Solanke's big City night
He rocked them like a Harry Kane
SPURS 2-2 CITY
Premier League Match Week 24
Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
Sunday, February 1, 2026
Spurs (3-4-3): Vicario, Palhinha, Romero (c) (Sarr 46), Dragusin, Gray, Bissouma (Odobert 68), Gallagher, Udogie, Kolo Muani (Tel 68), Solanke (Byfield 90), Xavi
Unused substitutes: Kinsky, Rowswell, Souza, Olusesi, Kyerematen
Manchester City (4-1-4-1): Donnarumma, Nunes, Khusanov, Guéhi, O’Reilly, Rodri (Marmoush 90+4), Semenyo, Cherki (Reijnders 69), Bernardo (c) (Foden 88), Ait-Nouri (Nico 70), Haaland
Unused substitutes (not used): Trafford, Ake, McAidoo, Alleyne, Lewis
Referee: Robert Jones
SCORING: Cherki 11, Semenyo 44, Solanke 53, 70.
Long after Pep Guardiola retires, he will see Spurs in his nightmares.
At halftime of yesterday’s match, it seemed City were well on their way to what has been a rare result in our result fixture history: an easy win. Their 2-0 lead at the break could well have been 3- or 4-0. And it didn’t look like we had any chance of getting a good shot on goal, much less mounting a comeback.
Wait, it gets better: Thomas Frank had to take Christian Romero—not just our best center back but, it sometmes seems, our best scoring threat—off the pitch due to illness, leaving our back line anchored down by the likes of Radu Dragusin and Archie Gray, the type of ER-shift defense that cost Ange Postecoglou his job. Rayan Cherki looked as if he was going to take away MOTM honors as he scored the opener and was generally having his way with our back line.
So of course we came back to draw things level and looked like we might even take all three points in the end.
It is the history of Tottenham and Manchester City.
USMOTM: DOM “THE SCORPION” SOLANKE
Genius, esoteric, insider-level observation: We have missed Solanke. Although he came into the match with just 9 goals in 31 league matches for Spurs, he’s our most fundamentally sound striker—and I said so on Sunday before his wordlie of an equalizer. He also is a proper “glue guy” as a center forward, one who connects play, presses the ball, and demands something of defenders.
And how he may be out next Puskás Award winner.
His first goal was more sly than scintillating, but it changed the entire match. After Xavi Simons found him with a lofted ball, Solanke battled through traffic and made mincemeat of Marcus Guehi to somehow poke one past City’s Donnaruma.
Our second one also came from an eye-opening challenge, this one through Conor Gallagher’s industry. He had the look of a player who wanted to take things over, and that he did when he ran into space and sent a speculative cross Dom’s way. It was a bit behind the striker, and we’re grateful for that as it forced Solanke into attempting the sublime with a scorpion kick equalizer…
He will never be Harry Kane, but he’s now done something even ‘arry ‘asn’t.
At that point, Pep was surely thinking “Why me?”
SPURS OF THE MOMENT
We kept the pressure on City and pressed for a third. If not for Solanke’s heroics, Xavi would have been our MOTM in what was his best performance in a Spurs shit that bears the number last worn by our talismanic captain Son Heung-min.
What have we most missed under Thomas Frank? Line-breaking passes. Suddenly, we had a player doing that better than anyone has this season:
I’ve had concerns about whether Xavi has the physicality to make it in England—I fear for any Premier League player who weighs less than me—and even during this match, we saw how he can struggle in tight spaces. As with most players who come from continental leagues, there surely must be a learning curve in adjusting to opponents who actually deny you space. (Side note: I love Sonny as much as the next man, but I must ask folks to stop post clips from the MLS to argue he hasn’t lost a step.) But perhaps our new no.7 is beginning to make the necessary adjustments to thrive at this level—his performance on Sunday certainly indicates he is. Moving forward, one hopes to see him in a rotation with Madders when he returns to the pitch.
