Jose Mourinho offers explanation as to why Matt Doherty wasn’t at his best

An opening weekend loss for Spurs.

Jose Mourinho has given his take on the debut of his new signing Matt Doherty after he saw his side fall to a 1-0 defeat at home to Everton.

The Republic of Ireland international secured a move to London this summer after signing from Wolves and Mourinho handed the Dubliner a start on the opening weekend of the Premier League season.

Doherty was solid but not spectacular on his first Premier League game with his new club. He almost opened the scoring before half-time after playing a lovely one-two with Harry Kane.

Jose Mourinho: “He was not Matt Doherty like he normally is.”

Mourinho was quizzed on his new signing after his side’s loss. The Portuguese manager provided an explanation for Doherty’s subdued display.

“The players who didn’t have pre-season, we don’t have now the possibility to give them a pre-season but we have a lot of matches now to play consecutively,” Mourinho said.

“We have to use these matches, not just to win them and the knockout ones are obviously decisive ones with everything decided in 120 minutes or even penalties, and try to use this to improve the form of some players because some of them were really in trouble.

“You can look to Doherty, a player who is normally in incredible condition. He didn’t have pre-season. He went direct from holidays to national team matches. No pre-season at all. Direct and not one single training session, direct from holidays to national team. He played two consecutive matches and today he was not Matt Doherty like he normally is.

“So these are the things that we knew could happen to us.”

Spurs will be back in action very soon. Mourinho’s side take on Lokomotiv Piodiv in the Europa League on Thursday. After this, they travel to St Mary’s to take on Southampton in the Premier League on Sunday.

Read More About: everton, jose mourinho, matt doherty, Premier League, tottenham hotspur

Author: Sean McMahon

Sean is Deputy Editor and head rugby writer. You can contact him by email seanmc@punditarena.com or on Twitter View all posts by Sean McMahon