Tottenham Set to Compound Leicester’s Premier League  Woes

With just one point from six matches and placed last on the log, Leicester City’s Premier League woes may be compounded today as they visit North London for a date with Tottenham Hotspur who are yet to taste defeat in the league this season

Tottenham Hotspur will be aiming to bounce back from their Champions League defeat to Sporting Lisbon when they welcome Leicester City to North London for today’s  battle.

The Lilywhites suffered a 2-0 loss in Portugal midweek, while Brendan Rodgers’s men most recently went down 5-2 to Brighton & Hove Albion.

While Antonio Conte watched his side struggle to create many clear-cut opportunities against Sporting, former Tottenham youngster Marcus Edwards nearly scored an exhilarating solo goal before another pair of Ruben Amorim’s attackers got the job done for the hosts in the dying embers.

Substitutes Paulinho and Arthur Gomes both came off the bench to score in added time for Sporting as Tottenham fell to their first Champions League loss of the season, although Conte did not believe that a defeat was an accurate reflection of how the game went.

However, Conte’s reluctance to refresh is XI did not pay dividends, but Spurs have been handed an ideal opportunity to recover against the Premier League’s basement side, with the game going ahead despite concerns that Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral would force a postponement.

A 2-1 win over Fulham two weekends ago saw Tottenham move onto 14 points from their first six games of the new league season, and the third-placed Lilywhites could end the day top of the table if Manchester City fail to overcome Wolverhampton Wanderers at lunchtime. Current leaders Arsenal will hope to respond against Brentford one day later.

Tottenham welcome Leicester to North London having strung together a seven-game winning streak at home in all competitions, but creative concerns continue to bedevil Conte, whose side are far from well-rested compared to Rodgers’s under-performing crop.

Some Leicester fans would have welcomed the chance to see their side test their mettle against 17th-placed Aston Villa last weekend, while others would have accepted the postponement of that clash with open arms given the way their side have performed so far.

In what turned out to be Graham Potter’s final match in charge of Brighton & Hove Albion before his quickfire Chelsea appointment, the Seagulls were the predators and the Foxes were the prey in a 5-2 South Coast romping, which extended Leicester’s losing run to five matches.

Rodgers and co can no longer turn to the transfer market to solve their lengthy list of problems – although there was a reluctance to splash the cash in the summer anyway – and the visitors remain rock bottom of the standings with a measly one point from six games.

One would not knock Leicester for going down to Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United, but performances in all areas of the pitch have been alarming nonetheless, and only Bournemouth (18) have shipped more goals than the Foxes (16) so far.

Tottenham did the double over Leicester by an aggregate scoreline of 6-3 in the 2021-22 Premier League season and are now out to record their fourth successive win in this fixture, and the hosts’ confidence tank could do with a top-up before facing Arsenal after the international break.

Meanwhile, top spot in the Premier League table is up for grabs for Manchester City when they travel to Molineux to take on Wolverhampton Wanderers at lunchtime today.

The Citizens ran out 2-1 winners over Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League in midweek, while the hosts have not been in action since beating Southampton 1-0 on September 3.

From becoming Wolves’ new marquee striker to suffering a devastating  Anterior Cruciate Ligament  (ACL) injury in his first half of football for the Premier League side, Sasa Kalajdzic went through all the emotions as he now embarks on the long road to recovery.

With Raul Jimenez also struggling to cut the mustard, Wolves have turned to Premier League winner Diego Costa to spearhead their charge, with the ex-Chelsea man bringing his fiery and controversial playing style back to England for another year.

Wolves did not need Kalajdzic, Costa or Jimenez to sink Southampton 1-0 two weekends ago, as Daniel Podence came up with the game’s only goal in first-half injury time for their first win of the season, and their trip to Anfield to take on Liverpool was postponed in the wake of Queen Elizabeth II’s death.

As such, Lage’s side still possess a three-game unbeaten run ahead of the visit of the champions, but their lack of firepower to this point has only allowed them to climb as high as 14th in the table with a league-low three goals – only West Ham United have also been as shot-shy. Having conceded just one goal at Molineux and four in total so far this season, Wolves do hold the honour of being the Premier League’s best defensive team after six matches, and every inch of that rearguard nous will have to count if City are to walk away with anything less than three points.

Out of respect for his former club, Erling Braut Haaland did not celebrate his winner against Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League, but the BVB faithful could have forgiven the 22-year-old for revelling in his acrobatic excellence at the Etihad.

Jude Bellingham marked his return to English turf with a deft header to open the scoring in that Group G clash, but a John Stones thunderbolt levelled the scores in the second half before Haaland channelled his inner Johan Cruyff to sink his old employers – the outside-of-the-foot cross from Joao Cancelo was not half bad either.

Now returning to domestic action for the first time since drawing 1-1 with Aston Villa on September 3, Pep Guardiola’s side remain one point adrift of Arsenal at the top, but a draw would be enough to see the champions return to the summit before the Gunners tackle Brentford a day later.

City’s unbeaten run in all competitions now stands at eight games – with four of their most recent five ending in victory – and it has been over a year since Guardiola’s men lost a Premier League away match, winning 15 and drawing six since defeat to Tottenham Hotspur last August.

Wolves did overcome the Citizens at Molineux as recently as December 2019 – doing the double over them that year – but the champions have since won four in a row versus the hosts, and the four-goal Kevin De Bruyne masterclass helped City to a 5-1 win in this fixture back in May.