What's Gone Wrong for Tottenham Hotspur This Season

Comparisons are, by their very nature, mainly designed to make one object seem worse than the other. And in the case of Tottenham Hotspur this season, they've always been on the thin end of the stick.

Tottenham’s results this season are clearly worse than last year's. 15 points after 16 games is not good enough—yet for the most part, it's the same team that finished 5th last year.

What’s gone wrong?

It doesn't help that their traditional rivals Arsenal have performed better this year than last; again, with the same starting eleven as in 2006/07'.  After 16 games, Tottenham are 22 points and 12 places behind the team based at the Emirates.

Yet Tottenham (and their fans) need to concentrate on their own fortunes rather than looking enviously towards others. Tottenham's success should not be related to Arsenal's. More than anything, this led to Martin Jol's dismissal.

With Juande Ramos installed as the new manager, Tottenham now have the successful leader they've not had since Terry Venables—someone whose record at Sevilla shows that he can take good players and mould them into a great team.

28 goals in 16 league games show that Tottenham can score. But individual mistakes have cost the team dearly. After just over a month in charge, Ramos has without doubt identified the players he needs to solidify the team.

Though Paul Robinson has not played consistently well for the last season and a half, I don't see much changing. Radek Cerny and Ben Alnwick have both played Premiership football in the past.

With Gareth Bale out for around three months, it's essential that Tottenham get a left-sided player this January. Matthew Taylor has fallen down the pecking order at Fratton Park, and is a known Tottenham fan. He's also free to play in the UEFA Cup—and I would be very surprised if a deal isn't made to bring him to N17, either on loan or permanently.

Strengthening the defence will be the other priority during this transfer window. The treatment room is now clear of Ledley King and Ricardo Rocha, thereby giving Ramos the one luxury to be denied to Tottenham this season: a selection of defenders to choose from. An experienced defender will surely be added to the squad, hopefully becoming a guiding light for Michael Dawson, the much maligned Younes Kaboul, and the promising Dorian Dervitte.

Only Dider Zokora is off to the African Nations Cup, and this gives Teemu Tainio or Tom Huddlestone the chance to impress while partnering Jermaine Jenas in the centre of midfield. However neither is the quality defensive midfielder that the fans are asking for.

Ramos has also flirted with playing Steed Malbranque more centrally, and even using Dimitar Berbatov as the most attacking player in a midfield five, hoping to give him more touches of the ball. If anyone is to be brought in, it will be a midfielder who specialises in harassing the opposition—and perhaps that left-winger Tottenham have spent the last three seasons searching for.

Tottenham have four quality strikers, but with question marks still hanging over the long-term future of Berbatov and Jermain Defoe, speculation will be rife as to whether one of these two will be leaving in January.

If one is to go, I expect Defoe will be the one sold, as his contract expires first. Harry Redknapp's Portsmouth will probably lead the chase, though Chelsea may also want him to replace the disappointing Shevchenko.

Tottenham's season is far from over. With a Carling Cup quarter final at Manchester City next week, a FA Cup third round tie at home against Reading, and the UEFA Cup knockout stages to look forward to, there's still a lot to play for. And a European placing through the league, though now difficult to achieve, is still not beyond them.

With the busy Christmas schedule soon upon them, the next two league games at Portsmouth and Arsenal are vital, and also sandwich that quarterfinal at City. If Tottenham can get four points from those two league games, it will set them up nicely for the next two home games against Fulham and Reading. Eight or ten points from the twelve available before 2007 finishes is a reasonable target for a team that has shown an ability to turn victories into draws, and good performances into bad results this season.

Ramos has already shown the tactical nous that Jol lacked. If he can get Tottenham winning the games they dominate, and mold a quality team from the quality players that Tottenham undoubtedly have, then 2008 promises to compare favourably to 2007.

And that, despite what may or may not happen in the red half of North London, is what Tottenham should aspire to.