an impact on the result…..
“I don’t think it was a key moment,” he admitted in a press conference. “We were in control. Obviously it made it easier but it was just a by-product of the pressure we were putting on them. I don’t think it was a malicious one from John.” In the first half, neither side took the initiative but Maddison has since revealed what Postecoglou noticed and thus told his players at half time that helped them dominant the following 45 minutes.
Speaking to Sky Sports, the Tottenham midfielder said: “The gaffer’s team talk was pretty much to keep it how it was in the first half because over the last ten minutes, they were starting to tire and that’s a common theme in our games – scoring second half goals, particularly late goals…..
They played a lot of balls in behind and they were getting tired which helps us then counter and move forward quicker. The red card helped as well, before that we had the two-goal cushion, but we’d blown them away by that point.”….
Another three points has taken Spurs two closer to Villa, who occupy fourth spot, with a game in hand over their rivals. However, Maddison was keen to point out that despite the superb victory, Spurs must keep up their focus for the final 11 games….
We’ll take it game-by-game,” he said. “Sorry for the boring, cliche answer but that’s all you can do. If you start looking at who plays who and how many games in hand someone might have, you just need to look and focus on yourselves and winning the game and that was the message today….
“No position in the table is solidified by any result that happens today so it was a big step, a big win and we’re really happy with it.”…..
