Premier League 2019/20: 5 players who could win the North London derby for Tottenham
This weekend sees the first North London derby of the 2019/20 season as Arsenal play host to Tottenham Hotspur at the Emirates Stadium, and while both sides have seen mixed results in their opening three games, right now you’d probably have to say that Gunners fans will be happier.
Spurs limped past promoted Aston Villa in their opening game, somehow rescued a point against a dominant Manchester City in their second, and then fell to Newcastle in their third in a genuinely awful performance. That result meant that taking into account 2018/19’s results, Spurs have lost 8 of their last 15 league games.
Naturally, Mauricio Pochettino’s men will be gunning to right the ship against their bitter rivals on Sunday. And if they want to do that, then Spurs need the following 5 players to come into the match on top form.
#1 Harry Kane
Tottenham’s top striker Harry Kane seemed to have erased his so-called ‘August curse’ for good during their opening game against Aston Villa by scoring a late brace to give his side a 3-1 victory. Kane took his goals excellently and it looked like the England captain was back to his best form, but in the two games that have followed, the forward has been trapped in the periphery of the game.
Barely being given a kick by Manchester City was one thing; City dominated possession and for Tottenham to even manage three shots on goal was almost a miracle, but against Newcastle, Kane struggled to make any kind of mark on the game and even missed a golden chance to equalise late on as he scuffed a late cross from Moussa Sissoko.
It is true that Kane is at his best when his teammates are providing him with goalscoring chances, but the striker is also capable of so much more than he’s shown in his past two games. Against Arsenal too, Kane has been a deadly marksman recently – he’s scored in all but two of the last ten North London derbies, and if he can recapture his best form this Sunday it could be trouble for the Gunners.