Eric Dier has bemoaned Tottenham’s decision to put themselves in a position where they must struggle for results even when they appear to be at home and dry..
Spurs trailed 3-1 with 16 minutes remaining at Southampton on Saturday after Ivan Perisic added to goals from Pedro Porro and Harry Kane, but the hosts scored a stoppage-time penalty to salvage a 3-3 draw.
Following the team’s failure to move into third place heading into the international break, head coach Antonio Conte lashed out at his players in an explosive post-match press conference one hour after the final whistle.
At a time when the defender was unaware of what the Italian was saying as he spoke to the media outside St Mary’s, Dier also delivered his own honest assessment of the draw after shipping “sloppy goals”..
All three goals were extremely sloppy. We should really control the ball better at 3-1. Sloppy, sloppy goals “The England international agreed. “Not only is the goal itself sloppy, but so is the entire process leading up to each goal.
We put ourselves in a position similar to last week’s [3-1 win over Nottingham Forest]. We were fortunate last week when Fraser [Forster] saved the penalty and we were able to finish the game.
But by leading in a comfortable position, we put ourselves in a position where we have to struggle for results every time.”
So, is the Spurs’ inability to finish games due to a lack of concentration?
“I don’t think it’s a lack of concentration… although it could be due to sloppiness.” “Dier stated. “I’m not sure what you can attribute it to.
In the games, we put ourselves in this position as if we want to make things difficult for ourselves. We need to be better at controlling the game when we are ahead, especially when we are ahead by two goals.
I believe they were available for the taking. With the way they were set up, we could have created so many more opportunities. If we had been better, I believe we could have created 20 chances like that.”
The draw on the south coast was yet another bad away day for the team, who had previously lost in the Premier League to struggling Wolves and Leicester City in the previous month. In games where Tottenham should have won, Dier knows that the Lilywhites will struggle unless they put an end to their road woes..
“Of course, yeah. These are the games you need to win if you want to compete for the top spot..
It’s the last thing we have, and we have to win these games if we want to be fighting for it. We’re going to struggle if we don’t win games like this.”
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