The Premier League has deleted a social media post it made which appeared to mock Tottenham Hotspur.
Following Spurs’ 2-1 defeat at Fulham on Sunday, the league’s X account saw fit to post a video of goalkeeper Vicario launching a free-kick out of play with the captions ‘Just how the play was drawn up’ and ‘An interesting free-kick from Vicario’, accompanied by a crying laughing emoji.
Users were quick to criticise the competition, pointing out that taking the mickey out of one of its own clubs was not the greatest look.
Daily Mail Sport understands officials at Tottenham, who are currently locked in a relegation battle, also raised eyebrows and made their feelings known to league bosses.
A widespread view was that while Spurs accept they are open to criticism thanks to what has been a deeply disappointing season, it did have a right not to expect such ‘banter’ from the league it competes in.
The Premier League’s now-deleted tweet which mocked Tottenham Hotspur’s free-kick
The Premier League’s account, seen as the mouthpiece of the competition, has 44.9m followers and the post was viewed hundreds of thousands of times.
While the competition is yet to respond to a request for comment, the post was deleted on Monday morning.
The mockery is an additional unwanted distraction for Tottenham, who sit four points outside the Premier League’s bottom three after Sunday’s defeat by Fulham made it four losses on the spin.
Furious Igor Tudor branded Raul Jimenez a ‘cheat’ and ripped into his flops after they extended a winless run to 10 Premier League games.
‘It’s a complicated situation, a lot of problems,’ fumed Tudor. ‘We need to find the voices inside each of us. We need more personality. We need more will to react.
‘So, an amazing situation. Amazing.’
Tottenham goalkeeper Vicario’s free-kick was launched out of play in the loss at Fulham
Tudor, who replaced Thomas Frank last month, defended his decision to alter his tactical shape from the back three he deployed in his first game against Arsenal to the 4-4-2 at Fulham.
‘It’s not about system,’ said the 47-year-old Croatian. ‘The system is not important at this moment. The last thing that is important is the system.’
Tudor agreed Fulham were the better team, especially in the first half, and deserved to win.
‘It’s very difficult to understand because you have the quality,’ he added. ‘But also football is a sport of running and duels. I have a sensation that Fulham players (are) always running and even with the brain. They arrive before us, they predict and we are always late on everything.’
