- Tottenham threw away a one-goal lead to lose at home to struggling Leicester
- Ange Postecoglou’s side are 15th and winless in seven Premier League games
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Ange Postecoglou has revealed that he regrets starting a player who was not at full fitness as Tottenham succumbed to a shock 2-1 defeat at home to relegation-threatened Leicester in the Premier League.
The player in question struggled throughout the contest and was substituted just nine minutes after the interval, in which time Leicester had scored twice to flip the game on its head.
With scrutiny reaching breaking point for Postecoglou as Spurs boss, the Aussie admitted after the game that playing 22-year-old midfielder was a mistake in his selection.
However, Postecoglou reiterated that the inclusion of an fitness-hampered Pape Matar Sarr was forced by Tottenham’s unrelenting injury crisis, with Djed Spence, Brennan Johnson, Destiny Udogie, Wilson Odobert, Timo Werner, Guglielmo Vicario, Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven, Dominic Solanke and James Maddison all unavailable for the Leicester match.
‘I’ve said all along, the players need help and I’ve also said the club are working hard in that area to try to alleviate some of those problems, because Pape Sarr shouldn’t have played today,’ Postecoglou said in his post-match press conference. ‘He obviously wasn’t fit.
‘The players are going out there and giving everything they can because we can’t call off games. We’ve got another game in three days’ time that these players have to front up for.
Pape Matar Sarr was brought off after 54 minutes as Tottenham slumped to a shock defeat
Ange Postecoglou admitted that playing Sarr, who wasn’t at full fitness, was a mistake
Tottenham fans expressed their anger as the club languish in 15th in the Premier League table
‘The injury situation will ease and I’m confident they will sort of help us. Even one more player coming in, just in the short term will give us an opportunity, at least to navigate these last 10 days, two weeks, of what’s been a really hard slog for this group of players.’
Sarr missed Thursday’s 3-2 Europa League win over Hoffenheim through injury, but surprisingly returned to the fold for the Leicester clash, immediately thrown back into the starting XI with senior options in the midfield lacking.
However, the 22-year-old Senegal midfielder looked off the pace for much of the contest and was caught out for both of Leicester’s goals from Jamie Vardy and Bilal El Khannouss, which came within four minutes of each other at the start of the second half.
Sarr lasted only 54 minutes before being replaced by Sergio Reguilon, going off alongside Richarilson who gave Spurs the lead in the first half.
In a further blow for Tottenham, Postecoglou confirmed that the Brazilian’s withdrawal was also forced by injury.
‘He was feeling his groin, he should have come off at half-time but he wanted to give another 10 minutes,’ he added. ‘I could see he wasn’t running well so that is why I took him off.’
The loss leaves Tottenham languishing in 15th in the Premier League table, having not won in the league since thrashing struggling Southampton in mid-December.
With a squad feeling the strain, their fixture schedule does not ease up over the next couple of weeks, returning to Europa League action on Thursday when they host Elfsborg before making the trip to Brentford next Sunday.
