Bale’s injury ends bad night for Tottenham against Basle

Drama has come as standard in Tottenham Hotspur’s Europa League adventure. From Mousa Dembele’s last-gasp winning goal in Lyon to the fraught extra-time passage against Internazionale, Andre Villas-Boas’s team has played fast and loose with its future.

Gareth Bale was taken off on a stretcher after a collision with a Basel player in stoppage time as Spurs finished with nine men. They remain alive at the halfway point of this quarter-final, after another adrenaline-fuelled tie, but when they reflect, they will know that the die should already have been cast.

On a night when Basel thrilled in the freezing temperatures, Tottenham were second-best for long spells. They were forced to recover from two goals down, which they did with commendable spirit, although Basel could well have been 4-0 in front before Emmanuel Adebayor initiated the fightback, which would have been rather more difficult to recover.

The deflected shot by the substitute Gylfi Sigurdsson drew Tottenham level but thereafter, Basle remained the more threatening team. They spurned a further clutch of presentable chances, with the outstanding Mohamed Salah blowing a gilt-edged one-on-one with Brad Friedel and it was debatable who was the happier to hear the full-time whistle.

Tottenham have to hope that Basel have missed their big opportunity, although on this evidence, the return leg next Thursday promises to be the club's toughest test so far.

Winning mentality
The feeling, possibly fuelled by English arrogance, was that Tottenham should be beating Basel. It overlooked the manner in which the Swiss champions had brought Manchester United to their knees at last season's Champions League group stage, not to mention their European pedigree, motivation and winning mentality.

They arrived in London having not tasted a meaningful defeat since November, with the second-leg loss to Zenit St Petersburg in the previous round of this competition not hurting them.

Tottenham had the big names, with even Villas-Boas admitting that his players were “superior”, but Basel called the tune at the outset and their first-half goals were hardly bolts from the blue. The last time that Tottenham faced Swiss opposition was in the Champions League play-off against Young Boys in 2010, when they conceded three times in the early running. The deja vu was uncomfortable as Tottenham’s defensive work was again inadequate.

Fabian Schar should not have been allowed to pick his way through on the half hour to find Mohamed Salah and when he crossed the alarm bells rang. Marco Streller turned beautifully and he worked a shot against the post but Valentin Stocker followed up to swell the empty net. Worse for Tottenham would follow when Jan Vertonghen's attempted clearing header from a corner located only Fabian Frei and his firm header beat Brad Friedel.

Drifted just wide
Basel might have scored a third in the 36th minute when Stocker cut through the Tottenham backline as though it did not exist and, confronted by Friedel, his dinked effort drifted just wide. Tottenham flickered through Gareth Bale and Kyle Naughton in the first half and they desperately needed a response to Frei's header. But it came when Bale's shot deflected and after Emmanuel Adebayor had missed his first bite, Scott Parker chased and returned a cross that deflected again and Adebayor profited from close-range.

Tottenham clawed themselves level as the action swung from end to end. After Naughton had forced Yann Sommer into a flying save, Sigurdsson cut inside from the left and tried his luck. His fizzing drive deflected off Schar to lop in under the crossbar.