Tottenham Hotspur: Dark Horses?

We’ve discussed many a time as to how Leicester have turned the Premier League upside-down… but there’s another side that have almost sneakily climbed up the table to really put themselves in to contention: Tottenham Hotspur.

Almost without going noticed, Spurs have got themselves in to 2nd in the table: they’re just two points off of Leicester, and with the best goal advantage of any team in the league are ahead of their rivals Arsenal to boot. All three teams will be desperate for the title, though – to put it in to perspective, here’s the last time all the top three teams won the top tier title:

Leicester: Never
Spurs: 1960-61
Arsenal: 2003-04

So Arsenal were the most recent winners of the league from these three teams, and that was 12 years ago. But can they take on a Spurs that have surprised?

Home Is Where The Hart Is – Perfect for Spurs fans!

Perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise – Tottenham have hung around near or in the top 5 for the past few seasons, but since raising their game even further they’ve been climbing significantly. They’ve won all five of their last Premier League games – the best form of anyone – and it helped them close in by 5 points on Leicester and 7 on Arsenal in that same time period.

But if they can’t quite make it to the title, there’s a chance to gain some long overdue revenge over Arsenal – their local rivals have been so used to beating Spurs in the league in recent times that a concept called St. Totteringham’s Day was created in 2002 – the day in which the Gunners could mathematically no longer be caught by Tottenham. Since its creation, Spurs have not been able to cancel the celebrations – they’ve been behind Arsenal every year (in fact, you have to go back to the 1994/95 season for the last time it was the other way around – before Arsene Wenger was even manager of Arsenal!) – but this looks a better year than any to overturn that.

Of course, this is all slightly presumptuous – Spurs are only ahead on goal advantage against their rivals, and there’s still 12 games left. But with form on their side, they’ll want to keep the momentum rolling in the final part of the season to possibly end a 55 year wait for the league title…

Someone’s drought is likely to end this year: Can it be Spurs’ season? Are they the dark horse?

Ashley Redman
Home Is Where The Hart Is