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Thursday November 27, 2008 Finished Goffert Stadion

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NEC

Tottenham Hotspur

  • O'Hara 14’

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  1. Efficient Spurs too good for NEC

    Efficient Spurs too good for NEC

    Tottenham Hotspur won 1-0 at NEC Nijmegen in Group D of the UEFA Cup thanks to a 14th-minute goal from Jamie O'Hara. More

  • Live Commentary

    Time:90'
    • NEC
    • Tottenham Hotspur
    • 90+3' And that's it! Not a classic, but a good job by Spurs tonight, who pretty much wrap up their spot in the knockout phase of the UEFA cup with this result. Thanks for joining us tonight, and we'll see you again.
    • 90'+2 Seconds left now, but just enough for Tshibamba to have a go at decapitating Bale with his right shin as the latter goes for a ball with his head. It's innocent enough though, and the ref doesn't bother reaching for his pocket.
    • 90'+1 Another new cap for Spurs as Harry Redknapp brings on 17-year-old Mason to play out the match. Bale takes as much out of the clock as he can with spurious pre-throw-in directions.
    • 89' Bentley getting stuck into wasting a bit of time at the corner flag, and as if in punishment the fourth official decrees an extra three minutes. Not sure quite where he found them from.
    • 87' The fight seems to have gone out of NEC now, with Spurs looking ever more like the job is done. Lennon fires a shot from 30 yards, but it's more like he just felt like swinging his foot rather than was genuinely trying to score.
    • 83' A lovely cross by O'Hara is cut out just as Obika has run onto the pitch, but the ball is cut out just as he's about to slot it home. What a way that would have been to start off...
    • 79' Davids is cautioned for a clumsy challenge, then Shimbamba comes on for Lorenzo in a final throw of the dice for NEC. They'll need to take at least a point from this match to have any realistic chance of going through.
    • 77' One-man team El Kabir makes another run but is dispossessed at the final second as he's about to pull the trigger - great tackle by Woodgate.
    • 73' El Kabir makes another good run up the right for NEC and puts in a good cross, but Davids isn't up to making anything of it. Just to make it clear, it isn't actually Edgar Davids who is playing, but Lorenzo. Yet in both appearance and hair, it might as well be the great man. Spooky.
    • 71' Aaron Lennon comes on for Darren Bent, showing exactly how worried Harry is about his boys slipping up, i.e. not at all. This is looking comfortable.
    • 68' The attacking change by NEC has helped them along, but not that much. Maybe it's their freaky kits. The black bits must merge into the stand, the green into the pitch and the red into the pitchside advertising. They might as well be playing in combat fatigues.
    • 65' Bouaouzan comes on for Sibum, and it seems to give a lift to NEC. El Kabir latches onto a pass from the newcomer but is brought down five yards outside the box. The ref plays the advantage to allow van Beukering's effort on goal, but it's well saved. Suddenly the striker is surrounded by team mates glaring at him about wasting the advantage, but he stares them down.
    • 63' Free kick wasted. That seems to be the problem with NEC: they're decent on the ball, but on this evidence don't seem to be able to turn elegant strings of passes into chances. With over an hour gone they've only managed a single shot on target - and that was the aforementioned deflection off Dawson.
    • 61' We're back to the midfield aerial pinball at the moment, and let's face it: Spurs will be the only team in it if it carries on this way. Edgar Davids is bundled off the ball once, twice, three times, but comes back for more and passes to Schoene, who's brought down by Campbell. Free kick.
    • 59' Gomes and El Kabir clash as the Spurs goalie collects a ball, and it looks as if the Dutch striker might be in trouble. He's escorted off the pitch limping to applause from the crowd - he might walk it off yet, we'll have to see. It'd be a shame if he had to go off, he's been NEC's best player by quite a margin in the second half.
    • 56' They certainly know how to sing, these Dutch fans. There's been a sort of constant background din throughout, and as El Kabir and Fernandez make an incursion up the right for NEC it rises expectantly. But when the ball outruns Fernandez, it's the Spurs travelling contingent who are left singing.
    • 54' The best chance of the match for the Dutch! Well, not really. But a 35-yard effort from Sibum ricochets of Dawson's thigh, and briefly wrong-foots Gomes who comfortably adjusts his footing.
    • 52' A rare Dutch incursion into the top third of the pitch leads to El Kabir winning a corner for NEC. But it's a fairly limp-ankled efforts that couldn't have curled more comfortably into the arms of Gomes if it tried.
    • 50' It's all Spurs now: a change in shape at half-time seems to have given them much better penetration, and they seem to be converging on the box. Spurs look relaxed and in control here.
    • 47' The second half gets under way with just the one change - Radomski makes way for Kivuvu for the Dutch team - and within a couple of minutes Bentley on the right puts in a goregous cross to unmarked Darren Bent in the box. Bent's header is brilliantly saved by Hungarian keeper Babos, who has kept NEC in this match and no mistake.
    • 45+1 That's it for the half, and Spurs will be happy. They have played well, and despite the work rate of NEC have looked like a 6'10" boxer holding off a thrashing midget with a single hand planted on their opponent's head.
