16 Conclusions from Liverpool 1-1 Tottenham: Richarlison, Ngumoha, Salah, Tudor, Slot and what next? | OneFootball

We all assumed we were watching Igor Tudor’s last game as Spurs manager. A forlorn commitment to fulfil Tottenham’s contractual obligation to turn up and be embarrassed at Anfield once a year, in order to spare any new manager the humiliation and unpleasantness.

Instead we ended it wondering how many more games Arne Slot has as Liverpool manager. Familiar nonsense from Richarlison, familiar nonsense from Liverpool and extremely unfamiliar resilience from crisis club and walking punchline Tottenham all combined to deliver a wildly unexpected 1-1 draw between two teams both, in their own differing ways, struggling desperately.

Let’s get into it. Because there was a lot of it.

1. You’ve got a game against the worst Premier League team of the whole year. You’re at home. You’ve been handed a chance to make a big move towards Champions League qualification by the stumbles of your rivals.

You take a 1-0 lead early on against a team with no confidence or belief in itself. You then sit on that lead. You slowly but surely allow that moribund opposition to dare to dream, to believe the inevitable might only be the seemingly inevitable. That they might be able to do something about it.

You drift along apparently oblivious to the increasingly obvious peril in which you have unnecessarily placed yourself. You concede a late equaliser via some horrendously half-arsed and small-brained defending.

Even then you fail to wake up and could in the end even have conceded all three points instead of only dropping an infuriatingly avoidable two against a team haunted by relegation fears.

It’s a scenario we’ve seen play out in plenty of Spurs games over the last 15 years or so. But never this way round.

2. We should all, of course, have seen it coming. It was just the perfect level of ridiculousness for Spurs to get their first point under Igor Tudor here, at a ground where they traditionally suffer the sort of calamity they’ve delivered in every one of his games up to now.

Whenever we make a serious prediction based on careful study, it is invariably wrong. When we try to be whimsical or absurd, we have an alarming success rate. Just look at how we were chortling it up in our Big Weekend preview of this.

And there it is. Igor Tudor survives. Time will tell whether Spurs really are better off for what happened here today.

3. What he for sure has now are some enormous selection decisions over the next week, first against Atletico Madrid in a surely-forlorn (but, as always where Spurs are concerned, who really knows) rescue mission and then the biggest game of their season so far against Nottingham Forest in a true six-pointer

Fate forced Tudor’s hand here, with the Croatian even admitting that until late in the preparation his plans for this one involved Conor Gallagher in midfield. When Gallagher’s illness proved stubborn enough to keep him out, Tudor had to change again having already been robbed of a dozen senior first-teamers for various reasons new and old, short-term and long.

What he very obviously got right here – and what would still have been correct even had it ended in another defeat – were the formation and gameplan. With only two players even approaching centre-backs available, Tudor finally admitted defeat and at last abandoned any ill-starred variation on his back five.

Here was a team that had almost as many square pegs in square holes as is possible with a squad operating at the very limits of availability. It was a four-four-f*cking-two if ever we saw one. And it worked.

4. Everyone trying very hard to get the best possible outcome is a requirement of such entry-level status that it should not even justify a mention. But Spurs had that today and they have not had it for months.

This was, at last, the sort of performance Tudor was supposed to get out of Spurs. This was the Mr Fixit who was promised. Somewhere along the way, this unfamiliar team of players at least playing in familiar positions… worked.

Two big men up top? Worked. Two centre-backs at centre-back, and two full-backs at full-back? It worked. A Pape Sarr-Archie Gray midfield is a callow one indeed to take on Liverpool, but they held their own in what was at least for each of them individually a familiar part of the pitch.

Spurs are Spurs so they still had an 18-year-old left-back starting at right wing, but the point stands. Here, more through necessity it must be said than anything else, Tudor found a team of players who could all do the job they’d been given and would all give everything to the cause.

Astonishing that it seems so astonishing, but there we are.

