Box fresh
Not much has peaked my interest in the international break. Aside from a couple of hard grafting Harry Kane performances and Dele Alli's début for the Three Lions. The only other newsworthy item that had me scrolling through my Twitter time-line was the news that Brendan Rodgers had left Liverpool Football club. Not really a surprising conclusion to his tenure at Anfield. After-all, it was Rodgers that mocked Spurs and Andre Villas-Boas with the infamous quote citing how '...when you spend £100Million, you should be winning the league'. He oversaw almost £300M on transfers, so I'm guessing the treble would have to be his equivalent target.
Instead we welcome the wonderfully mad Jürgen Klopp to England whilst I continue to smile at Jamie Carragher's bitter dig suggesting Liverpool are turning into Tottenham. I guess both clubs like to slip up occasionally. Naturally, we face Klopp in our next game. The football fixture list aligning with the stars to give a cosmic baptism to the former Dortmund boss as he loses his Premier League cherry against the club Liverpool are trying really hard not to be.
A new beginning for them but how about our awakening?
Eight league games in and already we've gone from questioning our lack of depth and experience to posturing over players selected out of position to then bemoaning the slow pace of our transitional movement from midfield to attack to then screaming at the distinct lack of style. Yet beyond some of the error lead surrendering of points we have flipped most of the downtrodden grievances into smiley faces.
Lack of depth? We might revisit this again if January is non-eventful, but so far this team has bonded and solidified its shape. It's easy to knee-jerk and claim our early season form was a sign that Mauricio Pochettino still doesn't know what he's doing and cite last season as evidence for the continuation. It seems the best way for players and ideas to grow and blossom are within the contained pressure-cooker of first team football and not pre-season tours. Spurs are super fit.
Eric Dier is the Pochettino poster boy for keeping the faith. Poch stuck him in the middle and he's done a superb job when many of us doubted he could muster the composure and intensity required. We all wanted a certified midfielder to take the responsibility. With Ryan Mason and Nabil Bentaleb injured, Dele Alli has provided us with some surprise refined hype; One for the future that is relevant in the present.
Son Heung-min and Clinton N'jie are the pacemakers that will make you skip heartbeats and Christian Eriksen the one to pull us out of the creative lull. Erik Lamela's recent spark of influence is a benchmark that might inspire the player to finally man up and own games.
It's only eight games but this Tottenham team is fighting to reclaim identity, brushing off its past indiscretions where we failed to recognise our own reflection. Tottenham's reinvention, for once, looks tangible although remaining fragile in its infancy. No £100M necessary this time. Guess you can't win anything with kids...can you? For now, hoping dearly we make Klopp strop.
