A year ago there weren’t many unhappier Premier League clubs than Spurs, but all that has changed, and now they’re looking up rather than down.
No other Premier League club has changed quite as much over the last 12 months as Spurs. This time last year, the club seemed mired in a cycle of self-destructive behaviour. A new manager had eventually been found, but only after a search that had felt excruciating rather than exacting, while the team’s most-prized asset didn’t seem far from chaining himself to the gates of the training ground in protest at not getting the transfer that he wanted.
Three straight wins at the start of the Premier League season – including an opening-day win against Manchester City, of all people – papered over these cracks in such an ineffectual way that they were still clearly visible, and by November the ill-fitting manager had gone, along with the team in ninth place in the table and any early-season optimism already having completely drained away. Classic Spurs.
Much of what has happened since then has been most un-Spurs-like. The arrival of Antonio Conte as the replacement for Nuno Espirito Santo always felt as though it could go in one of two ways, and there were occasional signs that Spursiness can’t simply be wished away from the DNA of the club.
Getting eliminated from the group stages of the Europa Conference League after failing to fulfil their last fixture because of a Covid outbreak and getting knocked out of the FA Cup by a Championship club seemed to confirm that. There were points at which Conte’s frustration at seeing what he’d let himself in for suggested that he might not last until the end of the season.
But when push came to shove, Conte delivered. Spurs only dropped seven points from their last 11 matches of the season, and as Arsenal faltered above them, a thorough win in a postponed north London derby that became both clubs’ penultimate match of the season left a return to the Champions League little more than a formality, tied up with a resounding win at Norwich on the last day of the season.
Son Heung Min ended the season tying for the Golden Boot with Mo Salah, having scored 23 of the 40 Premier League goals that he and Harry Kane managed between them. There has been no serious talk of either of them leaving the club this summer, which in itself speaks volumes for the club’s transformation over the last 12 months.
Spurs’ summer has been marked by brisk and efficient transfer…
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