One of Alex Ferguson's most effective team talks consisted of three words. "Lads, it's Tottenham." That, Roy Keane recounted in his autobiography, was enough. It was a disparaging dismissal of a side that, whatever its talent, lacked Manchester United's winning mentality. They were Tottenham Hotspur. They were a soft touch. They were an opportunity to pick up three points. United invariably did.
“Lads, it’s Tottenham.” It has acquired a rather different meaning now. It used to be an invitation. Now it is a warning.
Read more: Richard Jolly on Louis van Gaal's rewarded faith in youth at Manchester United
It is Tottenham, the team with the longest unbeaten run in the Premier League.
It is Tottenham, the team who invariably outrun all others.
It is Tottenham, who never give opponents a minute’s rest. It is bad news for the old, the slow, the lazy or those who simply prefer to dawdle in possession.
Santi Cazorla had been the most influential central-midfield playmaker in the Premier League this season. He ran rings around Manchester United last month, reeling Bastian Schweinsteiger in and passing the ball past the World Cup winner. He was substituted after 45 minutes on Sunday, the incessant pressure from Eric Dier and Dele Alli, men a decade his junior, proving too much. Old gunner was exhausted by young guns.
Minus their midfield general and with a distinctly odd line-up, Arsenal escaped defeat in the North London derby. Tottenham were denied the sort of defining statement an away victory against their neighbours would have provided; they have still only registered one since 1993. They are behind Arsenal in the table and, for a 21st successive season, will probably finish beneath them.
Yet there is the excitement offered by accelerated development and a sudden opening. Chelsea’s decline has increased the possibilities of a top-four finish and, assuming Leicester City’s revelations cannot sustain their remarkable form, Tottenham should be the favourites to fill the void.
They have improved at such a rate that it is a vindication of manager Mauricio Pochettino. Alli and Dier have been a precocious upgrade on last season’s central-midfield partnership of Nabil Bentaleb and Ryan Mason.
White Hart Lane no longer looks a place where expensive arrivals’ potential is rarely realised and Erik Lamela and Mousa Dembele, who did seem a £45 million (Dh250m) pair of misfits, instead appear fit and focused players who have allied their talent with commitment. Arsenal won too many headers in the Tottenham penalty area but Jan Vertonghen and Toby Alderweireld still seem Spurs’ best central defensive duo for years.
Above all, there are the shared beliefs that indicate a club once noted for individualism is being driven on by a collective ethos. Those who do not buy into are swiftly exiled as Andros Townsend, suspended by Spurs following a row with a fitness coach, is now discovering. Those who do are benefiting. Spurs have become relentless. They are often the division’s youngest team and its most energetic.
A couple of hundred miles farther north on Sunday, Jurgen Klopp, another advocate of a pressing game and another whose team played in Europe on Thursday night, argued that tiredness is a state of mind.
“I decide if I am tired, nobody else,” said the German, in typically emphatic fashion. The accent was different but it was easy to imagine the words coming from Pochettino’s mouth.
As the Argentine’s rotation in the Europa League is largely limited to the full-back positions, there is still the chance that fatigue will prove a factor. Yet whereas his Southampton sides had a habit of conceding late goals, his Tottenham teams scored so many last season to show they did not run out of steam.
Undefeated runs tend to provide proof of physical power and team spirit alike and there is an irony that now Tottenham are a team transformed that their sole defeat came at the hands of United, who used to belittle them, when neither is exactly a side in the club’s traditions. That is an indictment of Louis van Gaal’s unconvincing outfit and an indication of the progress under Pochettino.
Since that August setback, the Argentine’s side have been indefatigable and undefeated. “That’s Tottenham, lads”. Just not the Tottenham of old.
Follow us on Twitter @NatSportUAE
