​If Glenn Hoddle is the saviour of English football - Cymru Am Byth. For Osvaldo Ardiles demonstrated at White Hart Lane on Saturday just how much England still have to learn.

Ardiles was unable to prevent Aston Villa running out deserved 2-1 winners but still totally outclassed everyone else on the pitch.

Tottenham's little Argentinian midfield player kept his best work until the closing stages perhaps the only flaw in an otherwise marvellous performance and then found that his colleagues were not sharp enough to take advantage of the openings he created.

With Hoddle, Lee, Jones and Ricky Villa way below their best, Ardiles and Pratt provided most of Spurs forward inspiration but until the last 15 minutes or so it was seldom enough to trouble unduly Villa's central defenders McNaught and Ormsby.

McNaught carried on exactly where he left off last week with another solid display and with Ormsby, deputising for the suspended Evans, his usual efficient self, Lee and Jones were given very Little in the way of time and space.

Bullivant, in for Mortimer, looked decidedly useful but without their skipper to prompt and cajole, Villa's midfield, excellent though it was in destroying, offered only occasional bursts of constructive play.

Mixed feelings

Striker Geddis will have very mixed feelings about the game that saw him end his goal famine. Geddis put Villa ahead in the 22nd minute with a crisp, risIng shot after Little and Shaw had set up the chance.

It was his first goal for the club since his £300,000 transfer from Ipswich 15 matches ago but his obvious relief, and that of his team mates, turned sour 12 minutes before the final whistle when he had to be carried from the pitch with knee and ankle injuries.

Villa, a yard quicker to the ball than Spurs throughout a game played at a too frantic pace went two goals clear after 56 minutes when Cowans converted a penalty awarded for a rugby tackle by Dairies on Little.

They should have increased this lead long before that but some indifferent finishing let them down and, in fact, Spurs would have equalised in the 46th minute had it not been for a spectacular save by Rimmer as McNaught and Gibson watched Lee race on to a Pratt centre.

Ardiles - who else - pulled a goal back for Spurs after 72 minutes and the remainder of the game Villa lived as dangerously as a fly in a spider's web. A combination of Rimmer, defensive bodies, goal posts and crossbar helped them to hold on to the two points and leave them with only one defeat in nine away matches.

An impressive record that Spurs manager Keith Burkinshaw acknowledged when he said: "No team has succeeded in closing us down the way Villa did. They just did not let us play. They are the best side to come here this season." Just wait until Liverpool hit town, Keith.