This article is part of Football FanCast’s Off the Bench series, which places in-game managerial decisions and squad selections under FFC’s microscope.
Tottenham suffered a 2-1 defeat to Liverpool at Anfield on Sunday, despite taking an early lead through Harry Kane’s header.
The result leaves Mauricio Pochettino’s men languishing in 11th place in the Premier League, after what has been an extremely disappointing start to the campaign – the north Londoners have won just three of the opening 10 games.
Against the European champions, the former Southampton boss could only watch on as Jordan Henderson and Mohamed Salah took the points away, although his use of the bench in the dying stages left a lot to be desired.
Snapshot
As aforesaid, Henderson and Salah scored second-half goals to win the game for the Reds.
The latter’s firm penalty after Serge Aurier had fouled Sadio Mane found the back of the net in the 75th minute, leaving Pochettino with 15 minutes to react.
A whole nine minutes went by before the Argentine decided to throw Lucas Moura into the fold in the 84th minute, before Pochettino also decided to introduce Giovani Lo Celso in the 88th minute.
Pointless use of his bench
What on earth was Pochettino expecting his two subs to do with such little time to make an impact?
Surely as soon as the Spurs boss saw Liverpool take the lead – a side who have now gone 45 games unbeaten at Anfield – he should immediately have thought that the Reds would manage the game accordingly and grind the win out.
As a result, instant action should have been taken after Salah’s goal – Lo Celso and Lucas should’ve already been ready to enter proceedings before the Egyptian had even finished celebrating.
It’s not like it would’ve been tough to chose a player to depart the pitch – Dele Alli failed to record a single shot, key pass or dribble, while Christian Eriksen had just one shot and that was all.
Pochettino delivered a moment of madness by giving his substitutes such little time to trouble a solid backline.