5. There should be senior Spurs players watching this game from the sidelines and asking themselves uncomfortable questions at the sight of Kevin Danso and Radu Dragusin toiling manfully away.

Or that of Mathys Tel – a young player whose career has not turned out remotely the way he thought, who has been treated pretty shabbily by Spurs but yet remains among the most reliably and whole-heartedly committed of the entire squad.

Or that of Gray, just turned 20, and perhaps the only player who can look both a) at his own effort over the last month and b) Tel in the eye.

But Gray and Tel we know will be significantly involved over the weeks ahead. The bigger and thornier decisions concern Danso, Dragusin and those most conspicuous by their recent absence.

The biggest decision of Tudor’s resuscitated Spurs reign comes now: what does he do with Micky van de Ven and Cristian Romero?

Both have been liabilities for several weeks now. Neither has been a reliable leader. Both have got themselves stupidly suspended. Neither should see an automatic route back into this team.

Right now, in this situation, you’d certainly take Danso over either of them. It seems a mad thing to say, but he might now be the first name on the teamsheet, regardless of how many centre-backs Tudor picks.

That, of course, is the other big call for Tudor. We know he’s a back-three man. We’ve seen the painful outcome of his previous stubbornness in preferring that set-up. But we’ve now seen how much better Spurs are when a simpler option is chosen.

Which centre-backs he picks in the next two games, that’s a tricky decision. How many he picks should not be.

6. The other thing that should have come as no surprise from a Tottenham point of view is that, if indeed there was to be mischief from them today, Richarlison would be at its epicentre.

Really, the sheer potency of this situation was such pure essence of Richarlison that everything that happened here now looks like it simply had to happen.

A combination of Anfield Richarlison, World Cup-year Richarlison and relegation-scrap Richarlison is a heady brew of Richarlisons indeed.

He was a pest all day long, and is another easy pick for Tudor or whoever happens to be Spurs manager at any given moment for the rest of this run-in.

He is not the purest technician. He is not a keen and careful protector of the ball. More than once in a game where Spurs inevitably spent much of their day on the back foot he was dispossessed in dangerous positions.

But he remains one of the purest chaos merchants that the Premier League has to offer, and on days like this he becomes a force of nature. Liverpool should need no warning about Richarlison’s propensity for mischief in this fixture. Since joining Spurs he has now scored four goals in seven Premier League games against Liverpool for Spurs, and 21 Premier League goals in 88 games against everyone else.

Yet they failed to heed any of the many, many warnings served today. Twice in the closing minutes of the first half Richarlison had headed chances; one went narrowly wide, one smartly saved by Alisson.

Twice in the second half Alisson was again called into action to deny Richarlison his goal. But from Richarlison’s fourth shot on target – as many as Liverpool managed in total – the goal finally came.

It was the least convincing contact of the lot, which probably worked in his favour as the ball scuttled into the bottom corner with Alisson powerless this time.

It was nothing more than Spurs in general and Richarlison deserved. And he kept his shirt on, which is the one and only reason Liverpool didn’t score an even later winner when they had the chance to break Tottenham hearts with a breakaway in added time to added time. Seasoned Richarlison watchers will have feared for him, but not this time.

7. We say one and only reason, but really it was two. The second reason is that Liverpool were astonishingly bad here. And not for the first time.

For all the talk that this could be a vital and transformative point for Spurs, it really might also be a complete illusion. This was a weekend when Spurs, Leeds, West Ham and Nottingham Forest all picked up a big point in the fight against relegation. By definition, one of those points will prove not to be that.

And it absolutely could be this one. In leaving Anfield with a point, Spurs have merely matched the effort of Leeds and fallen short of Nottingham Forest’s. Burnley too left here with a 1-1 draw.

Spurs are catastrophically bad, sure, but Liverpool are absolutely not good.

They were poor throughout this game, really. They were poor at 0-0, poor at 1-0, poor before their substitutions, poor after the substitutions and poor even after the ultimate wake-up call of Spurs’ late equaliser.

