Tottenham throw away lead in chaotic 4-2 loss to Man City

Tottenham's Son Heung-min stands in dejection after Manchester City's Riyad Mahrez scores his side's fourth goal during a Premier League match at the Etihad Stadium in Manchester on Thursday. [AP/YONHAP]

For a couple of minutes, and only a couple of minutes, on Thursday night it looked like Tottenham Hotspur might have finally figured out everything that has been going wrong for the club over the last few months.

With minutes to go before the half-time whistle, Spurs hammered in two rapid goals to take a 2-0 lead over Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium on Thursday, seemingly breaking whatever curse caused them to fail to score before the break in all but one of their last 14 games and snapping the malaise that has seen the briefly exciting club descend back into boring draws and embarrassing loses in recent weeks.

Alas, it wasn't to be.

Despite being 2-0 up at half time, Spurs wasted no time falling behind in a series of plays as chaotic as the three-minute Dejan Kulusevski-Junior Emerson rally that capped off the first half.

Julian Alvarez took the score to 2-1 in the 51st minute, only for Erling Haaland to make it 2-2 two minutes later.

But Spurs don't do anything by halves, so it did not come as a particularly big surprise when 10 minutes later Riyad Mahrez made it 3-2, and then, in the 90th minute, added one more for a resounding 4-2 win.

As with most recent Spurs losses, the finger points squarely once again at Hugo Lloris, who returned from the World Cup looking like a Sunday league goalkeeper still struggling with a bad hangover. While the French captain managed to avoid any errors this time, he was caught flat-footed for both of Mahrez's goals.

It was not a good look for the attacking line either. With the obvious exception of Kulusevski there was very little reason to praise the midfield. Ivan Perisic missed what might have been one of the biggest Spurs opportunities of the night, Son Heung-min, with the exception of one header, was barely present and Harry Kane was unable to produce anything significant.

Ryan Sessegnon, Yves Bissouma and Richarlison all performed reasonably well off the bench, but didn't make a significant impact.

Speaking after the game, Tottenham manager Antonio Conte remained characteristically upbeat.

"If I have to compare this game with the game we played last season," Conte said, "I think we played much better today. The performance was good today because we played with personality, we created a lot of problems for Manchester City.

Despite the attempt at a positive spin, Conte conceded that Spurs are allowing far too many goals to be scored.

"If you ask me, compared to last season we are conceding a lot more goals. A lot, a lot. It's not good and to concede four goals in one half, the second half.

"This is the first time in my career that one of my teams has conceded so many goals. We have to continue to work and we have to continue to improve and try to do our best. We are really disappointed for the final result because we could deserve much more in the end."

Spurs will get another shot to turn things around on Monday as they face what should be an easier match against Fulham.

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]