How to ruin young player – Tudor subbed his goalkeeper after 17 minutes in another nightmare
Reading Time: 3min | Wed. 11.03.26. | 10:50
Croatian coach is destroying everything around him — Tottenham hit rock bottom: a 5–2 defeat to Atletico, topped off by a scandalous goalkeeper substitution in the 17th minute
Since taking charge of Tottenham, it’s fair to ask whether Igor Tudor has done even a single good thing in North London. The Croatian coach decided to start Antonin Kinsky in goal instead of Guglielmo Vicario in the first leg of the Champions League round of 16 against Atletico Madrid in Madrid (5–2). Italian goalkeeper may be in very poor form, but the decision to throw the most talented Czech goalkeeper into the fire seriously backfired.
Fourteen months ago, Tottenham paid Slavia Prague €16.5 million for Kinsky, considered the most promising Czech goalkeeper. The young shot-stopper failed to establish himself, and before last night’s match he had played only 12 games for Spurs’ first team.
The visit to the Metropolitano could have been a turning point — the night when the 22-year-old secured the status of first-choice goalkeeper. Instead, it may turn into a night of nightmares — hopefully not a depressive episode.
We can’t claim this with absolute certainty given the limited sample size, but what Kinsky produced last night could easily go down as one of the worst performances in Champions League history.
After just 16 minutes, he had already picked the ball out of the net three times. The first and third goals were direct gifts from Kinsky’s mistakes. The third was even more comical than the first, as he practically handed the ball to Julian Alvarez, allowing him to walk it into the net. Kinsky had five touches of the ball — two ended in disaster.
Captain Cristian Romero reacted immediately, approaching Tudor and telling him to substitute Kinsky. It turned out that the Croatian coach had sent onto the pitch a player who was not psychologically ready for the opportunity of a lifetime.
Tudor admitted his mistake by taking the Czech goalkeeper off in the 17th minute and bringing on Vicario. To make the moment even more painful for football fans, Kinsky left the field in tears.
It seemed that Romero had approached the Croatian coach and told him to take the goalkeeper off, but after the match Tottenham’s manager said it was his own decision.
“Kinsky was disappointed. The team is with him, and so am I. I spoke with him. He understands the moment and understands why he had to come off. He is a very good goalkeeper. It’s never about one player, it’s about the team,” Tudor explained.
However, he does not believe it was a mistake to start Kinsky.
“When you see what happened, of course now it looks like the wrong decision. But for me it was the right decision at the time. It was the right moment to make the change because it’s a different competition. It’s not easy to change a goalkeeper after 20 minutes, but it happened. There’s no need to comment too much. It was a strange match. We gifted them three goals. Three situations that destroyed us — very strange and unusual. We had a chance for 4–2, then conceded another goal. We apologize to the fans, this is a difficult moment. It feels like everything is going against us,” the Croatian coach said at the press conference.
UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE - ROUND OF 16
Tuesday
Galatasaray - Liverpool 1-0 (1-0)
/Lemina 7/
Atalanta - Bayern Munich 1-6 (0-3)
/Pasalic 90+3 - Stanisic 12, Olise 22, 64, Gnabry 25, Jackson 52, Musiala 67/
Atletico Madrid - Tottenham 5-2 (4-1)
/Llorente 6, Griezmann 14, Alvarez 15, 55, Le Normand 22 - Porro 26, Solanke 76/
Newcastle - Barcelona 1-1 (0-0)
/Barnes 86 - Yamal 90+6 pen/
Wednesday
20.45: (5.65) Leverkusen (4.30) Arsenal (1.62)
23.00: (2.60) Bodo (3.80) Sporting (2.65)
23.00: (2.00) PSG (3.60) Chelsea (4.00)
23.00: (3.50) Real Madrid (3.90) Man.City (2.05)
***odds are subject to change***