All good things must end somewhere; no unprecedented charge goes on forever. With 15 consecutive wins on the board, Manchester City have created a bubble that forthcoming opponents will now be desperate to burst. Now all the significant records have been broken, the dynamic will shift. A game against them becomes a shot to nothing, even for Tottenham.
The upside of becoming the first team to stop Pep Guardiola’s men in their tracks far outweighs the downside of being just another hapless victim. In psychological terms, the pressure is negligible but the prize is huge. For one team, it could be an empowering result that washes away all previous misgivings and instils renewed belief, buying weeks of favourable narrative.
For Tottenham, an opportunity to hit the reset button and immediately rekindle the awe with which they were revered towards the end of last season must be very enticing. Their Premier League season hasn’t gone according to plan but they, perhaps more than anyone, are capable of giving City a bloody nose, by virtue of their manager and his philosophy.
Mauricio Pochettino knows and understands Guardiola, possibly better than anyone. He’s a fellow Marcelo Bielsa disciple and he stunned the Spanish game in February 2009 when his Espanyol side triumphed in the Catalan derby, beating Barcelona in their own backyard by fighting fire with fire. The Blaugrana were unbeaten in 22 league games at the time.
In four years spent managing in the same city, Guardiola and Pochettino faced off nine times and Poch punched above his weight in all but two of them. Twice, the Pericos held their all-conquering neighbours to a draw. On three other occasions, they were beaten by a single goal, the decisive strike coming from the penalty spot in two of them.
So the Argentine won’t be remotely intimidated. The team he takes to the Eithad this weekend is much less inferior and the players themselves know they had the measure of City last season, so should pay less attention to what City have accomplished since. They can reserve judgement until their own experience tells them otherwise.
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Tottenham might be deprived of Toby Alderweireld, Davinson Sanchez and Victor Wanyama, but they will test City in a way that no-one else has over the four weeks that John Stones has been absent. The Sky Blues were at their scintillating best when riding the crest of a wave against Swansea in midweek but they were below par for five matches prior to the Manchester derby.
And despite bossing United from start to finish, City weren’t flawless at Old Trafford either. Their counters often lacked precision and the defence, though warrior-like in attitude, showed occasional glimpses of discomfort. Spurs will be tenacious and energetic. They will press from the front and challenge those potential weaknesses.
City, on the back of eight games played on their own terms over the past 28 days, can be dragged out of their comfort zone. Other teams have been scared to come out and stand toe-to-toe with Guardiola’s men, mainly because it’s not in their nature do anything else. But for Tottenham this is doing what they do best, playing the game they’d like to play every week.
You could argue the Londoners have let themselves down with uncharacteristic displays on big occasions at United and Arsenal this season but, equally, they also put an attack-minded Liverpool side to the sword at Wembley and have shown an admirable maturity when raising their game in the Champions League, not least for those two games against Real Madrid.
Any bet on Tottenham to win might be underestimating Guardiola and his genius. The Catalan mastermind will have factored all of these possibilities into his thinking and plenty more besides, and he certainly has the full attention of his players right now. But let’s not kid ourselves that Tottenham lack the calibre to take something from this game.
Forget the run City are on and the frenzy of attention that naturally goes with it. This is going to be a real contest, a throwback, perhaps, to some of the helter-skelter top-six encounters witnessed at the Etihad last season. City will take risks and Spurs, of course, possess a centre-forward capable of being decisive in a game that produces ample chances at both ends.
Recommended bets:
Tottenham +1.0 on the Asian handicap at 2.00
Tottenham to beat Man City at 6.00
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