Spurs have not won in all competitions for a month now, and this is not the ideal run to be on going into a North London derby. Spurs need to wake up and start changing things for the better. The performance against Leverkusen at Wembley was scandalous and was totally unacceptable.
In order to stand a chance of beating Arsenal, here are three changes that Mauricio Pochettino must make going into the derby.
1) Play expansive football and use our full-backs in attack
Tottenham’s play was so predictable in midweek against Leverkusen, in what turned out to be a shocking and embarrassing performance at Wembley. For me, they didn’t look to beat players down the line and get crosses into the box enough, it was all a little too narrow.
The key to beating Arsenal will be to stretch the defence. Spurs must play expansive football and look to use the full width of the pitch. As little as there was of it, all of Spurs’ chances came from through the middle against at Wembley. This means that the wingers and full-backs must step up and start to cause problems out wide, getting some dangerous balls into the mixer.
I know that Hector Bellerin and Nacho Monreal are not the easiest of full-backs to beat for pace down the line, but lots of overlapping runs from the likes of Danny Rose and Kyle Walker would be good to see. These runs could also cause huge problems for the Arsenal back line, and will be key to beating Arsenal.
