Above all, this was a tremendous occasion for Aaron Connolly, the 19-year-old from Galway who scored twice on his full league debut and was a quick-turning, two-footed menace throughout.
It was also a day to remember for Graham Potter, who saw his Brighton team win their first league game at home. Best of all they did so in the style he craves, with a fluency to their passing, the ball retained easily in midfield and menace on the flanks.
Fifteen minutes before half-time the Brighton fans were already singing “we want seven” – a rare treat for a team whose last seven league goals dated back to the start of May. But then all things are relative and in Spurs Brighton found an opposition who seem at times to be playing through a mist.
Defeat here made it 13 losses and nine wins in their last 29 games. There is something else too, variations on the idea of losing. Against Bayern Munich in midweek Spurs were purposeful for half an hour, then limp as a mouldering lettuce leaf by the end of the 7-2 defeat, a team who seemed to have mislaid the basic notion of being a team.
There are better ways to start a game than conceding within the first three minutes and losing your captain. What will alarm Pochettino is the response to adversity at the Amex Stadium, the lack of precision or drive. Spurs were always losing this game, losing it in every minute, every passage of play.
Hugo Lloris will be subject to the usual howls of despair over his early error but his dislocated elbow was the bigger issue, a shocking moment that left him being given oxygen on the pitch and eventually carried off in a state of genuine distress.
The goal came from two moments of slackness. First Érik Lamela made the most perfunctory effort at stopping Pascal Gross from getting a cross in from the left. Then disaster: Lloris simply dropped the ball right in front of Neal Maupay, who walked it into the net. Instantly it became clear the goalkeeper had also seriously injured his arm in the fall, his elbow twisting back horribly as he landed.
For a while the Spurs players looked a little stunned by their captain’s misfortune. Maupay’s movement, dropping deep then spinning away in the space in front of the centre-backs, was a source of constant pain. Steven Alzate and Dale Stephens had a grip of central midfield. Opposite them Eric Dier moved with all the easy grace of an out-of-commission combine harvester, understandably rusty on his first league start since May.
Around the half-hour mark Spurs switched to 4-4-2 with Son Heung-min up alongside Harry Kane, but with no discernible shift to the gravity of the game. Still they looked alarmingly creaky at the back, with a familiar vulnerability to speed between the centre-backs.
Brighton’s second arrived with 31 minutes gone. Another goal, another goalkeeping blip. This time it was Dan Burn who curled a lovely ball in behind the centre-backs from the left. Connolly twisted his body with real dexterity and produced a lovely flick on goal that Paulo Gazzaniga could only palm out. The rebound was gleefully gobbled up.
It was all Brighton after that, Connolly, Maupay and Aaron Mooy producing some neat combinations. Spurs’ only chance of the half arrived a minute before the break, Son and Kane combining to tee up Lamela for a shot that was blocked.
The turquoise away shirts were out five minutes before the restart, shooed early from the dressing room, and they looked more purposeful for a while. But this Brighton team is stuffed with neat little technical players. They snapped back and kept the ball in tight spaces as the air seemed to go out of Tottenham once again.
The third goal came from the same left flank, Connolly skipping inside and curling a wonderful low shot into the far corner as the Spurs defence stood and watched. With 72 minutes gone Son was taken off, to boos from the Spurs end. It was simply that kind of day – but an afternoon of real hope for Potter and the home support.
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