Premier League 2018-19: 3 reasons why Tottenham lost to Liverpool
A brilliant game was played between Liverpool and Tottenham at Anfield on Sunday and one that was won decisively by the Reds with a final-minute gaffe made by Tottenham's defenders. It was a fantastic match which see-sawed till the end and one that could not have provided a definite winner before the whistle blew.
Jurgen Klopp's men got the better out of Mauricio Pochettino's side clinically. We pick out three reasons why the Spurs eventually lost to Liverpool and why they are now level with Manchester United and just one point ahead of Arsenal in the Premier League table.
1) Hugo Lloris' big-time error
France's World Cup-winning captain Hugo Lloris, who also captains Tottenham Hotspur, made a silly error and failed to deflect a shot coming in from a Mohamed Salah header which allowed Liverpool to get ahead in the ninetieth minute after a game which was see-sawing all the way.
A lot can be made out of that error and it is extremely easy for us to say things sitting a million miles away in front of a desk and away from the heat of the battle and the cauldron that is Anfield, but the standards Lloris had set for himself made it very difficult to accept the mistake that he made. He pushed the ball without conviction which then took centre-back Toby Alderweireld's inadvertent touch into the goal line.
2) Kieran Trippier's poor defensive abilities
Kieran Trippier returned to the Tottenham fold after being away for a long time due to injury and was not exactly at his best defensively on Sunday. Andrew Robertson's sublime pass which found Roberto Firmino, who in turn scored Liverpool's first goal, can be attributed to Trippier giving him too much space and failing to cut him down at the outset.
Former Liverpool manager Graeme Souness tore into Trippier as well, saying that the England fullback is much better offensively than defensively. This can be a bit too harsh for someone who has returned to top-flight football after a long time but then you expect a lot more from England's World Cup star.
3) Ineffective Moussa Sissoko
If there was one player who was pathetic from across both the sides, it had to be Tottenham's French central midfielder Moussa Sissoko. Sissoko was unable to curb down the flow of the game when it got fast in the centre of the park nor could he distribute the ball as well as he and the Spurs fans would have liked him to.
To top it all, Sissoko missed a sitter of a chance later on in the game when he was one-on-one with only goalkeeper Alisson Becker in sight. He could have passed it to Heung-Min Son who was loitering nearby or made a clinical finish himself. Instead, that turned out to be the moment Tottenham figuratively lost the game.