If there is anything that completely lowers the mood of Tottenham fans to the ground, it is the 0-3 defeat to Brentford on the opening day of the Premier League. They have just witnessed a series of expensive rookies joining the club, but what they just saw at Gtech Community stadium is no different from a nightmare.
Tottenham was completely overwhelmed in both spirit and playing style against the team from the same city. Brentford showed all the qualities Tottenham lacked, which are cohesion, strength, speed and decisiveness in the bottom 1/3 of the field. While Brentford under Keith Andrews seems to be approaching completion in playing style, Roberto De Zerbi's Tottenham is like a team still struggling in the starting stage.
It is too early to talk about Tottenham's future this season, but the way they performed last weekend was no different from the form they had at the end of the Thomas Frank and Igor Tudor dynasties. Everyone understands that a series of new arrivals need time to catch up with the new playing style, but most of them are Premier League veterans. Therefore, the recent performance is unacceptable.
After the match, one of the reasons De Zerbi gave to explain the defeat was the too dense pre-season travel schedule. The Italian coach said that this has limited the training time of some stars such as center-back Micky van de Ven, causing him to miss the opening match. Besides, Spurs also lacked Pedro Porro, Mateus Fernandes for various reasons.
De Zerbi does not justify the defeat, he clearly sees the current situation of the team that it takes time to create cohesion. There were times in the pre-season Spurs showed progress, typically the impressive performance in the first half of the victory over Chelsea in Australia. However, even after defeating Hoffenheim 3-0 last week, De Zerbi himself admitted that the team has not yet reached the desired state.
Once again, the shortage of key personnel and the interrupted pre-season preparation process have hindered De Zerbi's efforts to build the team according to his intentions. However, the reality is that they are still very far from professional requirements. Jan Paul van Hecke and Marcos Senesi were recruited to support De Zerbi in deploying his playing style, but Brentford has thoroughly exploited the weaknesses in speed, as well as the aerial competition ability of this central defender duo.
The defeat to Brentford reminded Spurs fans of the image of the failed team last season. They were only 17th and only 2 points ahead of the relegation group. In the previous two seasons, they had lost 22 out of 38 matches. Therefore, one of the biggest challenges for De Zerbi at Tottenham is changing the defeat culture of the "Roosters". He seems to have made positive progress in his 7-match coaching period. However, the defeat on the opening day shows that De Zerbi still has a lot of work to do to change a club that is already used to losing matches.
