Spurs fight back to give Sherwood his first win as coach

Tim Sherwood claimed his first victory as interim Tottenham Hotspur coach as his side came from behind to win 3-2 at Southampton on Sunday in the Premier League.

Emmanuel Adebayor, second from the left, and his teammates gave Tim Sherwood plenty to celebrate as Tottenham Hotspur complete a fightback to give Sherwood his first win as interim coach with 3-2 victory over host Southampton. Paul Gilham / Getty ImagesShow less

SOUTHAMPTON 2 TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR 3

Southampton

Lallana 13’, Lambert 59’

Tottenham

Adebayor 25’, 64’, Hooiveld 54’ (og)

Man of the match

Emmanuel Adebayor (Tottenham)

SOUTHAMPTON // What a difference a week makes. Or, depending upon your interpretation, a change of manager makes. Not to mention a change of ethos, tactics and fortune.

Tottenham Hotspur have been transformed in the seven days since Andre Villas-Boas was dismissed. The broader question is if this result, a seemingly stunning endorsement of Tim Sherwood, heralds a bright new era under the caretaker or whether it was simply a hugely entertaining one-off.

What can be said with certainty is that, a week after a demoralised, depleted Tottenham team lost 5-0 at home to Liverpool, an energised, optimistic Spurs side played fearless football. Southampton kicked off with the joint best defensive record in the Premier League while their visitors began as a goal-shy outfit.

Sherwood’s adventurers duly confounded the form books at both clubs.

If the sacked Villas-Boas was too defensive to please the White Hart Lane faithful, the interim appointment went to the other extreme. When protecting a 3-2 lead, he brought on a centre-forward, Jermain Defoe. When Mousa Dembele, the closest thing to a defensive midfielder in a side shorn of holding players, went off injured, he gave a debut to the teenage Frenchman Nabil Bentaleb. It paid dividends, much like Sherwood’s other decisions.

Perhaps it was beginner’s luck but the interim appointment, who hopes to see off a host of more experienced candidates to land the job on a permanent basis, displayed a midas touch. Emmanuel Adebayor was summoned from obscurity to start in the midweek. He scored, in a losing effort to West Ham United in the League Cup, then and added two more goals yesterday.

“Emmanuel ain’t been playing so he doesn’t take much motivating,” Sherwood said. “He is a top player, isn’t he?”

If it amounted to a rebuttal of Villas-Boas, so did much else. The Portuguese had not started a league game with two strikers since January. Sherwood did so straight away, adopting a proactive approach. If the scoreline seemed like a return to the 1990s, when Southampton and Spurs were involved in several classics, so was the system. This was old-style 4-4-2.

“It’s my way, it is the way I like to set teams out,” Sherwood said. “You need to do what you believe in.”

It worked, too. The newly-paired forwards combined for their first goal, a stretching Adebayor volleying in Roberto Soldado’s cross. The second contained an element of luck, the hapless Jos Hooiveld turning Danny Rose’s cross into his own net. Yet Bentaleb’s role in the build-up was instructive. “The kid is a good player,” Sherwood said. Then Adebayor drove in the winner.

Southampton had struck first, Adam Lallana locating space to drill a shot past Hugo Lloris, and levelled when their superb captain displayed great presence of mind to find Rickie Lambert and give the striker an open goal. Lloris, who had rushed off his line, was partly culpable but that was typical Tottenham: they were always going forward.

The question now is which direction chairman Daniel Levy wants to take.

“These guys need a manager,” Sherwood said. A man with an ambitious style of play has great aims. “I don’t want it for 10 minutes,” he added. “I want it for the long term.”

Follow us on twitter at @SprtNationalUAE