And I don’t understand the folks who say Conor Gallagher was not necessary. While it can be fairly argued that other positions on the field needed reinforcements more urgently, I’ll gladly take a homegrown 8 who instantly raises our game in the middle of the pitch. In the lead-up to Solanke’s stunner, he showed the kind of industry we’ve sorely missed when he won possession, drove intrepidly into space, and assisted the equalizer. He’s only been with us a few weeks and already he has a signature moment for the team.
And let me put in a plug for Wilson Odobert. I could be cute and note he came on at the 68’ mark on Sunday and we equalized two minutes later, but there’s no need to do so as he’s looked like our best attacker this past month. It seems funny to say a 21-year-old is experiencing a renaissance, but his performance against Dortmund last month was a statement match, and he’s looked revitalized ever since. In this past month, I’ve gone from wondering if we’d ever see consistent output from him to becoming convinced he should be in our XI as much as possible in the foreseeable future.
ALL THAT SAID…
Let’s talk about what’s not working. To start, there is…how we start.
Frank needs to bin his defensive setups. It may well be too much in his “DNA,” but to come out so limp and lifeless in the first half—and to respond so resiliently in the second—makes what we’ve all seen for months now perfectly clear: Playing like Brentford does not work in N17.
What else does not work? Dragusin in our lineup. He was a toreador on City’s first goal, and his pathetic clearance led to their second. I can’t believe we gave this guy a 7-year deal. When our manager was Ange. Who demanded defenders play out from the back. When it comes to on-the-ball skills, the poor guy makes me miss Davinson Sanchez.
And I have to say it: For someone who’s supposed to be our best and most press-resistant 6, Yves Bissouma makes too many mistakes. (Go back and look at last month’s West Ham match, when he played well up until his attempt at a headed clearance served up the decisive goal.) On Sunday, the ease with which he was dispossessed in the lead-up to Cherki’s opener was comical.
The conversation around Bissouma has admittedly become controversial, but he lost me forever when he got himself suspended for the Super Cup match—which left us trying to close out a huge upset of PSG with 19-year-old Archie Gray. Yves has had various issues with our last three managers now, and if you can’t show up on time to team functions, I don’t have time for you.
I’m also very uncomfortable with the subtle racial coding—a form of what others have described as the soft bigotry of low expectations, or what I sometimes refer to as “those-people”-ism—I hear when some supporters bend over backward to argue that we can’t expect some players to be on time…and why is being on time for team training important in a team sport…and what is “on time,” anyway? Sorry, I’m not having any of that nonsense.
For me, this discussion brought to mind how certain podcasters jumped to say we shouldn’t criticize Tanguy Ndombele’s lack of hustle—even to the point of preposterously claiming Harry Kane did the “exact same thing.” (You remember Kane, the player who went from being a chronic loanee to winning Golden Boots and even a Playmaker award through his…lack…of hustle?)
Whenever a form of this curious apologia crops up, I always wonder how the many hard-training, hard-playing black players in our squad feel when they hear well-meaning white people clumsily claim we can’t expect certain players to hustle or even show up on time.
WHERE DOES THIS LEAVE US?
Well, we now have 29 points in the league. To break the 40-point line, we need to go just 3-2-9 until the end of the season. The fact we’re even having that conversation after we’ve just finished the Champions League group stage in 4th is both preposterous and very on-brand of late.
Unfortunately, and by Thomas Frank’s own admission, we now find ourselves with a weaker squad than we had before the transfer window due to injuries and to a lack of significant business beyond adding Gallagher. Our club captain has also weighed in on this:
To be fair, our new left back from Brazil, Souza, looks like he’s got some game in his boots…
…and we certainly needed a LB to stop forcing us to use Djed Spence as cover for both fullback positions. But Souza’s 19, or six years younger than Paulinho was when he arrived to much acclaim at White Hart Lane.
And if anything is Spursy, it is that we left our most glaring need unaddressed.
Up next: As we wait to find out who our R16 opponent is, we look forward to matches with Man U (away), Newcastle (home), and the NLD at home. How many points will we take from February? I predict…2 or 3.
It’s been a ‘mare of a season, but we are seeing signs of things to look forward to from our team. And just think how great it will be when we knock Woolwich out of Champions League!