    • 45 One extra minute declared - probably for the magic sponge incident between van Beukering and Dawson earlier on.
    • 44 A new Spurs attack builds up through the middle and Jamie O'Hara finds himself with a chance to net a second time. He thumps with all his might, but its too close to Babos between the NEC sticks. Still, if another goal is to be scored tonight it only looks like coming from Spurs.
    • 42 Bentley gets on the end of a Gomes clearance, and is terrorising the NEC right-back, Fernandez. He's looking very lively tonight, but the cross, when it comes, is cleared with ease.
    • 39 El-Akchaoui ("ellack chowey", we think) gets on the end of a Davids ball in the box, but is blocked out by Dawson and is forced to shoot wide. From the clearance NEC come back in, and El Kabir is released into the box... but only finds the side netting.
    • 38 Woodgate takes the ball just beyond the half-way and releases Campbell down the left in what is Spurs' most elegant move of the match... but sadly the cross doesn't measure up, and is collected easily by the keeper.
    • 35 Bentley puts in a cross from the left that's cleared well by Babos, and from the ensuing break it finally looks like the Dutch team have a bit of space. Some good footwork in midfield builds up to a chance from just outside the box for van Beukering, but he doesn't connect properly and pulls the ball wide and left.
    • 33 The frenetic pace is quieting slightly as yet another attack by the National Exhibition Centre peters out into nothing. What? You mean NEC doesn't stand for that? Are you sure?
    • 31 Davids should be looking a bit long in the tooth, but we pinch ourselves again to remind us that it's Lorenzo rather than Edgar. Still, squint a bit and it's great to see 'him' playing again - and reassuring to see that he's still not had a haircut. That must be at least 15 years by now.
    • 29 More whistling from the crowd as the Dawson-van Beukering battle takes another twist, with the lightest of touches from the Dutch striker sending his powerfully-built marker tumbling to the grass like a drunken ice skater. These two will not be on each others' Christmas card lists.
    • 27 Handbags! Handbags! A bit of a mid-air tussle between Dawson and van Beukering leads to an altercation that is swiftly halted by the referee. But there were some pretty mean looks going back and forth. Oh yes.
    • 25 It's end-to-end stuff now, with the two teams chugging away at each other as if it's the last ten minutes of the knockout stage rather than a group stage game. Great to see.
    • 22 NEC's corner is immediately put behind for another, which is effortlessly cleared by Dawson. The Dutch come back in, and have a superb chance with Schoene needing to beat the keeper from six yards... but Gomes is more than up to the challenge.
    • 21 Having inadvisedly used the words 'Dutch' and 'penetration' in the last entry it suddenly occurs that all sorts of new readers might come upon us through the search engines. You join us just in time to find that NEC have a corner kick after another incursion into the Spurs half.
    • 19 Spurs keep shrugging off the attacks from their hosts like a lion swatting flies away with its tail. Both sides are full of running, but for the moment it's hard to see any penetration coming from the Dutch.
    • 17 The Dutch don't look too happy about having conceded, and have kept the ball pretty consistently since the restart. But the defence holds solid - at least for now.
    • 14 AND IT'S A GOAL! With no decent chances having fallen for either team, suddenly Spurs have a couple of good chances. First Campbell hits the bar, but then O'Hara nods home unmarked for the simplest goal of his career.
    • 13 Edgar Davids lookalike Lorenzo Davids picks up the ball on the right hand side of the box, but gets hammered pretty quickly by Bale.
    • 11 Fernandez puts in a decent ball from the far right and back on the half-way line, but van Beukering is a couple of feet too short to make contact with his head. Classic long ball stuff - exactly what the Dutch coach criticised Rednkapp's boys for before the match.
    • 9 Neither team seems able to make any headway, and there's a lot of back-and-forth in the middle of the pitch. But it's fast and furious, and the NEC don't look like mugs in any way - as you might expect from a side that beat PSV a couple of weeks ago.
    • 6 Huddlestone picks up the ball in a central position 35 yards out and tries his luck, but the ball clears the crossbar by a good ten yards. Good to see that he's confident to have a go, but there might have been a bit more on there if he'd been patient.
    • 4 Campbell pulls down van Beukering in a fairly tame looking tussle, but the Dutch forward obviously does something on the way to the ground and is taken off the pitch for the physio to stare him in the face and put a cold sponge on his head. Always does the trick.
    • 2 A bit of argy-bargy early on with a few big tackles flying in on both sides and a bit of faux-limping. The referee is not impressed by any of it.
    • 1 And that's the kick off. NEC playing in an odd sort of Christmas tree-looking kit of green, red and black, while Spurs are head to foot in sky blue. Two odder looking kits you'd be hard pushed to find.
    • - Hello and welcome to eurosport.yahoo.com's LIVE coverage of NEC Nijmegen v Tottenham Hotspur at the De Goffertpark Stadium! Spurs have scored 20 goals in their last eight matches so we could be in for a cracker.

