Tottenham boss Villas-Boas happy with 'clinical' Defoe

9 Nov 2012 00:45:00

Spurs' manager was full of compliments for his team but the striker in particular after his hat-trick pushed him past Teddy Sheringham in the club's all-time scorers list

Tottenham boss Andre Villas-Boas was delighted with his attacking force after the 3-1 win over Maribor in the Europa League.

The manager saw his side produce a dominant display to take them two points behind Group J leaders Lazio, with Jermain Defoe overtaking Spurs legend Teddy Sheringham in the all-time scoring charts.

The manager praised both Defoe and Gareth Bale, after the pair combined for two of Spurs' three goals.

"He [Defoe] makes the most of the opportunities that he gets and Gareth [Bale] was amazing in his creation of the chances for him," Villas-Boas told Tottenham's official Twitter account.


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"When you have so much quality, you will always get opportunities to score, and Jermain is a clinical striker.

"It's also good for him to overtake Teddy Sheringham, it means a lot to him."

The Portuguese also was pleased with the character his side showed as they went into the interval at 1-1 thanks to an ill-advised back-pass from Kyle Naughton and a mistake from French goalkeeper Hugo Lloris.

"I thought we were brilliant from the beginning," he added. "The possession and attacking football was great to see. It was good to see the desire of the players to come back from 1-1.

"The way we kept the ball was fantastic. When we play like that we deserve good things."

Despite the success, Villas-Boas has said he will decide his formation on a game by game basis, and with Manchester City coming up for Spurs at the weekend, the manager refused to say whether he would stick with the 4-4-2 formation for the clash against the Premier League champions.

"We can create a lot of opportunities when we play with one striker too," he added.

"We've done well in the past with both formations. We go four steps up in the level of competition at the weekend so that will be a different type of game and scenario.

"So we'll regather the boys and then we'll start to focus on that game."