Skipping to Victory

A 2-0 win over Brentford puts Spurs firmly back in the top 4 race, with relegation-bound Norwich up next

It's all smiles in Tottenham after a 2-0 home win that was never in doubt. Son was back to his Sonsational best (or just about--he was unlucky not to add a second goal), Davies and Reguilón have found a perfect balance on the left side of the pitch, and Skipp controlled the midfield with aplomb in a Man of the Match performance. It was hard to find too much to complain about, and overall the mood is feeling positive for the beginning of the December fixture gauntlet. It helps to know that Norwich are up next, and this performance can be easily replicated against Dean Smith's underpowered side.

I'm sure that like many other fans stateside, I spent my lunchtime before the match reading the wonderful Athletic article about Ben Davies, where he reflects on his time at Spurs under four different managers and also reveals that he completed a business & economics degree last year. Congrats to Ben! But seriously, it's a great interview, check it out if you haven't already.

So it felt appropriate when Davies appeared to have scored Spurs' opening goal in the 12th minute, heading in a cross from Son that had resulted from one of many short corners taken in the game. Unfortunately, it turned out that Ben never touched the ball and it was actually an own goal by Brentford's Canos. Alas! Still, he had a great game overall and is clearly thriving under Conte's back-3 formation. He and Reguilón have a good understanding between them that has led to many of our attacks coming from that left-hand side, while Royal and Sánchez have struggled a bit.

But the glue that held the team together against Brentford was definitely Oliver Skipp. He was a deserving winner of the MotM award, thanks to his tireless efforts to fight for every ball, progress the play up the pitch, and contribute defensively when needed. The Bees just didn't have an answer for him. We could have had a third goal if Kane had done better to take on Brentford's keeper after a laser-sharp pass from Skipp.

I just want every fan that was doubting Skipp a few weeks ago to take a good hard look at themselves for turning on him so quickly...

Midway through the second half, we doubled our lead through a superb team goal. Although Sánchez had a few defensive blunders in the game, he did well to kick things off with a central pass out of the back to Son, who quickly laid it off to Kane nearby and immediately started to make his run. Kane rocketed the ball into the space in front of Reguilón for the Spaniard to run into, and Son arrived in the box just as Regui squared the ball. They made it look easy.

This is what happens when we play with some actual pace! And although we lost the possession battle with Brentford, we were fairly efficient, always looking threatening in Brentford's half. I'll take six shots on target and ten corners won, knowing that we will only improve the longer Conte has to work with the team. Pass accuracy is certainly an area for improvement, though we at least seem to have the vision aspect going in the right direction--just lacking the execution sometimes. Also worth noting:  Reguilón is our assist leader in the PL so far, with three assists. No other play has more than one. So while he's seemed to have an up-and-down season overall (and let's be honest, the whole team has), he's been fairly productive.

It's still early days, but Emerson Royal is lacking that end product on his side of the pitch. It doesn't do him any favors to have Sánchez covering him from the back, though. I'm not sure Tanganga is necessarily the solution since he seems to be lacking a bit of pace at the moment (if his last play of the match was any indication), but it could be worth a try since Sánchez isn't exactly looking like a permanent fixture in the starting lineup. Hopefully Romero heals soon--or we get a new CB option in the January window. At least Dier is proving to be a solid presence in the central position, game after game.

The substitutions were uneventful, but it's always good to see an effort to keep the players fresh, especially knowing that we've only just started the run of 10 games in 30 days. On another minor note:  no disciplinary issues in this match! In fact, neither team received a single card. Just a good, clean game of football. You love to see it.

Okay, time for the obligatory Harry Kane discussion. It's undeniable that he had some great passes against Brentford, most from a deeper position than you would typically prefer to see him playing in. But I still can't help feeling that he looks a bit, well, slow. Leggy, I think the Brits usually say. So allow me to advance an idea:  play Kane as a false nine, and give Son and Lucas the freedom to roam for a while, since the wingbacks are occupying a lot of the spaces they normally would right now with the new formation. At least, until (if) we bring in a second striker. Maybe Kane gets his fitness back to where it needs to be and he can return to a more traditional striker role. But even last season, we weren't really seeing that happen. It was more of a hybrid approach. How many times did we bemoan the fact that nobody was in the box last season? At least this year, we do have players arriving in the box, they just aren't the one player we would expect to be there.

I know we've all been feeling frustrated that Conte is stuck with an inherited roster until the transfer window opens, but maybe this could be a silver lining of sorts. Maybe the creative playmaker we need is already in the team. Is it the ideal use of Kane's talents? Probably not. But the truth is that he doesn't appear to be fit enough (or motivated enough, who knows) to be bagging the number of goals we need him to be as the sole striker in the team. If he can create some goals instead, it's better than nothing. Forgive me for pointing to a rival team to make my point, but look at Chelsea. They're not too fussed that their defenders have scored just as many goals as their very expensive forward line. They're winning games and leading the title race.

I'm spitballing here, but I feel like there has to be an alternative to these feelings of frustration with Kane week after week. Either way, I'm happy to see some other players stepping up this season.

Another home match to build

This is a portion of the season where we can really build some momentum, at least in the league. Back-to-back home matches against teams in the bottom half of the table helps, and then we have two away matches against teams that are both in a rough patch of form (Brighton and Leicester). We're right in the mix for top 4 at the moment, and we need to keep it that way.

Norwich did get a bit of a new manager bounce when Dean Smith came on as manager (and technically before that too, since Farke won his last game in charge while under duress). But those favorable results have all come against bottom-half teams, and they're still struggling to score. In fairness, Teemu Pukki scored a wonderful goal last time out against Newcastle. They're definitely missing Oliver Skipp. Sorry, not sorry.

Injury-wise, Norwich have quite a few players out, including a key midfielder, Mathias Normann. Spurs are only missing the Argentina contingent.

We're likely to see American player Josh Sargent starting for Norwich, though he hasn't had a successful season so far, with zero goals in the league. Billy Gilmour has also not had the best season on loan from Chelsea. And who even knows what's going on with Todd Cantwell, who seemed like a promising player last season but has been in and out of the squad this season.

This should be a good opportunity for Tottenham to claim a decisive victory and continue chipping away at our negative goal difference. Let's just hope Tim Krul doesn't have his usual blinder against us.

With any luck, Everton could pull off a result against Arsenal, and Chelsea are likely to beat West Ham, so we could be up into 4th place by the end of the day--and still with a game in hand. Fingers crossed!

A closing note from the club:

COYS