Their previous defeat to Leicester in January came before a run of six consecutive wins leading into Wednesday’s clash with West Ham, a stretch that included a superb 2-1 triumph over Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium.
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For Tottenham Hotspur, there was the chance to overtake Leicester and move to the summit of the Premier League standings for the first time ever outside of the month of August.
Michail Antonio was West Ham’s match-winner for the second successive game, netting in the seventh minute to hand second-place Tottenham only a fourth loss of the league campaign.
Slaven Bilic’s side come into this off the back of a 1-0 win at home against Sunderland last weekend to post an impressive W3-D1-L0 record through the course of their last four matches in all competitions and the Hammers have not lost in 11 home league fixtures (W6-D5), winning four of their last five. “It should have been more (goals)”.
“Every manager is trying to calm their teams down”, he said. “It’s a very, very open season”.
Spurs rediscovered some self-belief and had the better of the second half, and after Ben Davies and Mason sent wayward shots over the bar, Alli emerged to inject more vigour.
The Gunners travel to White Hart Lane for a huge derby match on Saturday 5 March and despite the setback in east London, Pochettino feels his side will be able to put it behind them quickly.
Tottenham lacked width and pace in their performance last night.
Antonio’s early header at the near post beat Hugo Lloris as the Tottenham goalkeeper tried in vain to stop it going over the line.
“We have learned a lot and improved”.
Emenike seems to have won over West Ham fans so far.
West Ham was completely overpowering Spurs and curbing any threat.
Recent games between these two entertaining teams have generally produced excitement.
Hitting the net was the problem.
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Adrian was called upon in quick succession as he needed to prevent Harry Kane from striking when his initial save from Toby Alderweireld’s 30-yard effort fell into the feet of the forward, but the England worldwide could not connect well and the keeper managed to push the ball away. Tottenham have recovered 17 points from losing positions this season, and the question was whether West Ham could keep up such a high-tempo game for the full 90 minutes. West Ham are direct but brilliant to watch, and should prove to be a stern test of Spurs’ heroic defensive record.
