Chris Sutton has said that he expects Sporting to play on the front foot this evening, which will, in turn, give Tottenham space to exploit on the counter-attack.
Both Spurs and Sporting made winning starts to their Champions League Group D campaign, with the North Londoners overcoming Marseille at home last week while the Portuguese giants thrashed Eintracht Frankfurt 3-0 in Germany.
Antonio Conte’s men have almost had a week to recover since the win over Marseille as their clash against Manchester City last weekend was called off due to the passing of Queen Elizabeth II.
Spurs were not at their fluent best against Marseille but got the job down owing to Richarlison’s second-half brace after the Ligue 1 side were reduced to 10 men at the start of the second half.
Sutton said that he expects Spurs to hurt Sporting on the counter-attack this evening and backed the Premier League club to come away with a narrow win.
The former Celtic man told The Daily Mail: “Antonio Conte doesn’t boast the greatest Champions League record. Not with Juventus, Chelsea or Inter Milan. You wondered whether he was getting his excuses in early when complaining about Tottenham’s fixture congestion before last week’s opening group game.”
“Yet Spurs got off to a flyer against Marseille, an emotional Richarlison scoring twice as he continues to show why he was worth their £60million investment.
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“Sporting are at home in Lisbon so I expect they’ll take the game to Tottenham, but that will suit Conte’s counter-attacking style. They have got the flying arrows who can hurt Sporting and make it two wins from two in their group. Prediction: Sporting 1-2 Tottenham.”
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On the back of their performance against Frankfurt, Sporting will certainly have their tails up for this clash. One can argue that this will be the toughest of the six group stage games that Tottenham will face.
So, picking up three points at the Jose Alvalade Stadium would go a long way towards ensuring that Spurs qualify for the knockout stages.
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