Spurs manager Antonio Conte looked an agitated and dejected figure on the sideline all afternoon as the Lilywhites suffered a major top four blow at the hands of Graham Potter and Brighton.
Conte's side never got going in this early kick-off in the Premier League and was eventually punished for their lacklustre display. In the dying embers as Leandro Trossard poked his effort home with the outside of his boot after some good link-up down the left-hand side. Tottenham tried to hit back late on but neither Stephen Bergwijn nor Son Heung-min were clinical enough alongside Harry Kane to ramp up the pressure on Arsenal and Man United ahead of their 3 PM kick-offs.
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Prior to the game, the Italian was fairly confident of his side's top four acumen, but this result in correlation to what the Seagulls did against Arsenal last weekend just shows the ever-changing nature of this fascinating top-four race. "Yeah, but I started to think about our position, but my team was able to stay in the race. Not only one week ago, two weeks ago. In the right moment, I understood this team was able to stay in this type of race. I said to you with honesty, and I say to you now that the team is ready, ready to fight until the end in this race," Conte said in his pre-match press conference on Friday afternoon.
"This race is not easy, and it's very important because to finish in the top four would mean a very good result for the club. Yesterday and two days ago we watched how important it is to play the Champions League, how fascinating are these types of games and I'm sure there is a great desire in my players to be protagonists in this competition, but we know very well there are other teams very strong. Arsenal, United, West Ham, Wolverhampton are in this same race with us, but we want to fight until the end, and we will see what happens at the end of the season." Added on to these confident comments in the build-up, Ledley King had gone on record to state that his former side were the favourites over Arsenal due to their recent 'winning' mentality. Comments that aged like wine to the Arsenal fans.
"They needed a reminder of how far they are. They didn't turn up at all. Every now and then, you're going to have a performance like that. No energy, and the top players didn't turn up," Jermaine Jeans immediately summed up on BT Sport 1. Trossard, who netted against the Gunners in the 2-1 win in the previous game week, reeled off in celebration to the travelling Brighton cohort, but the cameras immediately caught what Conte got up to when the ball hit the back of the net.
The Italian didn't look to frustrated at the time, but perhaps he was trying to hide it as he was filmed gulping what looked like a cartoon of coffee/milk or something similar.
Maybe something strong to help him forget about the nightmare-like afternoon that has just unfolded right in front of his eyes. His day will be made even worse if both top-four rivals pick up the maximum three points they need at this point of the campaign.
