Precedent Shows Tottenham Should Be Judged on How They Handle Christmas

On his song "The Christmas Waltz," Frank Sinatra described the season as "that time of year when the world falls in love."

After a tough start to the 2014-15 campaign, fans of 12th-place Tottenham Hotspur will hope they feel so affectionate about their team by the time they complete their busy Christmas and New Year's fixture list.

Recent precedent shows the start of winter has been a notably productive time for Tottenham in the Premier League. They have built successive strong pushes for a top-four place on their form during this period.

Albeit accounting for differences in personnel at the club now, big judgements about this Spurs side should be reserved until it is seen how they perform in the upcoming month-and-a-half. No early-season excuses anymore, just wall-to-wall football in which we will firmly see how the team is shaping up under Mauricio Pochettino's management.

Paul Gilham/Getty Images

The period essentially commences with this Sunday's trip to Hull City. With Europa League, Capital One Cup and FA Cup games included, Tottenham are playing two matches per week up until the weekend of January 4.

Such a prospect might sound concerning given the north London club have had mixed success handling a similar workload already this season.

Julian Finney/Getty Images

But there is something different about the flow of things from here on. The last international break of the year has passed, and while the process might not have gone entirely smoothly (certainly so in Spurs' case), the team has had ample time to get to know each other in the wake of summer changes. With little time to think about anything beyond the next game, they can concentrate fully on the task at hand.

New to White Hart Lane himself, Pochettino can take encouragement from how Spurs got things together three months into Andre Villas-Boas' reign two seasons ago.

After another poor start to November then, Villas-Boas' side finished the month strongly with wins over West Ham United and Liverpool. Save for a narrow loss away at Everton on December 8, Spurs used the momentum to establish an unbeaten league run which would extend until March.

The 5-1 thrashing by Liverpool on December 15—the latest, damaging loss to a top-four rival for the Portuguese—ended Villas-Boas' hopes of doing similar a year ago. His replacement Tim Sherwood benefited from taking over at such a frenetic time, though. Tottenham took 15 points from the following six games heading into January, keeping them in touch with their Champions League-place ambition.

Paul Gilham/Getty Images

That neither Villas-Boas nor Sherwood fulfilled that aim is a reminder that points recorded in the festive fixture list only go so far. Nonetheless, Spurs were in a position to compete in the final few months because of the consistency they showed around the turn of the year.

Under Pochettino, the Lilywhites have been less stable than in previous seasons at this point (in part a product of the managerial changes that instigated his own arrival).

The team look porous at the back, while the attack and midfield have varied between brilliant and uninspired with worrying inconsistency. The head coach himself is having difficulty figuring out the reasons for all this. He has gone from sticking with much the same league line-up to arguably mixing and matching a little too recklessly.

Conversely to past campaigns, the frequency of football ahead could work against Spurs if they are not careful. The flip side of so many games is poor performances and losses can soon pile up. The worst-case scenario is by New Year's Day, Pochettino's team could potentially be mired in the Premier League's bottom half and out of two cup competitions.

Richard Heathcote/Getty Images

'Tis (almost) the season to be jolly, though, so the Argentinian and his team would rather stick with the idea of so many games providing a great opportunity for them.

Tottenham are only six points off from where they were this time a season ago, three from where they were in 2012. By the time of their midweek clash with table-toppers Chelsea on December 3, they could theoretically be on the edge of the top four.

Ol' Blue Eyes sang, "Merry Christmas, may your New Year dreams come true" on the earlier mentioned track. If Spurs' dreams in 2015 are going to be fulfilled, the foundations need to be laid in the next few weeks.