The group stage of Tottenham's first champions league campaign ended last night and, despite what I was assured by a Chelsea fan after the draw, Tottenham did not get shown just how out of their depth they are but ended up winning the group and in the process beating the German, Dutch and European champions - not a bad little run.
Whilst it is true that it was not an easy run - 4-0 down against Inter, losing 2 goal lead against Breman - in the end most pundits agree we were the best in the group.
The game last night really summed up our away campaign with letting the lead slip 3 times, the game started in comical fashion with the Twente keeper having a nightmare to watch a simple back pass bounce past his foot for Spurs' opener.
Twente were soon back in it however after the Referee gave a penalty, now I would obviously disagree with the decision whatever it was but this was a very soft decision with the spurs defender punished simply for the human instinct for protection, however as the next goal was the result of an even worse decision by the Referee there is not too much point in dwelling on it.
Tottenham re-took the lead through a quite sublime piece of link up play between Defoe and Lennon which showed a little of what we have missed in his absence before the ref struck again to level the game, this time a free kick outside the box to penalize Lennon for laying a hand on the shoulder of a man around 2 foot taller than himself.
Bad refereeing aside however the free kick was top class so no complaints there.
The Twente keeper who, apart from the first goal, had a pretty good game was unfortunate again for the third spurs goal as he produced a wonderful save from Palacios which fell into the path of the ever alert Defoe to do what he does best. However Twente struck back again with their first goal not directly from a bad refereeing decision (there was a touch in between the free kick and the goal) this was again a greatly taken goal and really showed how good a team Twente are,
Obviously I do feel slightly annoyed at the part the Referee played in the goals but he was not finished yet, after a Twente player went down in the box (which to be fair he should have been booked for as he went down for a tackle that never came.) The Referee, correctly told Tottenham to play on, only to bring play to a stop as Lennon was running in full stride towards the Twente goal. But the fact that the Ref seems to think that his role is to shape the game, should not be held against Twente who did well to capitalize on his vanity. so it ended 3-3 but with Inter losing to Bremen Spurs still top their group, so mixed feelings on the result but the achievements are still massive for a Champions League debut, as an aside spurs became the first team to score two goals in every game in the group stage, now if we can stop letting them in then the future looks very bright indeed.
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