That one break after a Spurs corner deep, deep into added time aside, if anyone was going to find a dramatic late winner here it felt like it was going to be Spurs. And that’s just plain nutty.

With just a fraction more composure and quality to a final pass here or a cross there, Spurs might even be celebrating a first win of 2026 rather than merely a first point in six games. We also put it to you that no other football club that exists, has existed or ever will exist would have a record of two points from seven games and those two points be against Man City and Liverpool.

8. We digress. Let’s talk Liverpool a bit. Because that was bad. The changes to their starting line-up were, unlike Tottenham’s, unenforced. But entirely logical. Unlike Spurs, the second leg of their Champions League clash with Galatasaray absolutely can – should, even – be turned around. Shuffling the pack made perfect sense when faced with a Spurs team they routinely crush here anyway – despite what is now the inevitable Richarlison goal – and who arrived having lost their last five in the league and six in all competitions.

This was a Spurs team without its two starting centre-backs, its most experienced defensive midfielder, and which appeared to have kept the manager in charge purely to avoid a new manager having any bounce hopes scuppered by the expected and customary Anfield unpleasantness.

But Liverpool just never ever got going despite being given every opportunity to do so. Spurs had conceded at least two in each of their last 11 games against domestic opposition. For Liverpool away to be where that streak ends is a stain against this team, however less sh*t Spurs might have been.

The most damning assessment came from Jamie Carragher on Sky Sports commentary: “This Liverpool side have made Tottenham look like a decent team.”

No wonder there were boos at full-time.

We all came into this assuming it was Igor Tudor’s last game as Tottenham manager, but how many more does Slot have with Liverpool? If it goes wrong in midweek, does he even get the rest of this season?

9. Even the solitary goal Liverpool did manage against the team that always ships at least two was unconvincing, a combination of soft refereeing and even softer goalkeeping first giving Dominik Szoboszlai the chance to go for goal from what is now officially his Territory and to then allow the ball to enter pretty much the middle of the goal at no great pace.

Szoboszlai is, obviously, an elite free-kick taker. This was his fourth goal direct from a free-kick in this season’s Premier League; everyone else has 12 between them. But this was nowhere near his best effort. We’d wager he hasn’t in fact struck a weaker one.

Yet in it went as Vicario shuffled and then flapped.

10. The keeper would redeem himself to an extent with a smart save onto the post to deny Cody Gakpo in the first half and a vital save with his foot that went unnoticed by the officials to keep Mo Salah miserable, but it was a reminder of something important.

Igor Tudor has faced plenty of criticism for his handling of the goalkeeper situation. For picking Toni Kinsky in the first place against Atletico Madrid and then hauling him off when it went so wrong. But it wasn’t a decision from a clear blue sky. Vicario has been unreliable all season.

This was the 11th goal Vicario has conceded from outside the penalty area this season; no other Premier League keeper has been beaten from that range more than seven times.

11. Yet even when handed that fillip after what had been a bright start from the most beleaguered of visitors Liverpool did… well, pretty much nothing.

You expected them to seize control from that moment against such a wounded and vulnerable opponent. Yet they didn’t. They dominated possession but not in any compelling way, and it was Spurs who ended the half creating the more compelling chances despite not managing a touch in the Liverpool penalty area between the 11th and 43rd minutes.

12. The one exception to the general Liverpool malaise was Rio Ngumoha. Finally handed a Premier League start Liverpool fans have been loudly demanding for weeks, he was a pure menace. There is so much to like about the youngster.

He is, inevitably and obviously, still a very raw talent. But what a talent. He is already a nightmare to face up one-on-one, and it’s worth noting here that he had an unusual job among Liverpool players today: in Pedro Porro he was up against a seasoned senior pro playing in his normal and preferred position.

Porro, to his credit, stood up to the task. But Ngumoha was a clear and rare positive on an awkward afternoon for Liverpool and it’s not hard to see a future where he’s a more regular fixture in starting XIs.

