Mourinho spares duo as he slams sloppy Spurs; Kane fitness update

Jose Mourinho TEAMtalk

Jose Mourinho was far from happy with Tottenham’s performance in Austria as they drew 3-3 with LASK – and only spared two players from criticism.

Goals from Gareth Bale, Heung-min Son and Dele Alli still weren’t enough for Spurs in Austria during a topsy-turby game.

However, a point was enough to send Tottenham through to the knockout stages. As such, Mourinho said that was the only positive he could take.

“The result was better than the performance,” he admited in his post-match briefing. “The second half better than the first half. Some players individually had very good performances but some players individually had very poor performances.

“The only good thing I take from the game is that we are qualified.”

While refusing to pick out those who let him down, Mourinho did name two who would be safe from criticism.

“Without Son and [Pierre-Emile] Hojbjerg, I don’t think we get anything from that game.”

Bale, however, was on the scoresheet, albeit from the penalty spot, as he went some way to silencing his critics.

The Welshman was withdraw late in the match. Mourinho suggested afterwards Bale was still some way from a Premier League start

“I took him out 10-15 minutes before the end to save the last couple of runs,” Mourinho added. “He has lots of positive things in his game and of course you can see that there are little bits that he has to improve.”

He continued: “We have qualified and we don’t have the pressure on that in our last match. But we have to win our last match and I believe we will do that.”


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Kane fitness update

Harry Kane

Spurs travelled to Austria without Harry Kane, who was left at home to work on his fitness.

All eyes will be on the Tottenham talisman ahead of Sunday’s North London derby with Arsenal.

And Mourinho remains cautiously optimistic Kane will be fit to take part in the game.

While Spurs have kept a silence around the nature of the injury, Mourinho did say: “I believe [Harry Kane] is going to be fit.

“He’s having treatment but I could be doing some bluff and pretend he’s in trouble. But he’s not and I think he’ll play [against Arsenal].”

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