When Conor Gallagher chose to join Tottenham Hotspur over Aston Villa a little under four months ago the decision looked a sound one. Sure, Spurs were bobbing about uncomfortably in 14th but Thomas Frank was still finding his feet, the team were only six points off the Champions League places, and few questioned which was the bigger club.
Everything that has happened since will have made Gallagher regret his decision – right up until Sunday afternoon at Villa Park where Tottenham’s world changed; where a 2-1 thrashing of Villa didn’t just take them out of the bottom three and kick-start the Roberto de Zerbi era, it also put Gallagher at the very heart of the project.
Gallagher was Spurs, Spurs were Gallagher: tenacious, aggressive, energetic, and just plain good at football. Starting as De Zerbi’s number ten he lived up to the pressure that comes with the role both figuratively and literally, asserting Tottenham’s dominance with the ball by scoring the early opener and leading the way without it, harassing from the front to set the tone of the De Zerbi era.
Ange-ball never had a single player who truly embodied its core principles, which might say something about why it failed, or more specifically how amorphous those ideas really were. You cannot accuse De Zerbi of that. Frantic high pressing is the core of the mantra, and there aren’t many players in the Premier League who embody that better than the wild and snarling Gallagher, not so much a footballer as a medieval jouster.
So, here’s the plan writ large: run like Gallagher, press like Gallagher, believe like Gallagher. From the first minute he was a terrier, leading the hunt as De Zerbi’s long training sessions paid off. Within six minutes of kick-off Villa had been caught passing out from the back no fewer than three times, a pattern that repeated again and again until, by the time Richarlison’s 25th-minute header added to Gallagher’s superbly-taken first, the match was already over.
Not that Spurs had to do very much, in truth. After one-sided games there is always a debate about whether one team was good or the other just bad, and on this occasion, although the narrative pull is towards the former, we have to confess the real headline was Aston Villa’s abysmal, brain-melting display. Unai Emery made six changes and the resulting disconnect between the players, coupled with the distraction of Thursday’s Europa League semi-final to come, produced arguably the worst performance of any Premier League side this season.
Villa really were sensationally bad, loping about in the evening sun to give De Zerbi a neat replica of his midweek training sessions: seniors practicing their high-pressing drills against a hapless and half-interested B team.
Emery watched on in silence, unnervingly still on the touchline, too shell-shocked to react or maybe simply paralysed by boredom. That he chose not make any changes until the hour mark, and even then only one, showed where his priorities lie, although the constant boos ringing around a furious Villa Park suggested the supporters realise a third consecutive defeat, no matter the context, could have a fatal impact on morale ahead of Nottingham Forest’s visit next week.
That, or Villa fans just desperately wanted Spurs relegated, a prospect that looks significantly less likely after Emery’s side gifted the visitors a De Zerbi tactical masterclass; gifted a messianic performance from Gallagher to lead them into the final three matches of the season.
Neutrals might even call this a dereliction of duty, such has been the collective schadenfreude regarding Tottenham’s anti-miracle, a tonic uniting this fractured nation these past months. It’s one thing to ring the changes, another to entirely ignore the obvious tactical mismatch that occurs when you ask Tyrone Mings and Victor Lindelof to orchestrate the passing moves against a De Zerbi press. It gave the distinct impression of a manager who, assuming Champions League football is already secured, genuinely did not care about this one.
Which is surprising considering Aston Villa’s stated aim is to break up the ‘Big Six’ and become a serious player by the 2030s. Helping to relegate one of those six should form part of the long-term strategy, as should straining every sinew to finish fourth, not fifth, which if paired with a Europa League triumph might hand Champions League qualification and its financial windfall to a sixth-placed Chelsea.
Instead they’ve helped Tottenham climb out of the relegation zone and find their identity under De Zerbi. For the first time in months Spurs look not just capable of avoiding the drop but likely to do so, a prospect that ought to worry Villa. It might not be long until Tottenham are right back up there, challenging Villa for European places, throwing their weight around, muscling them out of Gallagher-sized deals.
In the end money always wins. Gallagher, after tonight, will finally realise that he chose well.
Remaining fixtures
West Ham: Arsenal (h), Newcastle (a), Leeds (h)