Tottenham Reaction: Another point closer to safety

Despite a soft Tottenham goal after just five minutes - the first goal conceeded by the Latics in six home games - Bruce's side rallied and equalised through Emile Heskey.

The goal was Heskey's second in a week after his volley at Stamford Bridge and the England forward has been in good form of late.

Fly Wilson: Palacios Challenges Huddlestone

It is likely that there will be more fight on display in the battle with Reading, but both sides played fluent attacking football in a game that offered plenty of action for the neutral supporter and as Bruce put it, a draw probably was a fair result.

Here is the reaction of the two managers.

Steve Bruce

Bolton's result has given them a lifeline but the position is that we have gone up two places so it is in our hands to beat Reading next week and if we beat them then we are safe. We couldn't ask for anything better than that really with three games left to play.

I was pleased with a point because I thought Tottenham, particularly in the first half hour and Berbatov in particular was excellent and it just shows what a good player he is because he can still play on a bad pitch. He caused us all sorts of problems. Spurs were very, very good especially in the forward areas.

We changed things a little bit in the second half and [Marcus] Bent was a couple of inches away from giving us a winning goal. It was a wonderful pass from Palacios and he took it well, then you are thinking hit the target, but unfortunately it was a fine margin.

Marcus [Bent] has a cut and we think he will be alright and Emile [Heskey] has got a slight hamstring strain and we think he will be OK too. We hope they will be fine next week.

Juande Ramos

Overall a point isn't a bad result for us. We came here to win, we had opportunities to do that but when the scores were levelled it took away some of the initiative we had in the first part of the game. That goal took the wind out of our sails.

We started well. It was a good style of play, we had a good pace to our game and we created chances. However, as I said, when they equalised it balanced things out between the two teams.

In the second half admittedly we were slightly weaker and at the end of the day a draw is perhaps a fair result. I think we were fairly equal over the course of the match.

Wigan are a physically imposing team and they earn and deserve great respect for the performances they've put in at home.

The Table

Latest match Saturday, 19th April 2008		Pld		Home						Away						Overall						Pts	GD
				W	D	L	F	A		W	D	L	F	A		W	D	L	F	A
1	Manchester United	34		16	1	1	43	6		9	4	3	29	12		25	5	4	72	18		80	+54
2	Chelsea	35		11	6	0	33	11		12	3	3	27	13		23	9	3	60	24		78	+36
3	Arsenal	35		13	5	0	36	11		8	6	3	30	18		21	11	3	66	29		74	+37
4	Liverpool	35		11	6	1	42	13		8	6	3	20	13		19	12	4	62	26		69	+36
5	Everton	35		10	3	4	29	14		8	4	6	21	15		18	7	10	50	29		61	+21
6	Portsmouth	34		7	8	2	24	12		9	1	7	23	21		16	9	9	47	33		57	+14
7	Aston Villa	34		9	3	5	29	19		6	7	4	33	25		15	10	9	62	44		55	+18
8	Manchester City	34		10	4	3	23	16		4	6	7	16	24		14	10	10	39	40		52	-1
9	Blackburn Rovers	34		7	6	4	22	17		6	6	5	22	25		13	12	9	44	42		51	+2
10	West Ham United	35		7	5	5	20	20		6	3	9	17	22		13	8	14	37	42		47	-5
11	Tottenham Hotspur	35		8	4	5	45	31		2	8	8	19	27		10	12	13	64	58		42	+6
12	Newcastle United	34		7	5	5	23	24		3	4	10	17	34		10	9	15	40	58		39	-18
13	Wigan Athletic	35		8	4	5	21	15		1	5	12	11	34		9	9	17	32	49		36	-17
14	Middlesbrough	35		5	5	7	17	22		3	7	8	14	27		8	12	15	31	49		36	-18
15	Sunderland	34		8	3	6	20	18		2	3	12	13	34		10	6	18	33	52		36	-19
16	Bolton Wanderers	35		6	5	7	21	18		2	3	12	11	34		8	8	19	32	52		32	-20
17	Reading	35		8	2	8	19	24		1	3	13	18	41		9	5	21	37	65		32	-28
18	Birmingham City	34		5	7	5	24	20		2	3	12	15	32		7	10	17	39	52		31	-13
19	Fulham	35		4	5	9	20	31		1	7	9	12	27		5	12	18	32	58		27	-26
20	[R] Derby County	35		1	5	11	10	33		0	3	15	7	43		1	8	26	17	76		11	-59

Next Up

Next for the Latics is the crucial visit of Reading next Saturday. A win would ensure the Latics' Premiership status for another year.

How ironic that such a game comes against the same side who were defeated in the final game of the Promotion season as the Latics earned their Premiership status back in May 2005.