DORTMUND must hate Heung-min Son. The striker sealed Tottenham’s second half-comeback with a superb 76thminute finish.
And it was nothing the Germans had not seen before. This was the South Korean’s eighth goal in his last ten appearances against Dortmund, dating back to his days in the Bundesliga with former club Bayer Leverkusen. It ensured unbeaten Spurs are still at the top of their Champions League group with four wins and one draw from their campaign so far. The strike also means someone at Tottenham other than Harry Kane can enjoying hogging the headlines this morning. Up until then it looked as though the England striker would once again be the name on everybody’s lips after he showed that even half-fit he is still a force to be reckoned with. Dortmund were on course for a shock win as they went in at half-time in front courtesy of a Pierre-Emerick Aubayemang strike. But Kane, still recovering from the hamstring injury that ruled him out of the international break, got Tottenham back into this tie with an excellent goal four minutes into the second half. His sixth goal in five Champions League clashes this term was also his 14th goal in 16 matches for Tottenham in all competitions and his 39th in 38 for his club in 2017 overall. Phew!
It shows how far he and Spurs have come since their last visit here - 20 months ago they left the Westfalestadion with their tails between their legs after being thumped 3-0. It was a night when Pochettino rested a number of stars as he focused on trying to chase down Leicester in the Premier League title race. Indeed only two players who finished that match – Hugo Lloris and Harry Kane – were in the Spurs starting XI last night as they fielded a far stronger line-up this time. They also arrived with a sense of superiority having already qualified for the knockout stage and beaten Dortmund 3-1 at Wembley on the way.
Especially as the hosts had only won one of their previous eight – and that was against a third division side in the German cup. Danny Rose, Serge Aurier, Harry Winks and Heung-min Son all returned as Pochettino made four changes following his team’s 2-0 defeat at Arsenal on Saturday. You could see why good luck charm Son was selected. He had the first chance of the night when he got away from the Dortmund defence only to see them get back and smother his shot, sending it out for a corner. But Spurs allowed their opponents back into the game keeper Lloris had to get down well to save a 13th minute shot from Andriy Yarmolenko. Aubayemang should have opened the scoring six minutes later when, with just Lloris to beat, he inexplicably skewed his shot wide. But just when we were starting to think he should rename himself ‘Uber-Meringue’ he made Tottenham look like lemons with the opening goal. The Spurs defence was once again caught square by another yummy Yarmolenko pass and this time the Gabon striker made no mistake as he fired past Lloris to make it 1-0.
It was his 16th goal of the season, but his first since the middle of October. Mind you, he was lucky to stay on the field after he swiped Spurs defender Davinson Sanchez in an off-the-ball incident moments later.
Yet, he somehow escaped without so much as a booking, despite it being right under the nose of one of the fifth officials behind the goal-line.
This injustice inadvertently sparked Spurs into life as they finished the first half the stronger.
Christian Eriksen went close to levelling with a shot superbly blocked by Dortmund keeper Roman Burki, who then pulled off an even better save to keep out an Eric Dier header from a Harry Winks corner with Son unable to squeeze in the rebound.
So it was left to Kane to once again rescue his team with another deadly finish four minutes into the second half.
The Dortmund back four must have felt they had blocked all avenues to go, but like so many defences before them they were wrong.
As Kane collected Alli’s pass, following good work by Rose, turned and drilled a low shot beyond Burki.
And to think, some of us were wondering if he should have been rested after recent injury and sluggish display at the Emirates.
But it was Son who stole the headlines as he fired a winner into the top corner with 14 minutes of the match remaining after brilliant work out wide by Dele Alli.
From The Sun
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