Tottenham Hotspur 0-2 Leicester City: 5 talking points as the Foxes go second | Premier League 2020-21
A below-par Tottenham Hotspur were handed their second defeat of the week today, falling 0-2 to Leicester City at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
A Jamie Vardy penalty and an own goal from Toby Alderweireld were enough to hand the Foxes a win, moving Brendan Rodgers’ side into second in the Premier League table.
Tottenham looked largely out of ideas throughout the game and failed to really test Kasper Schmeichel. And while Leicester didn’t show that much more attacking intent, they did make the most of their chances.
Here are five talking points from Leicester’s win over Tottenham.
#1 Aurier’s rush of blood costs Tottenham dearly
Much has been made during the current campaign of the improvement in Tottenham right-back Serge Aurier. When Tottenham brought in Matt Doherty from Wolves in the summer, it appeared that Aurier’s days in the starting XI were numbered.
However, his performances have improved dramatically, and he’s largely kept Doherty out of the side.
Today, though, was a flashback to his former self, as he gave away a first half penalty with a rash challenge on Leicester’s Wesley Fofana.
The incident occurred on the verge of half-time. A James Maddison free-kick was poorly cleared by Moussa Sissoko, and when the ball fell to Fofana on the edge of the box, Aurier barged into him from behind, sending him sprawling.
Play continued momentarily, but a VAR check confirmed the foul, and unsurprisingly, Jamie Vardy netted from the subsequent spot-kick.
It was a ridiculous and unnecessary challenge from Aurier, whose only defense was perhaps that referee Craig Pawson should’ve blown for half-time before the incident even happened. The second half saw the Ivorian withdrawn from the match, with Harry Winks replacing him. And it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Doherty now start Tottenham’s next Premier League match.
#2 When will the offside rules be looked at when it comes to VAR?
For Leicester today, it was a case of whatever VAR gives, it can also take away. The Foxes appeared to have doubled their lead early in the second half, with James Maddison latching onto a long pass to run clean through and neatly finish past Hugo Lloris.
However, a VAR check decided that the England international was offside, with at worst, his elbow ahead of Toby Alderweireld. Simply put, this was a ludicrous offside call in a long list of them during the current campaign.
Surely the offside law's idea is to prevent an unfair advantage for a goal-hanging attacker – not to chalk off perfectly acceptable goals by what appears to be a matter of millimeters.
Thankfully for Leicester fans, the disallowed goal didn’t matter today, as the Foxes ended up with a comfortable win anyway. But had Tottenham come back and won 2-1, Brendan Rodgers and his team could definitely have felt aggrieved.
At this point, it’s time that the rules surrounding offsides are reviewed, just as the rules around handball were earlier in the season. They’re simply chalking off too many acceptable goals to be allowed to remain as they are now.