Three games into the 2025-26 season under new head coach Thomas Frank, Tottenham must have believed they were onto a sure-fire winner. They showed tremendous promise in their eventual UEFA Super Cup defeat to Paris Saint-Germain on penalties, destroyed Burnley in their Premier League opener, and then tore apart Pep Guardiola's Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium.
Fast-forward three months, though, and you'd be hard pressed to find a Spurs fan who didn't have major reservations over Frank, let alone a growing contingent of people wanting him sacked. Tottenham were incredibly lucky to lose only 1-0 to Chelsea at the start of November, while they could have few complaints over Sunday's 4-1 hammering at the hands of north London rivals Arsenal.
Across those two matches against their most bitter of foes, Frank's side registered only six shots and a combined expected goals tally of 0.17. Their only goal came courtesy of Richarlison, who lobbed David Raya from just inside Arsenal's half during the second of those two defeats.
Frank was hired to bring organisation and a calmer head to a young team that had been burnt too much by their own adventure under Ange Postecoglou. However, by completely throwing that identity in reverse, Frank has made Spurs one of the most boring teams in the Premier League without a requisite number of points to make this at least palatable. Even his Brentford teams of far lesser quality never resorted to the lows we've seen of Tottenham over the last few weeks.
CEO Vinai Venkatesham declared upon Frank's hiring that he scored highest on a 10-point checklist of 30 managerial candidates. The club's belief in such a system will be put to the test over the winter unless the Dane gets his house in order again.
There isn't a simple fix to Spurs' issues, not least because they severely lack the star power of a Harry Kane or a Son Heung-min to get them out of a hole these days, but there are definitely solutions within Frank's reach to curb this unrest. GOAL runs through eight ideas to get Tottenham firing again:
Getty Images SportDestroy the 'Bentinha' midfield
Jamie Carragher broke down the number one problem with Spurs' build-up play prior to the November international break, which is that Frank has put far too much trust in two destroyers to anchor his midfield, particularly loan signing Joao Palhinha.
"Palhinha hasn't got the quality," he began, commentating over a clip from their loss to Chelsea. "For me, for a player playing in central midfield for Tottenham, that is a pass you have to be able to make. He can't make it, so… he goes back. Listen to the boos. The only reason he does a clever turn on the ball is because of the boos. Otherwise, he’d have gone back to the goalkeeper. Palhinha gets back on the ball and he takes five touches because he hasn't got the confidence or the ability.
"You might look at that result and think there's not a lot wrong, but when you watch the game at the weekend, that was like watching a League Two team against a Premier League team in the FA Cup. When you look at the stats, there was a huge contrast with the ball, and that is the biggest challenge for any coach making that jump from one of the teams in the bottom half of the Premier League to one of the big boys."
Pairing Portugal international Palhinha with Rodrigo Bentancur hasn't helped matters. In isolation, they're OK footballers who can break up play, but together they present huge challenges for Spurs both in and out of possession. They don't show for the ball, they don't want to progress the ball centrally, and they're not clean when they do get on the ball. The derby defeats showed their positions are effectively redundant too, seeing as Spurs gave away so many shots on the edge of the own box in the area the duo ought to be occupying.
Pape Matar Sarr, with his lung-busting energy and determination to actually get into the game, has inexplicably had his minutes cut following a fine start to the season. It probably isn't a coincidence he played out of his skin against PSG and Man City before results and performances took a tumble when he was removed from the XI. Meanwhile, Lucas Bergvall – the only player in the squad that resembles a deep-lying playmaker – and Archie Gray haven't featured enough considering those ahead of them have been churning out mediocre performances bi-weekly. Frank has to turn to fresh blood in midfield.
AdvertisementGetty Images SportKeep the ball on the floor
Spurs' inability to progress play in central areas has made them even more predictable than they were under Postecoglou. Guglielmo Vicario passes to Micky van de Ven, Van de Ven passes it back, Vicario passes it back again, Van de Ven doesn't have any other option but to smash it into the channel, where nobody is willing to challenge for it and they turn the ball over. Rinse and repeat every time you get a goal-kick.
Frank has tried to simplify Tottenham's game too much. It's overkill. As Gary Neville pointed out on commentary during the Arsenal loss, there's a difference between playing direct and playing long without any plan whatsoever.
Part of Spurs' current predicament is the only in-possession principles they appear to be abiding by are from set pieces. The Dane could perhaps take some tips from one of his predecessors, Mauricio Pochettino, in this sense.
Before Tottenham scored their second goal in what was an eventual 3-2 loss at Liverpool in 2015 during his first season, Pochettino was seen shouting one particular instruction towards defender Eric Dier. "Eric! To feet! No long balls!" he yelped from the sidelines. Now, this version of Spurs would go on to become a team who could cut teams open with ranging passes, but the point is that Pochettino wanted his troops to learn a rudimentary way of his final philosophy first. To boot, this came after the Argentine had made sweeping squad changes to overthrow the old guard and build around a younger core. This wouldn't be unprecedented territory for Frank to head into as a Tottenham head coach.
Getty Images SportLean on natural full-backs
This is a minor point in the grand scheme of this rebuild given there are only three full-backs in the Tottenham squad and Destiny Udogie has been injured for part of the season, but it's a structural issue all the same.
Pedro Porro, one of the Premier League's best attacking full-backs, hasn't hit top form yet this season. He's getting into promising positions, though has been let down by some poor deliveries and his team-mates not exactly knowing where to stand and which runs to make. Playing a back five at Arsenal would have made far more sense if Spain's first-choice right-back was starting instead of the defence-first option of Djed Spence.
Speaking of the England star, Spence's inclination to tuck infield when deployed on the left has also contributed to an overload of nothingness in the middle of the park. In the absence of Udogie, it would be worth giving Van de Ven some more opportunities at full-back, where he has been playing for the Netherlands national team.
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Getty Images SportTrust in Simons
Back in August, Tottenham nearly wrapped up a deal to sign Eberechi Eze. At the eleventh hour, Arsenal swooped in and brought him back to his boyhood club instead. The silver lining for Spurs was this led to a deal for Xavi Simons, who was only lower down their list of targets because it seemed for all the world he would be heading to Chelsea instead.
It would have hurt the Lilywhites immeasurably that Simons was dropped for the derby while Eze dropped a hat-trick on them. The point made by fans on social media post-match was there's an irony that Eze probably wouldn't have even been selected for this encounter had he joined Tottenham, such has been the extent of Frank's pragmatism to this point.
Simons, much like Liverpool's Florian Wirtz, is still adapting to the Premier League following a successful stint in the Bundesliga. If Spurs fans want any consolation over what happened at the Emirates Stadium, the Dutchman is five years Eze's junior and clearly has the potential to become a leading attacking midfielder, though his development is only being stifled by Frank and his deep-lying midfielders refusing to get him into games more.
This Tottenham team have created very little over the course of the season irrespective of whether Simons has been playing, though arguably one of their more potent spells came when they were trailing at Brighton in October, and the introduction of the No.10 in his natural position helped Spurs come from two goals down to earn a well-deserved 2-2 draw. Simons may as well be given more of a licence to roam and feel his way into games if Frank's men are putting up such measly xG totals anyway.