AVB: The Man To Make Tottenham Title Contenders; Or The Reason They’ll Drift Away Again?

Tottenham Hotspur sit 4^th in the Premier League, a position that all involved with the club would gratefully occupy when this season draws to a close.  They have conceded only five goals in their 10 league games played to date, and were widely lauded for a summer recruitment drive which saw Gareth Bale replaced with a series of high quality performers.

When the Argentine attacker Erik Lamela signed at White Hart Lane for a £30m fee, it marked the third occasion during the most recent window that the club had broken their transfer record – following the previous captures of Paulinho and Roberto Soldado.

On the same day that Lamela arrived, Spurs applied the garnish to what seemed a wonderful period of trading by persuading the sublime Danish playmaker, Christian Eriksen, to move to north London from Ajax.

All was set fair, then, for a tilt at the Champions League place that has agonisingly eluded Tottenham since their flirtation with the competition under Harry Redknapp three years ago.  Some sights, perhaps reasonably in light of the roster of players now available to the manager Andre Villas-Boas, and the state of flux which currently exists at other contenders, shifted towards the main prize itself – the Premier League title.

There has been no shortage of consistency at the Lilywhites in recent years.  The past eight campaigns have included four fifth placed finishes.  In 2010 and 2012 Spurs grabbed the lucrative 4^th spot – albeit, the latter of those accomplishments proved futile in terms of entering Europe’s prime tournament after Chelsea’s wondrous final victory over Bayern Munich.

The renewed positivity subsequent to their latest near-miss, – losing out on 4^th to Arsenal by a solitary point last time round – gave rise to optimism that the familiar late season anxiety experienced as Tottenham scrap to join the elite can be avoided this time out.

Early results backed up that confidence.  Setting aside the disappointment of losing to an Olivier Giroud strike at Arsenal, Crystal Palace, Swansea City, and Cardiff City were all defeated by a single goal.

If those victories were all rather prosaic in style, an authoritative 2-0 beating of Norwich City which contained some wonderfully fluid passages of play, and a 4-0 win at Aston Villa in the League Cup were interpreted as indicators that the new Spurs unit was on the cusp of gelling into something quite special.

The promise that was apparent in those two games, though, is yet to develop into anything tangible.  Indeed, a group of players that plenty of discerning judges anticipated would be full of guile and goals is, as yet, anything but.  And it is costing their team already.

That Tottenham have accrued 20 points out of 10 matches in which they have hit the net on a mere nine occasions is a remarkable feat, but one based predominantly on a terrifically drilled rear-guard, and the diligent work of whichever two players are stationed in front of them.

Nevertheless, it is quite conceivable that Villas-Boas will come to regret his inherent caution.  Unable to capitalise to the tune of more than a lone breakthrough during a swashbuckling start when playing Chelsea, Spurs ended that game with only one point.

Swathes of chances went begging in the league fixture at Aston Villa before a 2-0 win was secured.  Two weeks earlier, the story was very different.  An absence of any craft in a home fixture against West Ham United was punished in the most emphatic fashion imaginable when the visitors ran out 3-0 victors.

It was exactly the type of afternoon for which Tottenham have paid the heaviest of prices during the past two campaigns.  Right now, Arsenal, if not a certainty to maintain their present form through until May are showing plenty to suggest that they have far more staying power than Arsene Wenger’s latter models.

Chelsea and Manchester City will surely enter lengthy spells of relentless point gathering.  Manchester United, despite suffering by their standards a stodgy start, are three points behind Villas-Boas’ side, while Liverpool, Everton, and Southampton have laid the foundations for their own cracks at the European spots.

Never mind a nervy conclusion to the season.  It is not an exaggeration to state that the pressure is already on Tottenham’s former Chelsea manager.  Villas-Boas watched his team lose their opening three matches in November twelve months ago.  From there on in they were playing catch up, to the point that their largely fantastic form over the final five months was made redundant by successive March reverses against Liverpool and Fulham.  That is how fine the margins are.

In his inaugural year at White Hart Lane, the Portuguese boss was afforded some leeway – especially so for his coaxing the supreme form out of Bale that encouraged Real Madrid to part with £86m for the Welshman.  Bale’s flair, imagination, and often his simple individual brilliance were, together, worth a host of points to Tottenham last season.

Without Bale’s input, and despite his raft of talented acquisitions, Villas-Boas is a long way short of unlocking a formula that adds verve and sustained menace in the final third of the pitch, to Spurs’ defensive proficiency.

The criticism that Soldado does nothing more than score goals is, on initial consideration, a touch peculiar.  The £26m Spaniard has, on three occasions, struck decisively from the penalty spot to win his team three points.  His product from open play, however, paints a fuller picture.  A starter in all but one league games, Soldado has one goal to add to his spot kick tally.  Crucially, his input outside of the penalty-box could generously be described as minimal.  The former Valenica player is yet to exhibit any clinical striking aptitude (unless unimpeded from 12 yards) – particularly as regards instinct for taking up profitable positions.