Certainly, the presence of the likes of Ngumoha in the team could not be said to be the cause of Liverpool’s problems.

Because if anything they got worse after turning to their subs’ bench for Salah, Hugo Ekitike and Curtis Jones.

In so many ways, this was damning. Arne Slot, having shuffled his team more than he likes to, then went to his bench earlier than he wanted.

And yet on a day when Spurs’ bench pointedly contained two goalkeepers, three kids, some empty chairs and just two senior outfielders, it was the visitors who won the substitution battle, with Randal Kolo Muani providing the assist for Richarlison’s late leveller and Xavi Simons livelier than any of Liverpool’s own subs.

13. Watching Mo Salah has become a distressing experience. Spurs fans won’t have vast sympathy now – they have their own concerns, to be fair – but they will recognise the similarities in Salah’s fading and that of Son Heung-min over his final season in North London.

You could put Cristiano Ronaldo at Man United in the same group, frankly. Once-great players who became a burden with astonishing speed.

Both Ronaldo and Son took a drop down from Premier League standard. Salah is surely about to make the same journey once this season is done.

14. But while the sight of watching Salah butcher counter-attacks is alarming and distressing in equal measure, it was the Liverpool defending that was so far off it.

The goal was a shambles. A bog-standard route-one missile from Vicario which Kolo Muani didn’t even really compete for initially until Andy Robertson presented him with the ball. He was then able to take three touches into the Liverpool area unapproached before laying it into the path of Richarlison – also unmarked – to sweep home. Quite how such ordinary football had so easily undone Liverpool is not easily answered.

Yet it didn’t fall out of a clear blue sky. This was a team that seemed determined to take the easiest challenge currently available to a Premier League team and make it needlessly complicated. Liverpool opted to lift-and-coast their way through the game, and the goal when it came for Spurs didn’t even have the air of smash and grab about it. It was just a fair result from a game between two poor teams.

15. Spurs won’t care about any of this, and the Big Six is a fast-evaporating concept anyway. But we struggle to remember the last time such an occasion was played out in such low-quality and ultimately on Liverpool’s side low-intelligence fashion.

You felt that if Spurs were going to get something out of the game it actually, in a way, suited them to keep the game at 1-0 for as long as possible. A Spurs equaliser in, say, the 65th minute risked rousing Liverpool from their slumbers. But watching how injury-time panned out we’re not even sure that’s true. Liverpool were in a funk today and we’re not sure anything could have lifted them out of it.

It’s understandable for fans to think the team just has to turn up to win a game like this, but it’s not great that the players apparently felt that way too.

But a late Spurs goal was always the likeliest hiccup, if hiccups there were to be. Liverpool have now lost three and drawn one of their last eight Premier League games. The three winners and now this late equaliser they have conceded have all come in the 90th minute or later.

16. On its own, this result may not mean much to either team. It certainly isn’t terminal for Liverpool’s Champions League hopes – not with the way Villa and Chelsea are currently behaving – and it’s still only a point for a Spurs side that remain without a Premier League victory this year.

But for the visitors it does feel like it could be the catalyst for something. Spurs have been desperate for a moment, for something, for anything, to give them the belief better days could be ahead.

This might in the end prove as illusory as the comeback point against Man City. But for now it is something. Spurs have something to hold on to, a couple of days’ respite where they will not be the butt of everyone’s jokes, and genuine reason to believe they can beat the drop. At least until they pick a back five and find themselves 3-0 down with a man sent off after 20 minutes against Nottingham Forest next weekend.

Tudor won’t avoid the jokes, though. He may still have his job, he may have a Premier League point but he is never beating the banter charges. Not while he’s going about thinking a Spurs staffer minding his pre-match business is in fact Arne Slot.

https://twitter.com/Gaz3putt/status/2033219293559550012?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

He even tried to alpha him in classic schoolboy fashion before realising his mistake. Even on a good day, Spurs still don’t win and are still Spurs. Maybe Tudor really does belong here after all.