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Roberto De Zerbi criticized Spurs after their 3-2 defeat by Aston Villa. De Zerbi criticised his team’s mentality, but also the physical condition of his players, and said the substitute Mohammed Kudus had disrupted the balance of his team.
He said: “I am very disappointed, sad and frustrated for the performance. We can’t lose the game in this way, we can’t concede the second goal, we can’t lose balance just because we are losing. I spoke with our four attackers in minute 51, I asked them to use their head, all second half I was telling people to be calm. But the second goal was incredible.”
Speaking of Townsend, his former club, Tottenham, suffered another defeat yesterday, this time at the hands of Aston Villa.
On the bright side, Spurs scored a Premier League goal… twice!
Former England forward Andros Townsend was nearly run over by a motorised pitch roller while warming up with his Prachuap teammates at half-time during a Thai League 1 match on Saturday.
The 35-year-old avoided serious injury and later made a brief appearance in the match at Pattani. The former Tottenham Hotspur player did not see the roller, driven by a ground staff member, coming towards him when he stepped out of the practice area to attempt a pass.
The roller knocked Townsend over and drove up his legs nearly to his waist before the driver jumped off and tried to lift it off the player.
Townsend got back up and continued practicing, and came on as a late substitute while Prachuap cruised to a 3-0 victory.
“Turns out Stoke away wasn’t so bad after all,” Townsend later wrote on Instagram, joking about the English side Stoke City’s reputation as a tough place for visiting teams to play. (Reporting by Chiranjit Ojha in Purulia, India)
Mikel Arteta admitted Arsenal were taught a lesson by free-scoring Brighton as their 100% start to the season was abruptly ended on Saturday.
He said: “They deserved to win the game and it’s a big lesson for us. From the first throw-in you could sense it, it was so clear. We put ourselves in trouble one time, two times, three times and we need to get out of that much quicker than that. That’s one of the biggest lessons that we have to take from the game.
“We knew how tough it was going to be and the first thing we had discussed was about the first part. If you don’t get out of that first part as winners, it will be extremely difficult to dominate the game and to have any probability of winning the game. At this level, it’s extremely important to respect and to understand [that] before anything else.”
In the biggest Premier League result of the day, Brighton cruised to a 3-0 win over champions Arsenal at the Amex Stadium thanks to goals from Pascal Gross, Charalampos Kostoulas and Chema Andrés.
Hello, good morning and welcome to another Matchday live! We have four Premier League fixtures to look forward to this afternoon, with Manchester United, Manchester City and Liverpool all involved.
There is also (another) Old Firm derby taking place as Celtic seek revenge for last weekend’s 3-0 Scottish League Cup defeat to Rangers. And in the Women’s Super League, Ctystal Palace host Tottenham, Aston Villa travel to face Brighton and West Ham take on Everton.
Not only that, we’ll also be reacting to yesterday’s action – including Arsenal’s 3-0 defeat to Brighton.