A strange sort of season for Spurs came to a subdued end at Liverpool. After the first eight games of the campaign, the fans might have looked ahead to this fixture and imagined the possibility of needing to win it to stave off relegation. The arrival of Harry Redknapp, his reinvigoration of the team, and his signings in the January transfer window ensured that that scenario did not come to pass.

And yet this was a game that did need to be won, if Spurs were to cap a marvelous turnaround in their fortunes with qualification for the Europa League. Admittedly Anfield has not been a happy hunting ground for the club, but even so, the match was played out - on Spurs' part at least - as if it were meaningless. Even the manager described it afterwards as "a typical end of season game".

The most glaring illustration of this was the behavior of Robbie Keane, after he had beaten Pepe Reina to bring the score back to 2-1. With 15 minutes left and with European qualification rivals Fulham losing at home to Everton, Keane turned away as if he had scored the most inconsequential consolation goal imaginable. On the face of it - and on the performance of the team overall on the day - two more Spurs goals were not very likely. But they were also not impossible. Keane may be renowned for not celebrating goals against former clubs, but this was placing his own ego or image - whatever he wants to call it - ahead of the interests of the club. At 2-1, the captain of the team should be encouraging his teammates to push on, not strolling back to the centre circle with a face like an 8 year old who didn't get the Wii he wanted for Christmas.

Partly as a result of injuries both before and during the game, several players who have not featured much under Harry Redknapp were given an opportunity to show what they could do - and none of them took it. Bale at least worked hard. Pavlyuchenko looked uninterested when he came on for Defoe, adding fuel to the rumors that he will be sold in the summer. As far as David Bentley is concerned, his gutless display will make no difference to his future at the club, since Redknapp has already implied that his perennially unused substitute does not have one:

"David's going to look at it and think 'hang on, I'm not getting in the team even when Aaron Lennon's not fit. Maybe it is time I moved on'. "

If Bentley and Pavlyuchenko go, perhaps along with Bent and Zokora, the manager will have raised at least part of the funds required to bring in the "two or three" players he believes he needs to mount a challenge on the top six. Or maybe the top four - he never seems quite sure which is the realistic objective. One thing he can be sure of is that none of the aforementioned players will sell for anything like the money that was paid for them. The emphatic nature of Liverpool's victory suggests that Harry will need to deal skillfully during the summer if the Spurs' fans are to experience the success they crave and deserve.