- Tottenham reached the semi-finals of the Carabao Cup after a pulsating victory
- Ange Postecoglou has defended his side’s attacking blueprint non-stop
- LISTEN NOW: It all starts! Are Tottenham managers treated differently to other managers?
Ange Postecoglou praised his Great Entertainers as Tottenham booked their place in the Carabao Cup semi-finals after a seven-goal thriller against Manchester United.
Dominic Solanke’s double helped Spurs into a 3-0 lead before two cheers from goalkeeper Fraser Forster got the visitors back into the game.
Tottenham captain Heung-min Son added a fourth straight from a corner, but there was still time for Jonny Evans to force an exciting finish with a late third for United.
“Aren’t you entertained,” Postecoglou declared as he channeled Russell Crowe from the movie Gladiator in defense of his side’s non-stop attacking style.
‘What do you want? Want a scrambling zero? I know the TV studio is probably going to be in crisis because of my lack of tactics, but you know what, I think it’s great that we’re going to go out and just put it to our opposition.
“Even though we have so many absences at the moment, goalkeeper, both centre-halves, left-backs, we have kids on the bench, and yet these boys are sticking to their principles about trying to play the football that we want to be. .
Ange Postecoglou defended his Tottenham tactics after their 4-3 win over Manchester United
Spurs reached the semi-finals of the Carabao Cup after winning a thrilling seven-goal thriller
Goalkeeper Fraser Forster made two disastrous errors to give United a route back to the tie
‘We were playing so well, we were in control of the game and then, just as our season is over, we hurt ourselves a bit.
“It should have been much more comfortable, but we still can’t ignore the fact that this group of players is doing an incredible job to get us through this.
‘I’m so proud of the players.’
Postecoglou also jumped to the defense of his goalkeeper Forster, whose two flagrant errors resulted in goals for Joshua Zirkzee and Amad Diallo.
“He is disappointed,” Postecoglou added. ‘He didn’t have much to do in the first half and was very good with his feet. The first mistake affected his self-confidence, and he lost his faith a little, and the second made it worse.
‘He is a big boy and has put in a lot of effort for us during this period.’
The Spurs boss suffered another blow to his injury-ravaged side before Timo Werner’s clash was ruled out due to illness.
“He woke up this morning with a fever, the doctor went to see him and we had to rule him out,” Postecoglou added. ‘That’s just the way things are for us. I don’t go into race day looking for good news. It’s just incredible.’
Joshua Zirkzee struck home after a loose pass from Forster put Spurs under pressure
Heung-min Son scored immediately from a late corner to ease the home team’s nerves
Ruben Amorim dismissed the idea that United had fallen victim to the cup chaos
United boss Ruben Amorim again defended his decision to leave Marcus Rashford out of the squad for the second game in a row despite his side crashing out of the cup.
Rashford missed the Manchester derby and then revealed in an impressive interview that he was ‘ready for a new challenge’ ahead of the match at Spurs.
‘No, that’s not true [a mistake]’, Amorim emphasized about his decision. ‘I feel like I’m doing the right thing for the team, so it’s never a mistake.
“We have to make a selection, sometimes you fall a little short in the game and you see some guys come into the game and change it a little bit, but I don’t think it was a mistake because I always do the best for the team. my way of seeing things.’
Despite seeing his side come out on the wrong end in a seven-goal thriller, Amorim dismissed the idea that his side had been victims of some sort of cup chaos.
“I didn’t feel that,” Amorim said. ‘Eight minutes of the second half were like that. We lost balls in transition, but we were in control for almost the entire match. I saw a team that knows what we want to do, so it was chaotic.
“I couldn’t see any chaos in my team.”