Nuno Espirito Santo has praised the way in which Tottenham played in the first half against Wolves, but was frustrated with how his side let a commanding lead slip later in the game.
The Spurs head coach made his second return to Molineux of the season and saw his side book their place in the Carabao Cup fourth round, thanks to a 3-2 triumph via a penalty shootout.
Spurs raced into a 2-0 lead in the West Midlands thanks to goals courtesy of Tanguy Ndombele and Harry Kane, before they were later cancelled out by Bruno Lage’s side.
The hosts could not cope with Spurs’ quality in the opening period and were often forced into making mistakes, which were duly pounced upon.
Wolves managed to reduce the deficit, arguably against the run of play, when Leander Dendoncker capitalised on some slack defending from Ndombele to nod in a corner at the end of the first half.
Wolves used that lifeline and continued to press into the second period, where they equalised through Daniel Podence, which eventually sent the game to penalties.
Although Spurs escaped with the win, they made work difficult for themselves having had the initial lead, while playing some of their best football of the season so far.
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That has particularly annoyed head coach Nuno, who was disappointed with the defending for Wolves’ opener which allowed the momentum to swing in the hosts’ way.
He told football.london: “Different, different, different moments of the game but honestly I think we allowed Wolves to get back in the game.
“The first half we started really well. We were really good and we dominated, we pressed, we recovered balls and we created so many chances to put the game to bed.
“I’m disappointed with the set-piece. We cannot allow it because the momentum changes, the atmosphere changes and in the second half it wasn’t as we wanted which like you say the first half was really good.”
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Spurs, as usual, had to make things difficult for themselves, especially after how commanding the performance was in the first half.
The defending from Ndombele on the corner was poor, and it essentially handed Wolves an opportunity to get back into proceedings, when they really shouldn’t have.
The first-half was very good overall and hopefully, Nuno elects to build on that going forward.
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