Tottenham 1 Crystal Palace 3: Ten-man Spurs just one point off relegation after humiliating loss in empty stadium

IT doesn’t get any better for Tottenham. It only gets worse. Far, far worse.

A crisis club locked in a death spiral, plunging through the abyss towards the rocks below.

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Hope disappearing even quicker than any faith that Igor Tudor, or anybody else, can turn this utter mess around and save them from the ultimate humiliation.

Indeed, as Spurs pushed the self-destruct button over and over again, Micky van der Ven’s red card madness sparking a collapse and leading to a mass walk-out at half time, it seems hard to believe Tudor’s three-week tenure will last until the international break.

That is how bad it is. Tottenham remain, for now, just above the drop zone. Not for long.

Even when VAR came to their rescue, Ismaila Sarr’s nose and eyes ruled offside three minutes before Dominic Solanke briefly put them ahead, it was just a sick joke of a false dawn.

By the half-time whistle, they were a man short – with Van de Ven suicidally sent off – and already 3-1 down, doomed to yet another defeat.

Two from Sarr, including the spot-kick from Van de Ven’s needless foul on him, and one from Jorgen Strand Larsen tore what remained of the heart out of this sad sick note of a side.

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With furious fans turning on the club’s ANALYSTS – the problems run much deeper than that – as they streamed away early, that sense of doom was even more palpable. There seems no way back, no reason to believe.

Not with four points from the last 11 games or unless something remarkable happens, which requires, surely, a THIRD manager of this year alone.

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Tudor rose without trace. And is now sinking even faster.

For Palace boss Oliver Glasner, hit by a driving ban for speeding earlier in the day, these were the most welcome three points he has clocked up all season. The easiest, too.

In truth, it was no surprise. This always felt like the 90 minutes that would define the rest of the season.

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And Spurs, nervous as kittens, were lucky that they were not down and out before they had touched the ball in anger.

Inside 50 seconds, Guglielmo Vicario threw himself to his right to parry Adam Wharton’s bouncing effort, after his defence had failed to deal with Chris Richards’ long throw.

What followed was half an hour of turgid football by both teams – apart from a shocking foul by new boy Souza that crocked Daniel Munoz and a Mathys Tel shot at Dean Hendwerson – before all kinds of carnage.

First of all, Palace thought they had gone in front when Sarr, found by Evann Guessand, saw his shot deflect off Pedro Porro and loop past the stranded Vicario.

Time stood still as the VAR check went on, before Stockley Park told Andy Madley the scorer’s FACE was ahead of the ball. Glasner’s disbelieving reaction told its own story.

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Almost instantly, Spurs celebrated the escape by going in front.

Archie Gray, the one player who gets it, seemed to be going nowhere on the right of the box but somehow wriggled his way past three Palace shirts, including Richards, before pulling back for Solanke to stab home from five yards out.

Yet Van de Ven’s stupidity, yanking Sarr back when Strand Larsen’s header was going to run through to Vicario, brought the double punishment.

Sarr’s penalty was rolled home before the Dutchman had reached the dressing room, with Tudor sending on Conor Gallagher and Yves Bissouma for Brazilian rookie Souza and Randal Kolo Muani.

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Spurs could not even stay on terms until the interval.

Guessand picked Pape Matar Sarr’s pocket outside the home box, with Strand Larsen smashing through Vicario’s legs after Wharton’s weighted pass played him in.

And when Vicario, Pedro Porro and Joao Palhinha all looked at each other as Sarr poked another Wharton pass into the net in the eighth minute of added time, it summed up the season.

The masses of grey seats in every corner of the ground for the second period were a further sign that the fans are starting to accept the inevitable, even with nine games to go.

It did not matter that Spurs were better after the break.

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Gray in particular did not give up the ghost. His spirit is stronger than most of the senior players around him, while Solanke, too, kept going, forcing a foot save out of Dean Henderson.

Yet it was not going to actually change anything and the longer it went on, the more likely that Palace, with their fans tormenting the home supporters, would twist the knife even further.

Indeed, the biggest cheer of the half came when ex-Tottenham star Brennan Johnson, the hero of the Europa League Final in Bilbao nine months ago, came on for his new side as he donned a Palace shirt.

The game was long gone. Everyone knew it.

It feels like Spurs are long gone, too. They need a miracle worker. And they’re in short supply.

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