EPL: Stoke City 1-2 Tottenham

Christian Eriksen scores twice

Christian Eriksen's double left Stoke deep in relegation trouble as Tottenham won 2-1 at the bet365 Stadium on Saturday afternoon

The Dane stroked home the opener seven minutes after half-time and his free-kick on 63 minutes proved to be the winner, even though Harry Kane claimed he got the final touch on its way past Jack Butland.

In between those goals, Mame Biram Diouf had equalised for Stoke (57), capitalising on a mistake from Hugo Lloris before stroking into an unguarded net.

 

Tottenham had beaten Stoke by a four-goal margin in each of their last four meetings, but the two sides were evenly matched in a goalless first half punctuated by one golden chance each.

 

In the 12th minute, the unmarked Diouf fired over the bar from the edge of the six-yard box, before Butland did brilliantly to deny Heung-Min Son when clean through midway through the half.

However, the breakthrough came seven minutes into the second period when Mousa Dembele found Dele Alli inside the Stoke area and instead of squaring to Kane he delayed and pulled the ball back for Eriksen to stroke the ball first time into the corner.

 

Stoke were level just five minutes later when Tottenham goalkeeper Lloris, on his 200th Premier League appearance, raced off his line to win the ball just outside the area. However, his attempted clearance was straight at Diouf who bravely closed the ball down before rolling it into an empty net.

But Tottenham's lead was restored six minutes later when Moritz Bauer conceded a needless free-kick and Eriksen's delivery from the left sailed past everybody and into the net - though Kane was adamant he'd got a faint touch on the ball on his return to the starting line-up.

Xherdan Shaqiri went close to levelling when his finely-struck free-kick rattled the bar with 10 minutes remaining, but Stoke could not avoid a fourth straight defeat and time is now running out for them to preserve their Premier League status.