Soccer Champions League

Tottenham Hotspur Missed Their Big Chance In the First Leg Against Fiorentina

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Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino

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There’s a lot on the plate of Tottenham Hotspur right now, including the Capital One Cup final on Sunday, an ongoing assault on the top four in the Premier League, and, lastly and most imminent, a round of 32 Europa League second leg game in Italy against Fiorentina on Thursday. The Spurs could have made things slightly easier on themselves, but failure to take advantage of their obvious early dominance in the first leg at White Hart Lane is about to come back and haunt them.

The biggest problem Mauricio Pochettino has with the current fixture pileup is team selection. The players cannot physically play this many games, at this high a level, in such a short space of time; the effectiveness of Pochettino’s squad rotation will play in important role in the Spurs’ coming games, starting in Italy. Tottenham will go on to play Chelsea just three days later at Wembley Stadium on Sunday, before then playing two EPL games in the six days thereafter.

It’s a tough schedule, undoubtedly, but the Spurs could have made things easier on themselves a week prior. The first leg of the club’s tie with Fiorentina finished 1-1, but in truth, the Spurs could have won by a landslide if they had converted their early play into goals. Pochettino’s men failed to put the Viola to the sword though, and now Tottenham could pay in more ways than one.

That was the Spurs’ big chance to not only make the second leg easier for themselves by racking up a few goals, but to also take the pressure off of the team selection for their manager. Now, Pochettino will have to go with a strong lineup instead, and it will definitely affect the team physically for not just Sunday’s final, but the games beyond too.

Fiorentina visibly grew in the second half of the game at White Hart Lane, and the Italians now know exactly what they’re up against and just how to combat it, and that does not bode well for the Londoners. Fiorentina manager, Vincenzo Montella, made the appropriate tactical changes for his team to stem the Spurs momentum, and Pochettino never had an answer in reply during the second half. Things will only get tougher in Florence too, and a completely different game now awaits the Spurs than what might have done had they taken advantage of their dominance in the first leg.

Fiorentina will keep the ball well in their home stadium with the array of ball players that they have in the team, and they can now afford to be patient when in possession as well due to the favorable 1-1 scoreline. The Spurs are going to end up doing a lot of running in search of the ball and the game will be physically demanding, which is the absolute last thing the club needed ahead of the upcoming fixture list.

The Spurs players and management may not have recognized it at the time, but the first leg of their tie with Fiorentina represented their best chance of not only advancing to the next round, but of also lightening the impending heavy work load of the players. That chance, however, has now gone, and it will prove very costly indeed in the next nine days.

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