Tottenham defender Micky van de Ven was ridiculed on social media after two gaffes in quick succession led to goals against Newcastle
The Dutchman won plenty of praise for his impressive debut season at Tottenham, but endured a nightmare first half for him at St James’ Park
Van de Ven, caught in Newcastle’s opening goal, slipped on Alexander Isak’s turn and the Swedish striker took the lead in the 30th minute
Newcastle doubled their lead in similar fashion two minutes later when Van de Ven went down again and Anthony Gordon scored his second goal to secure a 2-0 lead at half-time
Rivals fans took to social media to share their thoughts on Van de Ven’s tough first half at St James’ Park
A number of memes have been posted about the Dutchman’s gaffes, including a reference to Steven Gerrard’s infamous gaffe during the Liverpool-Chelsea game
Rio Ferdinand, who described Van de Ven as a Rolls Royce before the match, admitted the defender had a forgettable half
The former Manchester United centre-back stressed that in both cases the defenders were unable to slow down, leading to the fall
We talked about how good he’s been this season, but today is that’s a 45 minutes to forget,’ Ferdinand said.
‘It is a great bit of skill from your Isak but you’ve got to slow your feet down to defend.
‘If you don’t slow your feet down you can’t then change direction this happens here.
‘He doesn’t change he’s able to change direction because he came across too quick didn’t slow himself down and in the end was put on his bum.’
Tottenham defender Micky van de Ven was so angry after dropping points in the race for the top four he was rendered speechless in the dressing room after the draw with Everton.
Spurs conceded an equaliser to Jarrad Branthwaite’s header in the fourth minute of added time as their game at Goodison Park finished 2-2, despite twice being ahead through Richarlison’s double which took his tally to nine in his last eight games.
Three points would, at the time, have lifted them level on points with second-placed Manchester City and north London rivals Arsenal but they missed the opportunity and Aston Villa’s trouncing of Sheffield United later in the day meant there is now a two-point gap to fourth place.
Asked what he did when he got back to the dressing room, Van de Ven said: “I was just mad, I don’t talk. We had a chance to kill the game at the end but we didn’t do it. It really hurts.
“Of course with more points we could have put pressure on the top but we didn’t do that so that’s really disappointing – but next week there is another game to fix it.”
Tottenham – particularly goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario – struggled to deal with Everton’s set-pieces and that was their downfall.
“We knew Everton were really good at set-pieces and they scored two goals from them so it’s not good for us,” added Van de Ven.
“We can do better and next time we have to fix it so they don’t score.
“It was a physical game. We know they play like more ‘fight’ football – long balls, fight, headers, second ball.
“It was a tough game and in the first half we were struggling a bit but in the second half we played quite well.”
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