Although Manuel Lanzini dragged one back late on, his step-over beating Walker, freeing up space to smash the ball into the roof of the net from a tight angle, West Ham were already crushed in spirit.
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Tottenham can secure qualification to the knock-out phase with a win over Qarabag while victory over Chelsea would put them 13 points clear of the champions in the race for the top four.
“It’s early to start to speak about that”, said the Argentine. We have been on the winning side a lot over the last few years.
“It is step by step”. It’s hard to know what will happen in four or five months. “I’m happy, but now we need to look at the next game”.
Spurs have the second-best defence in the division, but the Hammers will test them more than most.
When Kane added a third shortly after the interval it all but settled the game.
Pochettino is proud of Tottenham’s reputation for promoting youth but believes his team’s progress means they can also lure proven quality as well as up and coming talent.
“The best word to describe my feelings is very proud”.
“We’re playing very much as a team, something we haven’t done much in the past”, Dembele said.
With Tottenham 3-0 up, he picked up a needless booking for an altercation with Mark Noble and will now miss Tottenham’s game against Chelsea next Sunday.
Matches between West Ham United and Tottenham have been marred previously by confrontations and abusive chanting.
Pochettino said, however, that it was crucial to maintain that level of performance if Spurs were to reach their goals.
“He’s young. He’s played 10, 12 games in the Premier League”.
Under-21s midfielder Solly March was in the Seagulls team that took a first-minute lead from through former Three Lions forward Bobby Zamora.
The striker found the net twice and typified the excellent performance from the hosts who were simply too strong for the Hammers and were every bit as dominant as the 4-1 scoreline suggests.
“The player will then show his class and react better”.
West Ham boss Slaven Bilic says Tottenham wanted it more yesterday.
“A surprise is a word for something good – it was a shock”.
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After Sunday’s 4-1 whipping of West Ham, Dier said: “Hopefully we have got rid of that “soft” label because it is not a nice label to have”. To be fair of course we played a really bad game but they played a really good game and we have to give a few credit for this.
