For a team failing on all fronts, Tottenham Hotspur succeeded in one thing. They put the mad into Madrid. In the meltdown in the Metropolitano, Spurs appeared to knock themselves out of the Champions League in 22 strange, shocking minutes. An hour later, Dominic Solanke’s goal provided a glimmer of hope amid the humiliation. There may be a sliver of a chance the craziest part is still to come.
Because, as Tottenham lost six consecutive games for the first time in their history, they could be grateful they leave Spain only beaten 5-2. They seemed to turn up in the wrong boots, with the wrong goalkeeper and the wrong manager.
They gifted Atletico Madrid an assortment of ridiculous goals, the first three each sillier than the last, the fifth with a hole where their defence was supposed to be. A side with a capacity for slip-ups took it literally, losing their balance, the ball, their dignity and, probably, their place in the Champions League. Their latest manager may lose his job.
This was a harrowing night for the hapless Antonin Kinsky, a horrible one for the hopeless Igor Tudor. The biggest selection decision of his brief reign will surely be destined to be remembered as the worst. By the time Atletico went 4-0 up in the 22nd minute, Kinsky had already gone, his unexpected appearance so painful he met with sympathetic applause from the home fans.
Ludicrously, Tudor said: “We started good.” He was referring to the first two or three minutes, but this was Spurs’ most shambolic start to a game since they went 5-0 down to Newcastle in 21 minutes three years ago. That was Cristian Stellini’s last match in charge. Another interim could face a similar fate. This particular Tudor, like two of the wives of a historical namesake, may be bound for the chop.
The Premier League should dictate his fate but the Europa League winners, the side who finished fourth in the Champions League group stage, began by embarrassing themselves on the continental stage. A side with five clean sheets in their previous six Champions League games were four down a quarter of the way into this.
Sadly for the reserve goalkeeper, his display is destined for infamy; like Loris Karius after the 2018 Champions League final, he may take a long time to recover. Kinsky only touched the ball five times. Two led directly to goals.
Kinsky’s calamitous cameo was over within 17 minutes. Injuries apart, has a goalkeeper has ever been substituted sooner? Yet the essential fault lay with Tudor. He dropped Guglielmo Vicario for his deputy, who had not played since October, and soon had to swap them back.
Kinsky felt like collateral damage for managerial ineptitude. Opting to remove him may have been necessary, but it was heartless. Opting to pick him was clueless.
“It was, for me, the right decision,” Tudor nevertheless claimed. It was scarcely a comment to add to his credibility.
“Unfortunately it happened in this big game, these mistakes,” continued the Croatian. Removing Kinsky “was necessary to preserve the guy, to preserve the team”. Vicario, who made a fine save from Ademola Lookman, coped admirably in the circumstances.
But Tudor looked brutal, ignoring Kinsky as he walked past him. The compassion came instead from Cristian Romero, Kevin Danso and Pedro Porro, who commiserated with the goalkeeper on his way off the pitch, and substitutes Dominic Solanke, Conor Gallagher and Joao Palhinha, who followed him into the dressing room to console him. There, Tudor reported, he apologised to the team.
Kinsky’s 13th Tottenham appearance was unlucky for him and them. He fell over while attempting to pass the ball out, skewing it instead to Lookman. He fed Julian Alvarez who found Marcos Llorente to sidefoot in the sixth-minute opener.
Then it was Micky van de Ven’s turn. Fresh from his red card against Crystal Palace, the Dutchman made another awful error. Rather than meeting Pape Matar Sarr’s pass, Van de Ven tumbled to the turf, allowing Antoine Griezmann to stroll through and score.
The third was still more nonsensical. Van de Ven was the next to pass back, ill-advisedly, as Kinsky scuffed his touch straight to Alvarez. Kinsky had his head on the ground in disappointment even before the striker had walked the ball over the line.
After he departed, Vicario conceded after five minutes, albeit following a brilliant save to spare Sarr an own goal, only for Robin Le Normand to force in the rebound. Spurs’ fifth was a second for Alvarez, justifying Diego Simeone’s decision to pick him ahead of Alexander Sorloth.
Seconds after Jan Oblak made a brilliant save from Richarlison’s header, the magnificent Griezmann released Alvarez with a majestic touch. With Porro in distant pursuit, the Argentinian ran from inside his own half to angle a shot beyond Vicario.
Perhaps Spurs’ night was summed up in injury time when Romero and Palhinha headed each other, leading to fears each is concussed. “It looks like everything is against us,” lamented Tudor. “Incredible things.”
His Atleti counterpart had less to bemoan but could still have regrets. “It is true that all the things played in our favour in the first 20 minutes,” said Simeone. Thereafter, his side were insufficiently ruthless. As Spurs showed verve in attack, they were far less watertight at the back than the Simeone sides of old. “We could have dealt [better] with the two goals they scored,” said the Atletico manager.
Porro squeezed in a low shot to reduce the deficit. Romero headed against the outside of the post. And as the blunders became contagious, after Oblak’s poor pass, Solanke fired a shot into the roof of the net. A triumphant comeback next week went from impossible to merely improbable.
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