LONDON: Tottenham opened a new era without Harry Kane with the minimum essential 2-2 draw in their London derby trip to Brentford. Anything less and new manager Ange Postecoglou would have found himself under heavy pressure when Manchester United come to north London on Saturday.

Brazil striker Richarlison was the man charged with the impossible task of filling Kane’s place at the centre of attack. Richarlsion had done so in several pre-season games when Postecoglou was already planning on how to fill the attacking void left by the England captain’s move to FC Bayern.

Postecoglou has a reputation for rebuilding morale, style and results. Spurs is the biggest job of his career after a pre-season upset by a monsoon in Bangkok and bad publicity from business fraud allegations in New York against club owner Joe Lewis (which he denies).

Hopefully Postecoglou will not allow the club to waste the Kane fee the way Tottenham wasted the £85m earned from selling Gareth Bale to Real Madrid 10 years ago. At least one of the new men wasted no time making his presence felt. England playmaker James Maddison, who cost only £40m from relegated Leicester, provided the assists for both Tottenham’s goals.

The first was headed home by Cristian Romero after 11 minutes. Brentford, despite the absence of top scorer Ivan Toney because of betting-rules suspension, recovered to take the lead within 25 more minutes. Bryan Mbeumo penalty equalised from a penalty for a foul by new Tottenham captain Heung-min Son. Yoane Wissa put them ahead with the help of a deflection off new Spurs defender Micky van de Ven.

The new ‘World Cup timing’ rules saw 11 minutes added on at the end of the first half during which Emerson Royal equalised from another Maddison assist.

Spurs have failed to win on their three visits to Brentford’s comparatively new Gtech Community Stadium but Postecoglou will be just content to have taken a point.

Postecoglou said: “Harry Kane was massive figure for this club for a long time and will continue to be whether he is in the building or not. We wanted to go out and give our fans some hope and belief in the team. I thought we did that today. Our progression of the ball was really good, we just lacked a cutting edge.”

Predictably.

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