Emmanuel Adebayor struck a brace as Tottenham thumped relegation-threatened Sunderland 5-1 in the English Premier League to ease the pressure on manager Tim Sherwood.
Reports ahead of the Monday night game at White Hart Lane suggested Sherwood would be sacked as Spurs manager in the summer, with Louis Van Gaal seemingly the leading candidate to take over.
The only way to silence those reports, at least for the present moment, was to pick up an impressive win over Sunderland, and Tottenham did just that, coming from a goal down to press the cruise mode button courtesy four second half goals.
Lee Cattermole opened the scoring for Sunderland in the 17th minute, latching onto a calamitous pass from Tottenham defender Vlad Chiriches to slot in past goalkeeper Hugo Lloris. However, that was pretty much Sunderland's only bright spot of the night, as Spurs equalised via Adebayor in the 28th minute, with the excellent Christian Eriksen providing the assist.
Eriksen was the creator yet again, as Harry Kane struck his first Premier League goal just before the hour mark to put Spurs in front for the first time. There was no looking back for the home side after that as Eriksen, in the 78th minute, Adebayor, four minutes from time, and Gylfi Sigurdsson, in the second minute of stoppage time, scored to fashion a handsome victory.
"I can't comment on anything on my employment, you will have to ask my employer about that," Sherwood told Sky Sports after the win. "As far as I'm concerned, I set the team out well tonight, we outplayed Sunderland. We knew it would be a tough game, because they have got their threats, and we've done the job well tonight.
"We've got five games left and we think we can win all five games. We don't know where that might take us. "All I was focused on was winning the game tonight, preparing the boys correctly. You've just got to be professional.
"It's been an opportunity to manage this great club and I'm relishing it. My record has been very good. In the Premier League, any manager who has been here, I think my win percentage is higher than any of them."
Tottenham are five points behind faltering Arsenal, who are still clinging onto the fourth and final Champions League place. At the other end of the table, Sunderland, courtesy yet another loss, are rock bottom with 25 points from 31 games, seven adrift of safety, albeit with two games in hand.
Sunderland manager Gus Poyet admitted his team would now need a "miracle" to stave off relegation and keep their place in the Premier League. "We need a miracle, probably," he said. "We need something very unique. If not, it's going to be practically impossible."