  • Team Stats

    NEC Stats Tottenham Hotspur
    55% Possession 44%
    10 Shots 12
    2 Shots on target 7
    2 Saves 1
    4 Corners 2
    15 Fouls 15
    0 Offsides 0
    1 Yellow cards 0
    0 Red cards 0
    21 Tackles 24
    359 Accurate passes 259
    58 Bad passes 68

  • Player Stats

    G =
    Goals
    S =
    Shots
    SoT =
    Shot on Target
    F =
    Fouls
    FW =
    Fouls Won
    O =
    Offsides
    A =
    Assists
    AP =
    Accurate Passes
    BP =
    Bad Passes
    T =
    Tackles
    • NEC
      G S SoT F FW O A AP BP T
      1 Gabor Babos 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 13 2 0
      3 Peter Wisgerhof 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 28 0 3
      5 Youssef El Akchaoui 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 52 15 1
      21 Daní Fernández 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 31 2 1
      2 Ramon Zomer 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 33 7 2
      35 Moestafa El Kabir 0 2 1 1 2 0 0 17 1 2
      23 Arek Radomski 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 20 3 2
      10 Lasse Schöne 0 1 0 2 3 0 0 49 9 1
      16 Bas Sibum 0 0 0 2 1 0 0 33 5 3
      8 Lorenzo Davids 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 34 6 4
      9 Jhonny van Beukering 0 4 1 5 3 0 0 20 5 0
      13 Mark Otten 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      25 Rein Baart 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      6 Patrick Pothuizen 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      22 Joel Tshibamba 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0
      4 Dominique Kivuvu 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 20 1 2
      19 Tim Janssen 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      14 Rachid Bouaouzan 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 9 2 0
    • Tottenham Hotspur
      G S SoT F FW O A AP BP T
      1 Heurelho Gomes 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7 1 0
      20 Michael Dawson 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 19 0 2
      3 Gareth Bale 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 18 11 6
      16 Chris Gunter 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 20 0 2
      39 Jonathan Woodgate 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 18 2 1
      6 Tom Huddlestone 0 1 0 2 1 0 0 48 13 3
      4 Didier Zokora 0 0 0 2 5 0 0 24 6 1
      5 David Bentley 0 2 1 1 0 0 0 24 5 3
      24 Jamie O'Hara 1 4 3 2 1 0 0 46 17 3
      18 Fraizer Campbell 0 2 1 4 0 0 0 12 2 1
      10 Darren Bent 0 2 1 1 0 0 0 12 7 1
      51 John Bostock 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      80 Jonathan Obika 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 1 0
      21 César Sánchez Dominguez 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      77 Ryan Glen Mason 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0
      67 Adam Smith 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
      7 Aaron Lennon 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 8 2 1
      32 Benoit Assou-Ekotto 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

