Arsenal legend Ian Wright feels Tottenham might need ‘checked out already’ after one moment within the north London derby last weekend.
The Gunners secured a dominant 4-1 win at the house of their local rivals on Sunday on a nightmare afternoon for Spurs.
As Arsenal re-established a five-point lead at the highest of the Premier League table, Tottenham were left mired in a relegation scrap, just 4 points above the drop zone.
It looks more likely to be a three-way battle to avoid 18th place between Spurs, Nottingham Forest and West Ham, while Leeds will not be entirely secure yet, but are in a powerful position, two points and one place above Tottenham.
Defeat to Arsenal was no surprise, but Wright felt a clip from the match which went viral was a really worrying sign for Spurs.
A video showed newly appointed interim manager Igor Tudor telling centre-back Micky van de Ven to push up, with the Dutch defender not responding in any respect and the boss eventually giving up.
Wright feels it was an indication of a player who has already given up, saying on The Overlap: ‘Against Arsenal I saw Igor Tudor attempting to speak to Van de Ven and he blanked him, totally blanked him. That claims to me they’ve checked out already.
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‘He’s blanked him! This guy’s recent, he wants him to come back up, Van de Ven and he just stayed there. That don’t look good!’
Roy Keane was on The Overlap with Wright and was not so pessimistic, declaring Wright’s ‘checked out’ comment as ‘harsh’.
‘It was a troublesome start for him, Arsenal,’ Keane said of Tudor’s first game answerable for Spurs.
‘I still think they’ll be okay, but I’m not falling for this one, “they’re too good to go down,” no. However the games they’ve got coming up, I believe they’ll discover a bit greater than Forest and West Ham.
‘West Ham have gotten a bit little bit of momentum going and massive game coming up this weekend, Forest was a killer blow, last minute [defeat] to Liverpool. These are all little momentum-turners, they will change week-to-week.
‘I still think Tottenham could have enough to not sleep.’
Former Spurs midfielder Danny Murphy has also backed Tudor to get his team out of the relegation mire.
‘I can be really surprised in the event that they weren’t capable of fight their way out of it,’ he told BBC Sport. ‘The games coming up are all huge. I believe they are going to have barely enough.
‘The actual fact we’re mentioning Spurs happening is unbelievable. It’s absolutely ridiculous really.
‘Whether you blame recruitment or the owners, it might be catastrophic for that club. I even have heard some fans suggest happening may very well be the very best thing. I just don’t see that.’
Tudor himself also says he’s confident Spurs is not going to go down, feeling he has good players who’re doing the mistaken things.
‘In fact I’m confident because I imagine these are good players with bad habits. It’s all about that,’ the Croatian told Sky Sports.
‘They’re good. No person can tell me they don’t have quality. But we want to vary our mental sharpness. To be in the sport from the primary minute, and to have the physicality to do that.’
Despite being in a relegation fight, Spurs remain within the Champions League and can discover their last 16 opponents on Friday.
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