A late Richarlison goal gave Tottenham a vital point in their fight against relegation and left Liverpool scratching their heads at Anfield after a disjointed display.
Dominik Szoboszlai had given Arne Slot’s side the lead in the first half with another goal direct from a free kick. But after that, the home side tailed off, producing little of note, despite an impressive first start for 17-year-old Rio Ngumoha.
The result leaves Tottenham on 30 points, and in 16th place, only ahead of Nottingham Forest and West Ham by one. Liverpool are fifth, two points behind Aston Villa, who lost 3-1 to Manchester United earlier on Sunday.
Here, our writers break down the key talking points of the game.
Tottenham take advantage
Against a shaky Liverpool side, Tottenham delivered their best performance of the Igor Tudor era. On a different day, it could have been a more comfortable margin of victory for the home side, with Tottenham, as they have been for much of the season, far too easy to play through in the first half.
But, as he threatened to do all afternoon, Richarlison popped up in the 90th minute to deliver their first point since Tudor took charge, a crucial momentum boost ahead of Nottingham Forest next weekend.
Now, Tottenham need to translate that fight and desire demonstrated at Anfield into what is a true relegation six-pointer next Sunday.
Forest is the biggest game Tottenham have played since the Europa League final last season, and this boost could not have come at a better time.
Elias Burke
Disjointed Liverpool
This was a result that epitomised Liverpool’s season.
Another day of missed chances and another late goal conceded through dreadful defending. For large parts of the second half, Liverpool played with fire as they allowed the game to turn into an end-to-end battle, and ultimately, they got what they deserved when conceding the late equaliser.
It was disjointed, far from convincing, and yet another day where Liverpool failed to see off one of the worst teams in the division on current form.
Gregg Evans
Is Szoboszlai the best free-kick taker in the world?
Dominik Szoboszlai chipped in with another vital contribution as he closes in on a record-breaking season.
The Hungarian, who opened the scoring, converted his fourth free kick of 2025-26 in the Premier League and is now just one away from levelling the record set by two former set-piece specialists.
Szoboszlai will join David Beckham and Laurent Robert on five direct free-kick goals if he scores another in the closing eight games of the campaign after becoming the first Liverpool player to score four in a season.
Szoboszlai all-round play has been Liverpool’s shining light this campaign with his all-action performances, but it’s his goals that have made the headlines. When head coach Arne Slot has needed a moment of magic from his team, often it has been Szoboszlai to set up.
Admittedly, this free kick was not at the same level as his previous efforts, particularly against Manchester City, Arsenal and Bournemouth — and, in truth, it was more a goalkeeping error from Guglielmo Vicario.
Yet again though, it was a strike on target, with pace, and that made the difference. Szoboszlai is one of the best dead-ball takers in the world right now, and his five goals in all competitions from direct free kicks put him level with Bayer Leverkusen’s Alejandro Grimaldo in the scoring charts across the top five leagues in Europe.
And to think, Liverpool were concerned they would struggle from free kicks when Trent Alexander-Arnold left for Real Madrid last summer.
Gregg Evans
Tottenham’s keeping problem
In isolation, Tudor’s decision to trial Antonin Kinsky away to Atletico Madrid in the last 16 of the Champions League seemed like a strange decision. He turned 23 on Friday and had not started a match since the 2-0 Carabao Cup defeat to Newcastle United in October, a game where he made a costly error. But placed in context, it doesn’t sound so ludicrous.
Vicario has been underperforming in a Tottenham shirt for a while. He had an excellent spell in October, including a match-saving performance against Monaco in the league phase 0-0 draw, but aside from that short period, he’s had a tough season between the Spurs sticks. His failure to stop Szoboszlai’s free kick, which was powerful and dipping but nowhere near the corner, is yet another example of his struggles.
After Kinsky’s horror show on Tuesday, it’s difficult to see him displacing Vicario between now and the end of the season, basically handing the Italian the starting spot by default. He’s one of the squad’s most experienced players and was named in Thomas Frank’s senior leadership team, and while he may play an important role in trying to keep spirits high behind the scenes, Tottenham have long needed more from him on the pitch.