  • Summary

    • 83' A lovely cross by O'Hara is cut out just as Obika has run onto the pitch, but the ball is cut out just as he's about to slot it home. What a way that would have been to start off...
    • 77' One-man team El Kabir makes another run but is dispossessed at the final second as he's about to pull the trigger - great tackle by Woodgate.
    • 52' A rare Dutch incursion into the top third of the pitch leads to El Kabir winning a corner for NEC. But it's a fairly limp-ankled efforts that couldn't have curled more comfortably into the arms of Gomes if it tried.
    • 47' The second half gets under way with just the one change - Radomski makes way for Kivuvu for the Dutch team - and within a couple of minutes Bentley on the right puts in a goregous cross to unmarked Darren Bent in the box. Bent's header is brilliantly saved by Hungarian keeper Babos, who has kept NEC in this match and no mistake.
    • 44 A new Spurs attack builds up through the middle and Jamie O'Hara finds himself with a chance to net a second time. He thumps with all his might, but its too close to Babos between the NEC sticks. Still, if another goal is to be scored tonight it only looks like coming from Spurs.
    • 39 El-Akchaoui ("ellack chowey", we think) gets on the end of a Davids ball in the box, but is blocked out by Dawson and is forced to shoot wide. From the clearance NEC come back in, and El Kabir is released into the box... but only finds the side netting.
    • 38 Woodgate takes the ball just beyond the half-way and releases Campbell down the left in what is Spurs' most elegant move of the match... but sadly the cross doesn't measure up, and is collected easily by the keeper.
    • 22 NEC's corner is immediately put behind for another, which is effortlessly cleared by Dawson. The Dutch come back in, and have a superb chance with Schoene needing to beat the keeper from six yards... but Gomes is more than up to the challenge.
    • 14 AND IT'S A GOAL! With no decent chances having fallen for either team, suddenly Spurs have a couple of good chances. First Campbell hits the bar, but then O'Hara nods home unmarked for the simplest goal of his career.
    • 4 Campbell pulls down van Beukering in a fairly tame looking tussle, but the Dutch forward obviously does something on the way to the ground and is taken off the pitch for the physio to stare him in the face and put a cold sponge on his head. Always does the trick.
    • - Hello and welcome to eurosport.yahoo.com's LIVE coverage of NEC Nijmegen v Tottenham Hotspur at the De Goffertpark Stadium! Spurs have scored 20 goals in their last eight matches so we could be in for a cracker.

Live Team Line-Up

  • NEC

    Captain: Peter Wisgerhof

    Starting line-up

    • G. Babos
    • D. Fernández
    • P. Wisgerhof
    • R. Zomer
    • Y. El-Akchaoui
    • A. Radomski Substitution Out (45′)
    • L. Schöne
    • B. Sibum Substitution Out (65′)
    • L. Davids Yellow Card
    • J. van Beukering
    • M. El Kabir

    Subs

    • R. Baart
    • P. Pothuizen
    • M. Otten
    • T. Janssen

    Injured

    None

    Suspended

    None

  • Tottenham Hotspur

    Captain: Michael Dawson

    Starting line-up

    • Gomes
    • C. Gunter
    • M. Dawson
    • J. Woodgate
    • G. Bale
    • D. Zokora
    • T. Huddlestone
    • D. Bentley Substitution Out (90′)
    • J. O'Hara Goal
    • F. Campbell
    • D. Bent Substitution Out (71′)

    Subs

    • César Sánchez
    • B. Assou-Ekotto
    • J. Bostock
    • A. Smith

    Injured

    None

    Suspended

    None

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