http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/teams/tottenham-hotspur/fixtures The run in! No more cup distractions, no more European trips, just Premier League all the way. 12 games left, all winnable, 36 points up for grabs. No Chelsea, no Arsenal, no Liverpool, the toughest (on paper I hasten to add) are away to Man United and home to Man City. This has the potential to be a really good time for the team as they focus on the league. Yes I know it's Spurs and if we can find a way to mess up we will but I have a good feeling about this young team. It would be great to end the season with a nice little run of wins and see how far up the table that can get us.
Many, not just our rivals, think Spurs are likely to fall away, if not apart, after a tough couple of weeks. Swansea Wednesday may tell us a lot. Beginning with the game after that, Spurs will no longer have a fixture congestion handicap. Unfortunately, Arsenal and Liverpool have found form, and are a few points ahead of us. It's a new challenge for a young team which has had plenty of ups and downs already, and been IMO well worth watching. I can only hope we can at least continue the two steps forward, one step back pattern we've established this year. COYS!
4/3 - Swansea (h) 7/3 - QPR (a) 15/3 - Man Utd (a) 21/3 - Leicester (h) 5/4 - Burnley (a) 11/4 - Villa (h) 19/4 - Newcastle (a) 25/4 - Southampton (a) 2/5 - Man City (h) 9/5 - Stoke (a) 16/5 - Hull (h) 24/5 - Everton (a) The first thing that springs to mind is...bollocks, I'm on holiday for the last two.
I always consider 27 pts from the last 39 as being a must for a top 4 slot. To get over 70 pts means 27 from 36, which is still a big ask. But we did it in 2010, and with a far worse fixture list than this season.
27 from 36 is achievable, we're very good side and as has been mentioned, we now no longer have any other competitions to focus on so we can hopefully play our best XI in every game without the worry of fatigue, just hope we don't get many/ any injuries. I'm hoping the Final loss will light a fire in the boys now and see us finish strong. Utd are unconvincing and Soton aren't looking as strong, Pool have got into some form though so we'll need to step it up if we still want that top 4 spot. Entertaining finale of games awaits!
Glorious failure awaits i fear. I know the competition divides opinion but i just hope we can get 6th and nab a spot back in the Europa next year.
Looking at your away fixtures, I'd say Utd looks the easiest on paper! After all, you win at OT every season now. That or Newcastle. Not sure trips to Stoke, Southampton and Everton, as well as strugglers Burnley and QPR will be any easier.
Teams have fallen away after League Cup finals in the past but we have plenty to play for. If we win our game in hand we are one point off Liverpool and only 3 off 4th. With the opportunity to take points off United and Southampton to come as well. If we can build up a head of steam, with no other distractions, there is no reason this season cannot become a memorable one.
The weird thing is that it's usually the winners that fall off: us in '99 and 2008, and for three straight seasons it was Birmingham, Liverpool and Swansea that put their feet up for the last couple of months of the season, with disastrous consequences in Brum's case.
We are a good team in terms of the football we play. But we’ve had trouble beating the teams we should beat. We had one decent undefeated stretch in the PL, 8 games I think it was. We could really use another.
We really should go on a decent run and pick up 25+ points from those remaining fixtures, but you just know this is Spurs and we will find a way to finish in a Europa League position. Bad luck and poor refereeing going against us at vital times is standard fare when we have a sniff of a top four finish, sadly our rivals never seem to suffer this way. I would predict we will finish 5th or 6th again.
Some key fixtures for the teams around us in the run-in... 15/3 - Chelsea vs Southampton 16/3 - Swansea vs Liverpool 22/3 - Man Utd vs Liverpool 4/4 - Arsenal vs Liverpool 12/4 - Man Utd vs Man City 18/4 - Chelsea vs Man Utd 26/4 - Arsenal vs Chelsea 9/5 - Chelsea vs Liverpool, Arsenal vs Swansea 16/5 - Man Utd vs Arsenal 24/5 - Man City vs Southampton If we maintain our form we can keep pace with the teams above us as there's a bunch of dropped points for two out of Southampton, Man Utd, Arsenal and Liverpool on that list - and with our games against Southampton and Man Utd, we have some say in whether we overtake one or two of them.
Before the season started I thought 8th and no trophy. We are now in March and nothing has changed my mind. Will 8th be low enough to avoid the bloody Europa League?
I was going to say 'glass half empty' but clearly you haven't even filled the glass at all. I guess if you are determined not to see any progress, if all you want to see is mistakes and problems, then that is all you will see - because no team is perfect. Is that what you are asking for, perfect or nothing? Because there is a lot of evidence of progress and things to enjoy about the way we are coming round to playing. If you don't enjoy that or see it, what is the point of supporting Spurs at all? As for the EL, it is a good opportunity to test the squad under competitive conditions, or would you rather go from no European football to the Champions League without any experience of squad rotation, playing two games per week etc?
