Tottenham have put on a show a number of times this season. This time, though, there were fans in the stands to enjoy it, with 2,000 supporters present for Sunday’s North London derby. A lot has changed in the time since the turnstiles last turned at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. For one thing, the team that plays there are now title challengers.
This was another illustration of how Jose Mourinho has changed Spurs and a sign of the gulf that now exists between the two North London rivals. Tottenham were pre-match favourites and they delivered on that status, claiming the three points needed to take them back to the top of the Premier League table.
Mourinho’s game plan followed a familiar template, with the approach designed to give Harry Kane and Son Heung-min as much time and space in the opposition half as possible. The midfield platform of Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Moussa Sissoko did its job, releasing Kane and Son who combined for the game’s two goals in the first half. Son’s opener was the pick of the pair.
It was a goal reminiscent of something another Premier League superstar would conjure up. While Mohamed Salah tends to cut inside off the right, rather than the left as Son did, before bending a curling strike into the top corner, there was a familiar shape to the way the South Korean found the back of the Arsenal net.