During what was a solid 0-0 draw at Everton on Sunday, a game that if Tottenham had seized on their first-half dominance would have resulted in a maximum point return, Soldado’s contribution was negligible.

For all of the Londoners’ superiority of possession and territory, the hosts’ defenders were rarely discomforted – with the exception of Leighton Baines who had to contend with the perpetually dynamic Andros Townsend.

What Phil Jagielka and Sylvain Distin would have least wanted to see as their legs became wearied was a spritely Jermain Defoe springing into the action.  Similarly, James McCarthy and Gareth Barry would not have relished Eriksen’s arrival into the fray.  While Defoe was consigned to a 90 minute watching brief, the precocious 21 year-old Dane was only used during the game’s dying embers.

Villas-Boas’ light use of Eriksen has been especially confusing – the Portuguese, of late, instead preferring the functional Lewis Holtby to perform the pivotal Number 10 role.    The manager’s steadfast faith in Soldado, and a simultaneous reluctance to employ some of his more fast-witted and inventive operators, is engendering a few disaffected mumblings among his club’s support.

Eriksen’s debut, in a 2-0 win over Norwich City, inspired a degree of confidence inside White Hart Lane, and some conviction from outside, that his presence would provide a valuable extra dimension to this Spurs team.  The new man’s immediate understanding with Gylfi Sigurdsson produced a sumptuous goal, and numerous incidences of attackers other than Soldado roaming into the box.

On their visit to Merseyside, Tottenham’s lone striker – Soldado – was routinely the single man wearing white stationed in the penalty area when his side were zipping passes around in front of Everton’s back-four.  Moreover, the advanced trio scarcely threatened to deliver a decisive final ball, or grab the initiative and run beyond their forward.

During the same game, Villas-Boas’ earlier changes lacked imagination.  Mousa Dembele was introduced in a straight swap for the excellent Sandro.  The Brazilian’s mastery of his holding job could release Dembele to take a more natural innovative berth higher up the pitch – working in tandem with Eriksen as opposed to the grafting Holtby.

Sigurdsson, strangely omitted for Aaron Lennon, entered the fray with 20 minutes to play after the England’s winger’s ineffective display.  In common with Townsend, who started the season on bench duty, Sigurdsson, whose Spurs’ future had been cast in some doubt following the raft of fresh faces being brought in, has been a standout performer in the campaign’s opening months.

Indeed, it was his direct impact on Sunday that triggered the period in which Tottenham looked most capable of scoring.  The Icelander will surely return to the first eleven after being displaced by the returning Lennon, and so re-invigorate a team that has begun to look slightly staid.

Villas-Boas has utilised Townsend, Eriksen, Dembele, and Sigurdsson in tandem, and to good effect – notably against Cardiff and Chelsea.  One defeat against West Ham, though, and the template was discarded.

The Portuguese’s safety first tendency, which was particularly evident in his early season deployment of Paulinho, Dembele, and Etienne Capoue in the same midfield, is betraying the guile and enterprise possessed by so many of his players.

It is possible that the hitherto inability of the wingers Nacer Chadli, recruited for £7m from FC Twente in Holland, and Lamela, spirited away from Roma, to adjust to football in their adopted country, is forcing their boss’ hand.  After all, if Villas-Boas believed Sigurdsson would be a regular in his plans he would not have shelled out such considerable sums on two players who could theoretically assume the ex-Reading man’s duties.

The marked evolution of Townsend can only be deemed a considerable boon, but an injury to Capoue has disrupted Tottenham’s midfield – even if Sandro’s recovery from his own ailment has offset the Frenchman’s loss.

Any critique of Villas-Boas must come attached with an acknowledgement of the impressive style in which he has taken to his latest challenge, after what could have been a career destroying stay at Chelsea.  The defensive high-line, so beloved of the 36 year-old, was a major cause of his troubles at Stamford Bridge.  With the liberty and time to mould a unit of his own choosing and, vitally, the signing of ‘sweeper-keeper’ Hugo Lloris, the success of the ex-Porto boss’ approach to that element of the game is evident in Spurs’ ‘goals against’ column.

Nevertheless, it is time for Tottenham to start winning regularly.  Much like the way in which they agonisingly failed to achieve their prime objective last term, Redknapp’s side of a year previously – having opened with consecutive defeats – paid for stumbling at the eleventh hour against the lesser lights of Norwich and QPR.

In a season which is shaping up to be one of the tightest on record, every opportunity to grab three points cannot be missed.  Clashes with Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool and Southampton are all on the horizon.

In comparable tests against Arsenal, Chelsea, and Everton, Spurs conceded only two goals, but scored just one of their own.  Three closely fought battles, then, resulted in two points earned.  That type of ratio does not make for Barcelona, AC Milan, and Paris Saint-Germain signing the White Hart Lane visitors’ log a year from now.

It is time for Villas-Boas to grit his teeth and give free reign to his battery of creative forces.  If he sits tight, the best Tottenham can hope for is more of the same.  Considering this Thursday brings the prospect of a Europa League tie against the Moldovans of Sheriff Tiraspol, that is no longer enough.

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