Tuesday night’s English Premier League game in hands including Tottenham’s victory against Brighton, and Southampton’s crucial point away at Watford.
Cataracts are cloudy opacifications of the eye lens, and the Tottenham Hotspurs forward line was suffering from them throughout last night’s victory over relegation battlers, Brighton.
Mauricio Pochettino‘s sent eleven warriors into the White Hart Lane Arena with orders to increase the gap over Chelsea to three points, and they held onto the football for 78% of the match and had more than 30-strikes on goal.
The first opportunity came in the 34th minute when Christian Eriksen found Lucas Moura down the right, and Lewis Dunk cleared his wicked low cross a foot from goal with Dele Alli waiting to pounce.
Five minutes later, and a rare attack from Brighton when the Spurs full-back went walkabout leaving space down the right for Alireza Jahanbakhsh; the Iranian sent the ball whizzing into the area, and a sliding Florin Andone missed the ball by inches with a gaping net ahead of him.
Then in first-half injury time, Spurs had the best opportunity of the match when Keiran Trippier found Alli in the box, and the man with the broken hand brought it down with one foot, poked it towards goal with the other only for Shane Duffy to clear off the line.
The second half was all Spurs.
First Danny Rose stung the hands of Mat Ryan from long range, Toby Alderweireld hit the inside of the post with a sliding shot from a corner, and Alli blasted over the bar from close range after Moura had set him up.
Then came the goal, and it was heartbreaking for Brighton.
With only two minutes on the clock, Eriksen picked the ball up from Ali, 30-yards from goal. The Dane found a little space and cracked a left foot drive screaming past Ryan. It was a brilliant goal, by a gifted footballer, who is yet to sign a new contract with Real Madrid waiting in the wings.
It was a crucial victory for Spurs after losing to Man City on the weekend, especially given the fact that Arsenal and Man Utd also failed to win, and Chelsea only gained a point at home to Burnley on Monday night.
The win puts Spurs three points ahead of Chelsea, four clear of Arsenal and six clear of Man Utd with Arsenal and Man Utd playing on Tuesday night.
The bookies don’t think Pochettino’s team has anything to worry about, making them the 1/14 favourite to join City and Liverpool in next season’s Champions League.
Brighton has not scored a goal in seven matches, picking up a single point in their previous six EPL games, in addition to an FA Cup exit at the hands of Man City (another game they failed to score in).
The saving grace for Brighton is their -22 goal difference, vastly superior to Cardiff’s -35, meaning Cardiff realistically need to earn four more points than Brighton in their remaining three games, and that feels like a Herculean task.
In the other game on the night, Southampton edged further away from the relegation zone after a 1-1 draw at Watford. Shane Long opened the scoring in 7.6 seconds (the fastest goal in Premier League history), but Andre Gray snatched a point in the 90th minute. The bookies believe Southampton is a 200/1 shot to go down.
Cardiff Remaining Fixtures
Fulham (A) 27 April
Crystal Palace (H) 4 May
Man Utd (A) 12 May
Brighton Remaining Fixtures
Newcastle (H) 27 April
Arsenal (A) 5 May
Man City (H) 12 May
Results in Full
Watford 1 v 1 Southampton
Spurs 1 v 0 Brighton
Chelsea Remaining Fixtures
Man Utd (A) 28 April
Watford (H) 4 May
Leicester (A) 12 May
Arsenal Remaining Fixtures
Wolves (A) 24 April
Leicester (A) 29 April
Brighton (H) 4 May
Burnley (A) 12 May
Man Utd Remaining Fixtures
Man City (H) 24 April
Chelsea (H) 28 April
Huddersfield (A) 5 May
Cardiff (H) 12 May
Spurs Remaining Fixtures
Brighton (H) 23 April
West Ham (H) 27 April
Bournemouth (A) 6 May
Everton (H) 12 May
EPL Standings
1. Liverpool – 88
2. Man City – 86
3. Spurs – 70
4. Chelsea – 67
5. Arsenal – 66
6. Man Utd – 64
7. Watford – 50
8. Everton – 49
9. Leicester – 48
10. Wolves – 48
11. West Ham – 43
12. Crystal Palace – 42
13. Newcastle – 41
14. Bournemouth – 41
15. Burnley – 40
16. Southampton – 37
17. Brighton – 34
18. Cardiff – 31
19. Fulham – 23 (R)
20. Huddersfield – 14 (R)
EPL Odds
To Win
Man City 4/7
Liverpool 11/8
Relegation
Cardiff 1/9
Brighton 4/1
Top Four Odds
Spurs 1/14
Arsenal 8/13
Chelsea 13/8
Man Utd 11/2
Top Goalscorer
Mohamed Salah 7/4
Sergio Aguero 9/5
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang – 7/2
Sadio Mane 7/1
Raheem Sterling 16/1
Current Top Scorers
1. Sergio Aguero – 19
2. Mohamed Salah – 19
3. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang – 19
4. Sadio Mané – 18
5. Harry Kane – 17
6. Raheem Sterling – 17
Next Manager to Leave
No Manager to Leave 8/11
Chris Hughton Evens
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer 12/1
