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Telling Tottenham moment amid celebrations and why Ange Postecoglou raged at Lucas Bergvall twice

Dominic Solanke celebrates scoring Tottenham's third goal at Old Trafford
-Credit: (Image: Michael Regan/Getty Images)


Tottenham sent out a real statement of intent on Sunday evening after recording a convincing 3-0 win over Manchester United. As poor as Erik ten Hag's men were across the 90 minutes following such an insipid display, Spurs produced a performance that will have made a number of people sit up and take notice.

On another day, Ange Postecoglou's side could have scored more than the three goals they did after creating a glut of opportunities at the Theatre of Dreams. Tottenham just ran riot against their Premier League rivals and showed everyone that they are moving in the right direction after initially enduring a bit of a mixed start to the campaign.

On the ball right from the off as Brennan Johnson scored from an exquisite Micky van de Ven run from his own half, Spurs well and truly put United to the sword as they cut through them time and time again. Both James Maddison and Dejan Kulusevski were in majestic form as they looked to open the hosts up at every opportunity from midfield, with Rodrigo Bentancur dictating the intensity and pace of the game in his No.6 role.

Manchester United just could not live with Spurs and they were extremely fortunate to only go in one goal down at the break with Johnson striking the post, Timo Werner missing a very good one-one-one and other players such as Destiny Udogie passing up chances on goal. Tottenham just needed that second goal to kill the game off, with it duly arriving two minutes after the restart as Johnson this time turned provider for Kulusevski to finish in style.

On a day when Tottenham had to do without captain Son Heung-min through injury, very little was said about the captain's absence with the Lilywhites completely dominating proceedings from the off aside from a period in the second half where United threatened on a few occasions. Despite those current injury issues with Richarlison and Wilson Odobert also on the sidelines at present, Spurs still have plenty of strength on their bench and that was evident before Dominic Solanke made it 3-0.

Pape Matar Sarr, Lucas Bergvall and Mikey Moore were introduced in the 76th minute and two of the trio have a huge impact a matter of seconds later. Bergvall swung in a corner, Sarr nodded the ball on and Solanke was on hand to prod the ball home from close range.

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The Tottenham players very much enjoyed the moment in front of the brilliant travelling away support as they went over to celebrate putting the game out of sight. There was a telling moment amid the celebrations as Sarr was congratulated for his role in the goal.

Such a popular member of the squad and usually the player the rest of the squad like to joke with, the Senegal international was surrounded by his teammates for his key header that allowed Solanke to make it three goals in successive games for the summer signing. Moore was first on the scene to congratulate Sarr before Kulusevski gave him a big hug and Djed Spence did likewise.

Once finishing celebrating with Solanke, Cristian Romero, who was captain on the day, gave Sarr a cheeky slap on the face before players such as Bentancur, Van de Ven and the goalscorer joined in and congratulated the highly-rated midfielder. It could have got even better for Tottenham in the closing minutes of the contest as they passed up some great openings when having a numerical advantage.

Firstly having a five-on-three situation after Kulusevski had played the ball to fellow countryman Bergvall, the new addition elected to shoot from 25 yards out but his effort went high and wide of the goal. The Swede's decision to shoot didn't appear to sit well with Postecoglou as he shouted over to his player and pointed, seemingly telling him to feed the ball to his teammates as he had support from Kulusevski, Sarr, Solanke and Moore.

Bergvall was to get it from his head coach once again when trying to play a reverse ball to Moore on the left with Spurs in another good position in the United half. Former Tottenham player Christian Eriksen cut out the pass with ease when the better option would have been to play the ball to one of Solanke or Sarr who were to his right.

Again, Postecoglou let his feelings be known as he screamed at the 18-year-old for wasting the ball. Moore did catch the eye in a bright cameo following his introduction on the left wing.

The teenager went on a couple of positive runs and he wasn't that far off with a curling last-gasp effort that would have put the cherry on top of an incredible Tottenham showing. An awful lot will be made in the media of how poor United were on the day but Tottenham deserve so much praise for producing such an electric display.

Undoubtedly the team's best performance of the season by quite some distance, hopefully a few more are just around the corner as Postecoglou looks to have Spurs challenging those at the top of the Premier League table in the months ahead.

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