Tottenham 3-0 Qarabag: 10-man Spurs start Europa League campaign with comfortable win with Dominic Solanke among scorers as Radu Dragusin sees red early

Gridlock on the streets of North London created an atmosphere of pre-match chaos. Qarabag was stuck in traffic and only reached the stadium 15 minutes before the scheduled 8:00 PM kick-off.

The Azerbaijani champions had been staying in a hotel 12 miles away in Stratford, but the rail and road closures caused widespread damage to everyone heading to the N17, including thousands of supporters.

TNT Sports pundits Peter Crouch and Glenn Hoddle had to jump out of their car and walk into the pouring rain. “We gave up the car,” Crouch said. “We had our heads down and pushed through.” Hoddle added: ‘Peter ran, and I limped.’

Qarabag is not the first to be caught out by the notoriously busy streets around Tottenham, whose previous European home match was delayed by ten minutes when both teams arrived late due to bad traffic.

That was against AC Milan in the second leg of the last 16 Champions League matches in March 2023, when Antonio Conte’s Spurs team could not overturn a 1-0 deficit from the first leg and crashed out.

The Qarabag team bus finally arrived with the help of a police escort during the last kilometer of the journey. Long-serving head coach Gurban Gurbanov looked decidedly unimpressed as he disembarked, but agreed to prepare as quickly as possible and aim for an 8:35 p.m. kick-off.

In fact, it was two minutes later when they set off and the visitors started cheerfully, as if happy to be able to move freely again. Spurs were surprised by their pace and reduced to ten men within just seven minutes.

Dragusin’s touch was poor as he collected a pass from Micky van de Ven and Juninho jumped off the goal line with great speed, hitting the ball free and chasing.

He looked set to accelerate away towards the goal when he got caught up in Dragusin’s desperate attempts to recover and was brought down. The French referee Willy Delajod produced a red card without hesitation.

The Romanian trudged away and Postecoglou rearranged. Lucas Bergvall was subbed off, the teenage midfielder replaced by left-back Destiny Udogie, while Ben Davies moved into the center alongside Van de Ven.

Postecoglou had made six changes to the team going into Saturday’s Premier League win against Brentford, but selected his strongest forward and to his credit he kept all three after the red card.

The reward for his risk came quickly as Dominic Solanke and Pape Matar Sarr forced an error from Julio Romao and Johnson produced a clinical finish, the first time from Solanke’s pass.

Johnson missed a chance to extend the lead before being replaced at half-time. The Wales winger won a race after taking a pass from Archie Gray and pushing it past Qarabag goalkeeper Mateusz Kochalski on the corner of the penalty area.

It wasn’t easy, requiring an immediate shot from a difficult position, with defenders scrambling back to cover and Johnson rolling his shot wide.

Qarabag, seasoned European campaigners who terrified eventual runners-up Bayer Leverkusen in the last 16 last season, were susceptible to Tottenham’s pressure at the back but were always dangerous on the break, especially when numerically ahead .

They finished the first half on top without making their chances count. Brazilian striker Juninho wriggled free of Davies and pushed the best of them wide when he should have scored.