Tottenham’s form continues to be as volatile as Antonio Conte’s mood after their season lurched off course again with defeat to Middlesbrough in the FA Cup last night.
Aiming to build on their biggest win of the season, the 4-0 thumping of Leeds, Spurs crashed out of a third and final cup competition this season, guaranteeing their trophy drought will extend into a 15th year.
Josh Coburn’s fierce strike in extra-time earned Boro a deserved quarter-final spot and continued Spurs’ wildly inconsistent run, taking their form in 2022 to W-L-W-L-W-L-W-L-L-W-L-W-L.
Six times since the turn of the year Spurs have won matches, in thrilling fashion in the case of the victories over Leicester and Manchester City, but every time they have failed to build on the results.
They have gone from beating the champions to losing to relegation candidates, from brilliant attacking performances to painfully laborious displays. They have, at least, proved capable of responding to defeats, with the exception of the back-to-back reverses to Southampton and Wolves, but Conte was left frustrated at the Riverside.
“I always say we have to become stronger and if we want to become competitive then we have to be a stable team,” he said. “Too many up and downs still for us and we have to continue to work very hard and try in the future to learn about this defeat.”
Conte blamed his players’ mentality for their form last night, suggesting a lack of focus was behind their failure to build on victories.
“In this type of situation you need to find the right key to go into the mind of the players, because it’s not only sometimes a tactical problem or a technical problem,” he added. “Sometimes you have to try to work and to push in other aspects — the mental aspects — and try to stay focused and to work also on the training sessions, to keep focusing.”
There is merit in Conte’s assessment of the problem, but to what extent is Tottenham’s form also a result of the coach himself?
It is surely no coincidence that results and performances have fluctuated so wildly when Conte’s own messaging veers from the glowingly positive to the grimly downbeat with such consistent regularity.
There is an element of chicken and egg to Conte’s messaging and his side’s form (which came first, the bad result or the frustrated outburst?) and a fragile squad would surely benefit from being exposed to less emotion, even if Conte insists his messaging is all down to “strategy”.
There are tactical elements at play, too. City and Leeds both played to Tottenham’s strengths, allowing them space to play in the final third.
After four months in charge, Conte’s Spurs are still more effective in transition than structured possession, but Boro followed the blueprint established by Burnley last week, getting numbers back, starving then visitors of oxygen and threatening at set-pieces.
The hosts saw plenty of the ball and were worthy winners, but they frustrated Spurs with their disciplined approach to defending in numbers. Conte’s side created chances, with Harry Kane seeing a goal harshly ruled out for offside and the wasteful Heung-min Son testing the goalkeeper on three occasions, but for long periods the hosts were comfortable in repelling laborious and unimaginative attacks.
Less precisely but, perhaps, most importantly, Spurs’ topsy-turvy form is down to their quality, which Conte has repeatedly described as “in the middle”. There was too little difference in technical quality between too many of Spurs’ players and their opponents.
This is simply what mid-table sides do: lurch from good result to bad, without the quality and consistency to put together a run in the Premier League, where no opponent is a pushover.
Spurs fans old enough to remember the ’90s should be familiar with the experience.
Conte will hope that with injured players returning and one game a week for the rest of the season, his side can find enough consistency to maintain their top-four push, which is now all that is left of their stuttering season.
