Room to improve - Trips

Kieran Trippier was back with a bang as we toppled Southampton 3-1 at Wembley.

The full-back was involved in all three goals on his return to the line-up having missed last week’s triple-header against Chelsea, Inter and Arsenal.

He took the short corner with Christian Eriksen that led to Harry Kane’s early opener, delivered another corner eventually converted by Lucas Mousa for 2-0 on 51 minutes and then won the ball from Matt Targett, leading to Heung-Min Son converting Harry’s cross for 3-0.

Unfortunately, ‘Trips’ trudged off on 87 minutes feeling pain in his groin but speaking afterwards, Mauricio Pochettino didn’t think it was a serious issue.

“It’s always good to be back,” Kieran told Spurs TV at Wembley. "Nobody wants to be on the sidelines and the lads have done extremely well over the last few games, I’ve been proud of them.

“I’ve just been working hard on the training field to get myself injury free. I’m delighted to be back in the team and to get the three points.

“As a player, you want to play in all the big games but the most important thing is the team. The game (at Arsenal) the other day was disappointing but overall, it’s been a good week. It was an important three points tonight and now we move on.”

There were scares. Hugo Lloris made a fine fingertip save to deny Pierre-Emile Hojberg at 1-0 in the first half and Mauricio felt the team dropped off after going 3-0 up - Southampton created a number of chances before a late consolation from Charlie Austin.

Nevertheless, it was all about three points - and the victory lifted us back into third place in the Premier League with Chelsea’s loss at Wolves and Arsenal drawing at United.

Kieran added: “I thought we dominated in the first half but a lot of credit to Southampton, they were 3-0 down but they still tried to play and had a few opportunities.

“Hugo pulled off one magnificent save. It was an unbelievable save and he does that on a weekly basis. He’s one of the best goalkeepers in the world in my view.

"It was one of those games where we needed to stay in control and take the three points, that was the most important thing. In the first half, I thought we did really well but there are a lot of things we can still work on and improve on.”