After a loss and two frustrating draws, Spurs will hope to get back to winning ways this Sunday, as West Bromwich Albion visit White Hart Lane.
It all started so well for Mauricio Pochettino with four consecutive wins. A drop off was inevitable as the new boss finds his best eleven and gets the team playing his way.
Tottenham played well against Sunderland and were unlucky not to take all three points. The trip to Serbia was always going to be tough, with a long journey, a partisan crowd and a terrible pitch. At least with only Lloris starting both games, the team should not be adversely affected by their efforts in midweek.
Opponents
West Brom missed out on relegation last year by the skin of their teeth, with just one place and three points between themselves and the drop. The unfortunate Pepe Mel was summarily dismissed and replaced by the relatively unknown, Alan Irvine, who has previously managed Preston North End and Sheffield Wednesday, as well as a more recent spell as the head of Everton’s academy.
The new man hasn’t had a good start. The baggies have picked up just 2 points from their four league games so far and sit second bottom of the league.
West Brom Tactics
Irvine has played 4-4-1-1 or 4-4-2 so far in the league. He has reverted to a more defensive, counter attacking style after Mel’s unsuccessful attempt to turn West Brom into a high energy, pressing side.
Youssouf Mulumbu and Craig Gardener provide the tackling and passing in the centre of midfield, while Saido Berahino and Graham Dorrans are two of the visitors more dangerous players going forward.
Interestingly, West Brom have made the third most crosses so far this season, averaging 27 per game. With only two league goals, both at home against Sunderland in their opening match, they are struggling to find the net – one of those was from the penalty spot.
Odds
Spurs are heavy favourites at 1.54, the draw is 4.5, with a West Brom win out at 7.4
Team News
Andros Townsend picked up an injury in the midweek Europa league game and is a doubt. Kyle Walker is a long term absentee.
West Brom could have a fully fit side but Anichebe faces a late fitness test.
Spurs Team
Dembele played well in the centre against Sunderland and did enough to deserve a place partnering Capoue this weekend. If Pochettino can teach him when to play the quick, simple pass, he could thrive in a box-to-box role.
I would give Ben Davies a chance at left back and pair Vertonghen and Fazio in the centre but with Kaboul being made captain this week, it looks unlikely that he will be dropped in the short term.
Lamela, Eriksen, Chadli and Adebayor should continue up front. Despite the disappointment of last weeks 2-2 draw, they created numerous chances and were unlucky not to secure the points well before Kane’s late own goal.
Prediction: Spurs 3 West Brom 0
Anything other than a win will be a huge disappointment.
Discuss this with me on Twitter: @ABPSpurs
Let me know your thoughts on the game in the comments below.
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Anything But Penalties 
As weird as it may sound, i would rather have Rose at LB and Naughton at RB.
Davies was simply atrocious against Partisan and he seems so out of place. He will eventually take over LB but i think it is too soon.
Dier is talented and promising but Naughton still has more experience. Dier had a baptism of fire and performed exceptionally well but after the last two games, his limitations and lack of experience (reckless tackles) are slowly starting to show.
I have to admit I only saw a bit of the Partisan game. Dier can be very good but I agree about his inexperience.
Would you play Fazio?
Fazio had a solid debut and yes, i would play him ahead of Kaboul but i have the impression that Poch will pick our new captain for the game.
Totally agree with others above that Rose must start ahead of Davies after his awful showing on Thursday. I’d also prefer the limited but experienced Naughton over Dier at right back. I think Kaboul will start as captain. Vertonghen and Chiriches will duke it out to accompany him. Possibly Stambouli may displace Dembele. But I don’t see Poch varying much from the team that started the previous match.
Stambouli Capoue would be an interesting combination but do we need two primarily defensive midfielders against West Brom?
No, so Dembele, who has been rested, will probably start. Stambouli looks good, though, and may be able to play the box to box role also.
I think we can get away with playing Dier today in at RB and that these are the kind of games we should be letting him get PL experience. Hopefully we will have enough quality, stamina and determination to beat West Brom who let’s face it are desperate for points and will be very stubborn as we try to break them down; I would rather have Dier over Naughton as for all of Naughton’s extra experience he doesn’t seemed to have learned from it – as they say in some circles you get three kicks of the can to prove you can cut it and this guy has had more than his fair share of chances but is still pretty much a walking brainfart.
I quite like that line up but I really hope we see Chadli and Lamela playing like they have just chugged pints of red bull and really aim to shred the defence with aggressive movement and interplay. I don’t know why everything just seems a bit static lately, apart from the QPR game where the defenders were so old and immobile I haven’t seen enough in the way of adventurous, lung busting movement from the offensive players to get me excited. Hoping for a high energy affair today.
A lot depends on the overall fatigue levels of the team that travelled during the week as to gets the nod in the CM berths. I would like to have Stambouli in. Is Paulinho injured? I wonder also whether Chiriches, Vertonghen (good readers with some footballing ability) or Kaboul (more of an all-out destroyer) for that matter can step into a defensive midfield role in order to accommodate Fazio in the back 4… but then again why do that when we have Bentaleb and Capoue for those roles so probably a waste of time unless you’re a believer in trying to squeeze your best eleven players into a line up.
So many permutations to try out and as individual form comes and goes throughout the season, not to mention the inevitable injuries that will occur, it’s going to be a while before we have a true picture of our best XI. With good rotation however we should have a firing squad to last us to the end of the season allowing us to finish strongly, unlike during the Redknapp days when he played the same XI every week and then wondered why the replacements were off the pace when they were playing their first games of the season in April.
We certainly have options now, particularly in central midfield.
I would really like to see Fazio play. As West Brom seem to use crosses as a major weapon, there’s an argument his extra height would be useful.
A different kind of disappointment today. Against Liverpool it was the lack of leadership and fight, against Sunderland was the lack of application and concentration… against West Brom it was the lack of intelligence from both manager and players that disappointed me most.
It has happened before, a technically inferior team sets up to contain us, and we struggle to break them down. Chadli, Lamela and Eriksen are all most dangerous in and around the centre of the final third and all you need to do to contain them is congest that part of the pitch.
How many times did any of our attacking quartet dribble towards the edge of the box before either being dispossessed or having a clever pass intercepted?
Obviously, when faced with a defence that is overloading in the centre, the way to get around them is to use the width of the pitch to try and stretch the play. Unfortunately our line up had no orthodox wingers and our fullbacks just don’t have enough quality to contribute offensively and so we played narrow for the whole game.
We effectively had 5 central midfielders on the pitch yesterday with only Danny Rose offering any natural width; says it all really. Poch should have changed it up, the players should have realised they needed to stop banging their heads against a brick wall and try something different.
The Sunderland draw was disappointing but you could see what we were trying to do and we created plenty of chances. Here we ran out of ideas. It does slightly worry me Pochettino lacks a plan B.