Laptop's Champions League preview: If Spurs go out and play against Milan then anything is possible

By Martin Lipton in Laptop with Martin Lipton

Published 10:59 15/02/11

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I'm not too sure - in fact I'd be willing to bet against it - that when Andrew Marvell wrote his Horatian Ode to Oliver Cromwell he thought it might ever apply to a football team.

Yet as Spurs run out in the San Siro tonight, Harry Redknapp's men know they really have to be true to their principles despite the key absentees that make doing so much harder.

Justifying Cromwell's aggressive pursuit of his war in Ireland, soon after usurping Charles I and naming himself Lord Protector, Marvell suggested: " The same arts that did gain/ A power, must it maintain."

And for Spurs, this evening, that is the guiding concept.

Redknapp side entered the Champions League as rookies, handed what looked like a tough baptism and expected to be scrapping for second spot behind holders Inter.

When they trailed 4-0 at half-time in the same San Siro in October, even that second place looked as if it might be a forlorn hope.

Tottenham were wide open and taken to the cleaners, with the half-time whistle a blessed relief and even Redknapp admitting he feared abject humiliation.

But something remarkable followed and while Gareth Bale's hat-trick did not salvage the match, it gave Spurs a genuine belief in their attacking prowess that stunned everybody.

Since that moment of desperation, Redknapp's side have scored 12 goals in three and a half European games, destroying Inter at White Hart Lane, laying waste to Werder Bremen, doing enough in Holland to clinch top spot and the advantage of playing the second leg of this tie in N17.

What matters now, above all, is that they ensure by the time Milan trot out at the Lane next month, it is with a sense of trepidation, not utter confidence.

And the best way of achieving that is by doing what they have done so far. Going for it. Playing the way that Tottenham know best.

As Redknapp accepts, if he asks his team to go and defend, it would be an accident waiting to happen.

Admittedly, a midfield including Steven Pienaar - or possibly Brazilian Sandro - and Niko Kranjcar does not carry the same threat as one with Bale and Luka Modric in the team.

But the basic principles have to remain, as Redknapp readily accepted.

"We have not got the players to come here and shut up shop," said the Spurs boss. "We are not set up to come here stick five defensive midfielders across the middle of the park because we haven't got them.

"Gareth and Luka are big losses to us but I can't suddenly ask Aaron Lennon to do a defensive job in a 4-4-2 or 4-5-1 because it's not in his nature, no more than it's in Niko Kranjcar's.

"I don't want to take people's strengths away from them. If I'm going to get the best out of people, they've got to play their natural game."

Redknapp could not be more right. He knows, too, that Milan, while staggeringly more experienced at this level - Dutch veteran Clarence Seedorf has won four winners' medals with three different clubs, and also played for Inter - are older and more vulnerable to pace.

Milan coach Massimiliano Allegri has been warned by club boss Adriano Galliani that elimination at the last 16 stage again - as happened against Arsenal in 2008 and Manchester United last term - is not acceptable.

That has cranked up the pressure on the Serie A leaders, aware that Spurs are not the sort of side who will play for damage limitation.

Allegri, pressed on the recent record of failure at the hands of the Premier League elite, only answered: "The numbers are there - but we have to prove they are wrong.

"We are going to play against a big team. We are well matched and  need to play with high intensity. The objective is not to concede.

"Tottenham have very high potential and are an aggressive team. We need to be very careful and have all of our attention from the start. Playing at home in the first leg means it is important we do not compromise the whole tie."

Milan are the favourites. After all, they are Serie A leaders, have won the Cup with the Big Ears seven times.

Yet they are worried about Spurs, even without Bale and Modric.

Tottenham's job is to make them be even more hesitant, to look to hit the home side hard at every opportunity, to create chances and take at least one of them.

Most important of all, they must not be cowed by the situation, must not retreat in a desperate effort to keep Milan at bay.

The same arts that did gain this power are the ones that will maintain it. Go out and play - and anything is possible.

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