It was meant to be over for Tottenham. No Premier League wins in 2026, and no immediate new-manager bounce under Roberto De Zerbi. The biggest question was whether he would stay around for the first Championship game next season.
But now Spurs are out of the relegation zone and finally have some momentum behind them for the first time in half a season.
De Zerbi arrived promising to keep things pragmatic, knowing he had only seven games to save his new side.
The Italian’s methods are normally anything but that. Lewis Dunk, captain of former side Brighton, once referred to his first weeks at the Amex as “horrendous” and a “carnage fortnight” as they attempted to adapt to his demands. The Seagulls subsequently picked up just two points from his first five games in charge.
That wouldn’t do at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium – and it hasn’t. Only Georginio Rutter’s last-minute equaliser for Brighton has stood between De Zerbi and three wins from his first four games.
The goalkeepers baiting opposition and league-topping line-up changes have been tempered but De Zerbi has managed to introduce some of the hallmarks of his coaching to underpin Spurs’ sudden improvement. The speed of his impact has been undoubtedly impressive.
There will be valid points raised about the quality of opposition, especially after Aston Villa’s raft of changes in Spurs’ 2-1 win on Sunday night. But for a team that had not won a single Premier League game in 15 attempts prior to beating Wolves a week earlier, it still took some doing – and now their survival is back in their own hands.
Highlights from the Premier League match between Aston Villa and Tottenham Hotspur.
High-pressing, efficient running
The signs of De Zerbi’s high-pressing game have become increasingly evident across his first four games to the point that he has the best record of any single manager across the division of winning the ball back in the final third this season – an average of 5.3 times per game since his arrival.
That does come with the caveat of a small sample size but Spurs are on an upward trajectory even within his four games in charge, and have almost doubled the number of times they are winning the ball in those areas compared to the rest of the season.
Spurs are pressing better by being smarter. Their running numbers are dropping across the board – they are sprinting less and covering around a kilometre less per game than before De Zerbi’s arrival, despite the possession stats remaining largely level.
That better organised, front-foot approach is having a different effect than might be expected. Yes, Spurs are winning the ball back closer to the opposition goal but only Xavi Simons’ fine strike against Brighton directly owes anything to it. Spurs are barely creating more xG, striking at goal more or even getting shots away quicker than before De Zerbi arrived.
Instead, keeping opposition pressure away from Spurs’ own goal is making a significant difference. They have given up 0.79xG per game on average under De Zerbi, almost 50 per cent down from before his arrival when they were shipping 1.52xG every match.
There are signs things could improve too, with Spurs conceding more since the Italian’s arrival than the numbers would suggest.
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A reinvigorated, industrious midfield
It’s worth remembering that things were not immediately plain sailing for De Zerbi.
The comparison between Sunderland captain Granit Xhaka’s numbers alone against Spurs’ midfield three in a 1-0 defeat at the Stadium of Light in his first game made for humiliating reading.
In that game, De Zerbi picked the young duo of Archie Gray and Lucas Bergvall alongside Conor Gallagher and was badly burned.
“Are two young kids, learning their trade, going to get you out of a relegation battle?” asked Sky Sports’ Jamie Carragher after that game.
“The balance in midfield at Spurs is not right. To be fair, the manager’s only been there a week or two,” added Roy Keane.
De Zerbi prefers players who can play but he did not make the same mistake again, and put his ideals on hold for more industrious options.
Gallagher has been joined by Rodrigo Bentancur in midfield for each of Spurs’ three games since, while Joao Palhinha joined them for the win at Villa on Sunday – the first time all three have started together all season.
What the trio may lack in flair, they made up for in energy at Villa Park, outperforming the home trio of Ross Barkley, Lamare Bogarde and Youri Tielemans despite playing 19 minutes fewer.
They set the tone with a display of tackling, duels and ball-winning superior to their Villa counterparts and dominated the middle of the park.
A lack of balance in that area has dogged Spurs all season, but De Zerbi looks to have settled on a system best-suited to winning the midfield battle.
Thomas Frank tried to do the same but where he fell down in getting the best out of his front three, De Zerbi is having no such problems.
The De Zerbi factor
Numbers can only tell you so much about De Zerbi’s impact. A known man manager and big personality, he wasted no time in building his players up when he first walked through the door.
Reassuring them that he would be at the club next season regardless of relegation, true or not, laid a long overdue base of continuity. He has demanded positivity and belief, but he has provided it too.
“I try to find the best solution to reach every player,” he said before his first win over Wolves. “Sometimes that is analysis videos but sometimes what they have done in their career for other clubs.
“With (Randal) Kolo Muani, if I play with Kolo Muani as right winger it’s because he has played in that position. If you go to YouTube, and you go to Kolo Muani (at) Eintracht Frankfurt, you can see he played very well in that position and he scored a lot of goals in that position.”
Roberto De Zerbi’s typically passionate belief in his players has been evident in his early news conferences
De Zerbi’s plan is one Spurs players can buy into. It is working and it is effective. But they, like Marseille and Brighton before them, are buying into the man too. “I see football in a completely different way, I picture it in a different way,” Dunk said only months after working with him.
Conor Gallagher finally looks like the player who became Chelsea captain. No surprise when De Zerbi claimed his side were “playing with 12 men” owing to the performance of the goalscoring 26-year-old at Villa on Sunday.
“Every player in the squad has taken to him, everyone trusts him, he makes you feel good, confident, he’s bringing the best out of players and it’s only the start,” Gallagher told TNT Sports after Sunday’s win.
“Hopefully we can keep learning from him and build a great team.”
A great team can wait for the moment. In the last three games, survival will do. And for the first time in a while, there is a genuine belief Spurs might just do it.
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