Ange Postecoglou has admitted that Richarlison helped change the game when he came on against Liverpool and that the Brazilian gave Tottenham the presence they were missing upfront.
Postecoglou decided to start Son Heung-min as the number nine at Anfield and the move did not work, with the South Korean having very little joy upfront.
Even though Tottenham moved the ball quickly in the first half and got into dangerous positions on many ocassions, they struggled to create anything of note, with the Spurs captain cutting a frustrated and isolated figure.
Richarlison was Tottenham’s Man of the Match
Richarlison was introduced after the hour mark with the away side trailing 4-0 at the time and he made an instant impact, scoring one and setting up another for Son to bring the away side back into the game.
Although the 26-year-old’s cameo did not amount to anything in the end, Postecoglou admitted that he was pleased with what he saw from the forward and the rest of the side in the final 30 minutes.
When asked what he thought of Richarlison’s performance, the Spurs boss told Football.London: “It was good. I think that was because we had worked hard up until that point and, like I say, when we play our football, and it sounds madness because we were 4-0 down, we still made Liverpool work hard and we do in all our games, the Arsenal game was similar.
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“We always tend to finish strong and I think the subs benefit from the hard work of the other guys. I thought Richy was really good with his presence and then the other guys coming on I thought added something for us. We got a couple of goals and could have had a couple more.”
Postecoglou was then asked what his thinking was when he brought Richarlison on as the game seemed dead at that point and he responded: “Well it wasn’t was it. Richy started on Thursday night but he has been out for a fair while so we were never going to play him back-to-back games. It was always about trying to get him on the pitch for the last half hour today irrespective of how the game was going.
“Look, at 4-0 do you think you can win? No, but I still felt we could get something out of the game as I knew we’d finish strong because of the work we’d done. It’s fair to say before he came on we never looked threatening at all whenever we got into those areas. Him coming on, I thought Sonny improved on the left and Brennan on the right just gave us a bit more of a presence.”
Spurs Web Opinion
There is no doubt that we look a lot more threatening when we have a number nine who can occupy the centre-halves. While Son’s movement and finishing are second to none, he simply does not have the physical presence or the game awareness to play as a centre-forward against well-organised defences.
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