He made an impressive save down to his right to prevent a powerful Cody Gakpo shot from nestling into the bottom corner, but remained nervy and inconsistent with his feet.
If Tottenham are to survive, they can no longer gift goals to the opposition due to goalkeeping mistakes, so the error-prone Vicario must improve.
Elias Burke
Ngumoha’s impressive start
The most important statistics won’t show the impact that Rio Ngumoha had on this game. No goals, assists, or key passes, but that’s only half of the story.
For a 17-year-old who became the fifth-youngest top-flight starter for Liverpool, he was again the most vibrant attacker on the pitch and a relentless threat to the Tottenham back line.
The experienced Pedro Porro had a tough time handling him, particularly in one-on-one situations, and in the second half, before his substitution on 64 minutes, Liverpool found themselves increasingly relying on Ngumoha to spearhead the attack down the left.
He looked bright, sharp, and skilful throughout, and chants of his name could be heard around Anfield as he filled the stadium with excitement.
Liverpool have lacked pace and attacking purpose this season, but Ngumoha brings a totally different outlook. He completed all six of his dribbles in the first half and looked to be growing in confidence as the game went on.
A couple of chances went begging, and if there was any criticism, it’s that he should have at least hit the target with an opportunity early in the second half.
But overall, this was a good day for the youngster and one that showed he’s more than worthy of his starting place.
Gregg Evans
Tel-tale signs of improvement
Tottenham Hotspur’s confidence might be on the floor coming into this clash, but Mathys Tel looked full of confidence at Anfield.
His battle with deputising right-back Szoboszlai was a key feature of the first half in particular, with 63 per cent of Spurs’ attacking touches coming down their left third of the pitch in the opening 45 minutes.
Quick feet and direct running were served alongside a decent final ball in places, with the 20-year-old unlucky not to have had an assist in the first half after two crosses — one in open-play and another from a corner — found Richarlison’s head.
Tel moved to the right flank in the second half and continued to lead the fight with his progressive carries and neat flicks. It was a performance that was much stronger from the whole Spurs side compared with recent weeks, but Tel looked to be at the heart of all things they did well going forward.
Mark Carey
What did Slot say?
“In large parts of the game, we were the better team. That is the moment where you have to score the second, and we had moments to do so quite a lot.
“In the last 15 to 20 minutes, when it was more equal, it was waiting for one of the two teams to score. They created their chances in a similar way with a long ball and then picking up the second ball.
“But we also picked up a lot of those second balls and were able to counterattack them. From all the four versus three, and three versus two situations, with the quality players we have we should be able to create a better chance and score but we didn’t. Then in the last minute we conceded an equaliser and there was not much time left to make up for it.
“If course it is damaging. How many times has it been damaging for us? We don’t help ourselves at all. So many times this season we have created more xG and chances than we have scored. We also struggle to keep clean sheets. We haven’t had as many as you would want if you want to go higher up in the table. That is a bad combination to pick up as many points as we want.”
What did Tudor say?
“It’s a long way to our goal, which is to stay in the Premier League, still a lot of games to play, but today was important to show what they showed, independently of the result. When you are honest, you need to be honest, give everything, then the football will give you back.
“That was my words before the game, so this happened today. As I said, it was not easy, and now we need to see now what to do in these two games, in front of us, to see who is able to play, who is not able to play, who is injured, who is not injured, so it’s not easy. We continue to have problems from that point of view, the numbers, but that’s why this result is even more important.”
(On the change of system) “We were preparing one training session with Conor [Gallagher] in the middle, and other solutions, but we needed to change today, so it was a system, it was a team putting in without training. Let’s say, two, three positions were changed, because it totally happened like this, you know, you prepare two trainings, then in the morning, the team you didn’t prepare, because someone is out. So this, again, to repeat, is even more value of this victory to the guys. Congratulations to the guys, they were happy there also, you know, team spirit, that was the key of this point.”
What next for Liverpool?
Wednesday, March 18: Galatasaray (Home), Champions League round of 16 second leg, 8pm UK, 4pm ET
What next for Tottenham?