Second-half rally not enough as under-strength Spurs succumb to Newcastle
Tottenham (1) 1 Solanke 4
Newcastle United (1) 2 Gordon 6, Isak 38
Spurs continue to feel like a project on the slide - with the plethora of injuries biting hard as they slipped to defeat despite taking an early lead and turning in a gutsy second half performance.
Ange Postecoglou wants his team to go all-out all of the time, but they found it difficult to impose themselves against a strong Magpies midfield and a team very much in a good run of form that has taken them up to fifth in the table.
It felt too much to be missing all the first-choice members of the defence again in Guglielmo Vicario, Destiny Udogie, Micky van de Ven and Christian Romero.
But Spurs also started without Heung-Min Son, Yves Bissouma and James Maddison, with Rodrigo Bentacur another unavailable. The subs bench contained five players with little or no experience.
It was only when three of the regulars came on in the second half that Spurs finally made an impression.
These teams don't do 0-0s - you have to go back to 1971 to find the last one - and within five minutes we were guaranteed that trend would continue as Dominic Solanke sent a diving header past Martin Dubravka to give Pedro Porro's excellent first-time cross the finish it deserved.
Not a bad way to catch the eye of new England manager Thomas Tuchel, who was in the stands on a watching brief.
But with Spurs having to call upon a third-choice goalkeeper and with that defence decimated by injury, further goals were all-but a certainty and just two minutes later it was 1-1.
Lucas Bergvall's attempted pass out of defence struck Joelinton on the arm and the ball was played forward for Anthony Gordon to put away.
Postecoglou's shake of the head said it all. It was hard to believe that neither ref Andy Madley nor VAR official Chris Kavanagh thought it had a huge impact, accidental though it was.
Brandon Austin, making his Premier League debut because of illness to Fraser Forster, made a good stop to deny Gordon a second goal after Alexander Isak had played the England winger into the same channel from which he scored the equaliser.
Spurs had a lucky escape when Isak skewed wide with the goal his mercy but he got a final touch to put the Magpies ahead before the break when Jacob Murphy's low cross was touched on by Radu Dragusin into the striker's path.
Spurs rallied after the break - the sight of their massed south stand always stirring the blood. Brennan Johnson struck a post following up after Dubravka had palmed a Pape Matar Sarr shot in his direction..
A triple substitution also revived hopes - Son, Bissouma and Maddison entering the fray after an hour. The extra pep saw Spurs much more in the game and Maddison came close to levelling with a curling effort from outside the box.
Sergio Reguilon fired low across the face of goal when the slightest of touch would have resulted in a goal. Solanki headed onto the roof of the net and almost converted another cross with a header at goal during 10 minutes of injury time but the improvement did not yield a goal.
They must pick themselves up now for the Carabao Cup semi-final against Liverpool.
Spurs: (4-2-3-1) Austin - Porro, Dragusin (Reguilon h/t), Gray, Spence - Sarr (Bissouma 62), Bergvall (Maddison 62) - Johnson, Kulusevki, Werner (Son 62) - Solanke
Magpies: (4-3-3-) Dubravka - Livramento, Botman (Kelly 92), Burn, Hall - Guimaraes, Tonali, Joelinton - Murphy (Longstaff 86), Isak (Willock 86), Gordon (Barnes 78)
Attendance: 61,293
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