Spurs v Man City – Match preview

Moneybags Citeh come to play on the Wembley potato field this evening for only our fourth ‘home’ game of the season.

Previously, Fulham and Cardiff have been despatched, not entirely comfortably, and in between we lost to Liverpool. (How naive now it seems for us to have believed that that game in mid-September was going to be the opening one at the new WHL). This pattern of results, if you can call it that, sort of encapsulates our league season thus far. Of our nine matches played, six have been against teams from the lower half of the table and all of those have been won. Of the remaining three though, we have taken points from Man United only.

A visit from Aguero, de Bruyne, Silva and co isn’t the ideal way to break this cycle but, as Poch so often says, positivity (and aggression) are the keys to so much in football so we should view the chance to take on the best as a challenge and an opportunity.
Of course the news about Glenn Hoddle, the new stadium, the increased loan (£637m!) and the reminder from Leicester of the fragility of human life make it hard to approach a game with the correct mindset but that’s what Poch and his team are there for and where they will I’m sure, work their magic.

In amongst the bad news the return to fitness of Eriksen and perhaps Dele stand out as items we can pin some hopes on. Eriksen proved against PSV how much we’ve missed him and hopefully his unwanted rest will have dispersed some of the post-world cup fog that seemed to affect him before he was injured. Dele was playing exceptionally well before his hamstring strain, the amount of creativity in the side increases exponentially when these two are available.

City’s only defeat this season came against a Lyon side who pressed them aggressively from the start. Bearing this in mind I’d be surprised if Lamela wasn’t given an outing from the off and he Lucas weren’t told to make their presence felt amongst the City defence. My guess at the team would be Hugo, Trips, Davies, Sanchez, Toby, Dier, Winks, Lamela, Lucas, Eriksen and Kane. I’m never right by the way when it comes to team prediction.

I’ve no idea what state the pitch will be in but bearing in mind what it looked like against Barcelona, I think it’s unlikely to be great. A ready-made excuse for Pep? Let’s hope so.

The referee is Kevin Friend.

COYS.

Spurs v Man City betting tips

Tottenham have lost just two of their last 21 Premier League games at Wembley Stadium (W15 D4 L2). Spurs are 4/1 to get the win.

Tottenham’s Erik Lamela has been directly involved in four goals in five Premier League games this season (three goals, one assist), the same total he registered in 25 games last term (two goals, two assists). Lamela is 11/1 to score first.

Tottenham have won seven and lost none of their last nine Premier League games played on Monday (D2), with their last defeat coming against Norwich in April 2012 (1-2). A draw is 3/1.

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