Mathieu Valbuena has been quoted by RMC Sport as saying that he is confident his old club Marseille will beat Tottenham on Tuesday night, labelling Antonio Conte’s side as “brittle”. Spurs need a result to qualify in France.
Last week’s VAR decision, after Harry Kane thought he had scored the winner against Sporting Lisbon, took Spurs from utter elation, to despair. It saw Conte sent off. Now, they have to get a result against Marseille at the Velodrome.
They beat Marseille 2-0 at home. But Richarlison was the matchwinner and he is one of three Tottenham players unavailable, along with Dejan Kulusevski and Cristian Romero. Spurs are in a bout of indifferent form at the moment.
On Saturday, they finally got a win against Bournemouth, but needed injury time to come back after going two goals down – winning 3-2. They previously lost to Newcastle and Manchester United, and drew with Sporting in London.
Now, they take on Marseille. Igor Tudor’s side are also in poor form, failing to win in their last four games. On Saturday, they drew 2-2 with Strasbourg – after three straight losses. But Valbuena is confident Marseille will get a win.
“Marseille need to go into this game without any pressure, and be positive. I think Tottenham are a brittle team, they’re definitely beatable. There’s character in this [Marseille] team, there’s character in every department,” Valbuena said.
“Marseille have the team to put in a great performance, stir things up and play without pressure. Since the start of the season, Marseille have no reason to envy Tottenham. With their qualities, they can go through. I’m very confident.”
Valbuena confident Marseille will beat brittle Tottenham
Tottenham will be favourites but with Conte not in the dugout, and three crucial players missing, anything can happen. Marseille will be bang up for it. Not least, because of their Arsenal connections. Four players have Arsenal on their CV.
Nuno Tavares is on loan from the Gunners. Sead Kolasinac and Matteo Guendouzi were sold to Marseille by current Gunners boss Mikel Arteta. Leading the line is Alexis Sanchez. So, they will be ready to upset Conte’s side in France.
But Spurs have the quality and if they play anywhere near their best, they should avoid defeat and qualify. Of course, Spurs will want to win the match and go through as leaders of the group. But they will have to play to their strengths.
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