Liverpool fiddles with Mourinho’s declining Tottenham | sports

Faced with the increasingly weak breath of his fans at Tottenham Stadium, for an hour the spurs they turned impotent as a youth set harassed by professionals. Directed by Mané and Firmino, initiators and finishers of almost everything, the reds they ended up taking the three points and already add another statistical record in this century: four straight games in London culminated with victory. West Ham, Chelsea, Crystal Palace and Tottenham fell under the weight of an unbeatable team when squeezed and lucky when dosing efforts.

Liverpool transfers unknown levels regularly. It has been a year since he lost a Premier match (2-1 against City) and chained six games without conceding a goal. He had not won four straight matches in London since 1989, just during the last season he closed raising the title of England champion. The triumph at the house of Tottenham had this symbolic nuance in a race that leads without answer towards the reconquest. To 16 points of the second classified – the Leicester – he added his 12th victory followed at the cost of returning to his rival in the last Champions League final.

Only seven months have passed since the end of the Wanda and the gap that separates them only increases. The fall of Harry Kane, the captain, postponed until April by an operation on a tendon of the left leg, delved into the gloomy weather of White Harte Lane.

Fearful of reproach, Mourinho undertook the fortification of his area. He arranged his famous formation with four defenders in the rear and a side – Aurier – moved to the far right thinking more about closing than advancing. To the double step that put in the way of Mané and Robertson added a deep general withdrawal of the whole team. Upstairs only released Moura. To feed him, he reduced the diet to the maximum. Prevented against the dangers of pressure from Liverpool, his teammates only supplied him with long balls.

It was like putting a paper wall into a cannonball. The approach encased Tottenham against an elastic adversary. In the absence of spaces to counterattack, the Klopp team deployed all its ingenuity to drown its adversary at each exit, manage the ball and punish. The 0-1 of Firmino in the 37th minute, after a prodigious control before the debutant Tanganga who hugged him, sentenced a match that could be sealed with a win-win break. Alexander-Arnold sent a shot to the stick, Tanganga covered a firing of Firmino on the line, and Gazzaniga made a foreshortening to get a header from Van Dijk. At 40 minutes of siege the home team had barely had the ball 24% of the time of action.

Impatient and perhaps shocked at such inhibition, the public began to demand a little more courage from their players. When in the second part they decided to advance in block towards the opposite field, it was due to a greater cause. From the band, Mourinho was disappointed by asking the referee to miss fouls against Liverpool. Too little to compensate for an imbalance that only corrected the desperate thrust of Tottenham in the last minutes. In an agonizing effort, with a few minutes left, Winks stole a ball, played it with Son, and the Korean found Aurier. The center of the side was at the foot of Lo Celso, who did the most difficult: his shot on the second post, alone and with the defeated goalkeeper, sent the ball back where it came from.

Neither Tottenham had the fortune to tie nor Liverpool the bad luck of losing two points that were worked with care until it was left over and incurred the leniency. After the Holidays, the Premier hides a few puzzles. The identity of the champion is not one of them.