Bring on the Spurs

Well it is drawing ever closer to another weekend and at this time of the year, out of sync with the weather, the Premier League football season really hots up. There are some good matches taking place both in England's top flight and on the continent this weekend, with the greatest of all "derby" matches taking place in Spain on Saturday night with Barcelona playing host to Real Madrid.

Madrid have just changed their manager and former Tottenham manager Juande Ramos who was so ignominiously removed from his post just a few weeks ago has now taken over the reins at Europe's self-appointed top club. And speaking of Tottenham, they provide the opposition to Manchester United this weekend in what looks like the top billing Premier League match of the weekend at White Hart Lane.

I always look forward to Manchester United matches against Tottenham and that's not just because United have a fantastic record against the team from round the Seven Sisters Road, although it certainly helps. Spurs, like United, have generally always been a team that likes to play passing football and this usually results in open matches with both teams passing the ball well and using width. Added to which, I have always known Spurs supporters with whom to share some banter.

This time around, I have rather mixed feelings about the match. On the one hand, I think that once again it will be a good spectacle to watch. However, I think this will be a difficult match for United and not a match to be taken lightly. Spurs have picked up tremendously well in recent weeks under the stewardship of Harry Redknapp and whereas many of their players were drained of their confidence under Ramos, Redknapp has come in and given players belief in their ability again.

I am particularly worried about the absence of Patrice Evra for Manchester United. Evra was recently hit with a four match ban for a fracas with an overzealous steward in a match at Chelsea last season but in fact, he is serving a five match suspension as he was already sitting out the match at White Hart Lane due to picking up five yellow cards so far this season. Evra is an important player to United as his energy and overlapping runs down the left flank can very quickly turn defensive situations into attacking ones for his team. In his absence, he is likely to be replaced by jack of all trades, master of none John O' Shea, who even ended up in goal in a match at White Hart Lane a couple of seasons ago. O' Shea neither has Evra's pace, nor his positional sense, given the acres of space he afforded the Aalborg striker he was meant to be marking on Wednesday night, leading to their second goal.

Evra's absence is likely to result in a field day for Aaron Lennon. Lennon is the kind of greased lightning winger who will always polarise opinion because while some will marvel at his pace, others will bemoan his sometimes abject final ball. I've always tended to be of the opinion that if a winger has natural pace, that is the main thing as you can work on improving the other aspects of his game and no defender in top flight football really relishes playing against someone blessed with blistering pace. For that reason, I'm a fan of Lennon's and it is no surprise to me to see him blossoming under Harry Redknapp. Redknapp's strength as a manager is being a good man motivator, knowing how to get the best out of individuals and he has clearly recognised that Lennon is the kind of player that needs constant assurance.

I recall Manchester United's match against Tottenham in the FA Cup last season which United won 3-1 from a goal down and Lennon played in direct opposition to Evra in the match that day and gave United's left back a torrid time, setting up Robbie Keane's goal and generally causing a nuisance. Now, making a mug of a full back is what anyone wants to see from their team's wing players, but Lennon did not make any old full back look like a slouch, Patrice Evra is a very quick player himself and in my humble opinion, is the best left back that United have had in the 22 years I have supported them. If Lennon could make life difficult for such a good player, now that he has returned to form, what will he do if he is up against a mediocre utility man who has been short of games this season?

There are also a couple of other issues that United have to deal with for this match. Firstly, Cristiano Ronaldo is also suspended, as a result of his ill advised handball in the Manchester Derby which led to his second yellow card and an early bath in that match. It will be interesting to see who Ferguson chooses to replace the 2008 Ballon D'or winner for this match. My expectation is that he may give the industrious Park Ji-Sung a start. The South Korean has had a good campaign for United so far when he has been given the opportunity and he certainly cannot be accused of not pulling his weight.

Then there is the headline story of the day, namely that Dimitar Berbatov is returning to White Hart Lane for the first time since his summer departure. Given that Robbie Keane was booed by sections of the crowd when he returned with Liverpool a few weeks ago, considering the acrimonious way in which Berbatov left Spurs to join United, the Bulgarian is bound to receive a hostile reception from the Spurs crowd. From United's point of view, what would concern me is how Berbatov deals with this. Berbatov sometimes has a tag of being a player who goes missing in away matches and this tag is not altogether unwarranted. United need Berbatov to impose himself right from the start in this match and when the boos ring in his ears, he should let this galvanise him.

Given that Berbatov did not feature at all against Aalborg in the midweek match, that suggests to me that Ferguson will be starting him at White Hart Lane. But if it were me picking the team, I would be half tempted to leave Berbatov on the bench and start with Carlos Tevez. Tevez missed a couple of chances against Aalborg it's true, but there has been much to admire in his play when he has been given the opportunity in recent weeks and his commitment to the team is excellent. I know that there is some talk that Tevez could be off in January as his "owner" is unhappy that he is not getting a regular starting place and Tevez is still only on loan to United, but I think United should do everything in their power to hang on to him. Tevez scored United's late equaliser in this corresponding fixture last season and I think with a start this time around, this could be the ideal sort of match for him.

Berbatov will not be the only former Spurs player in United's line-up on Saturday. Michael Carrick did not feature against Aalborg but should return for the weekend. Both he and Darren Fletcher have enjoyed good seasons in the centre of United's midfield and both should feature at White Hart Lane. It was good, however, to see Paul Scholes return for United in the second half of their draw against Aalborg. It is no secret that the ginger magician is one of my all-time favourite United players and with him now 34 years of age, every match he plays brings home the realisation that he will not be gracing the pitch for that much longer. Scholes had been out for several weeks with a ligament injury which at his age could have kept him out for a long time. But it was testament to Scholes's appetite for the game and the remarkable way in which he has looked after himself that not only did he return to fitness much sooner than anticipated, but his energy levels in the 2nd half against Aalborg would have made a player ten years younger proud. Scholes has a good goalscoring record against Spurs, so I expect him to feature at some point on Saturday evening.

As I mentioned earlier, this is a match that I think United could have done with the fixture computer picking out for them a few weeks ago when Spurs were really struggling. Since Harry Redknapp took over, he has seen his team lose just twice and from the day he took over when his new club had scored just 2 points and were rock bottom of the Premier League, his team are now up to the comparatively dizzy heights of fifteenth following their win at Redknapp's former paymasters West Ham earlier this week.

Over the years, I have probably been guilty of doing Harry Redknapp a bit of a disservice. He has always been a bit of a wide boy and I suppose part of me has always had this picture in my head of him trying to market dodgy footballers in close proximity to a yellow three wheeled van. But while Redknapp's comparisons to Derek Trotter are not without foundation, clearly there is more to his managerial talents than just being able to spot a bargain.

You know the saying about getting better with age like a good red wine, well I think Redknapp is about the right vintage. I would say he has had the best years of his managerial career since he turned 55 some five years ago. He had his setbacks at West Ham but in the last five years or so, he got Portsmouth promoted from the Championship and established them as a Premier League club and got them to sign players of international experience such as Sol Campbell, David James and Jermain Defoe. And his crowning glory at that club was winning last season's FA Cup, Portsmouth's first major honour for over 50 years. OK, he had a brief and unsuccessful spell at Southampton between his two spells at Portsmouth, but Redknapp's heart was never in that move and he only went there out of spite towards Portsmouth's slippery former chairman Milan Mandaric with whom Redknapp had fallen out.

Redknapp is very old school with his methods, but that does not need to be a bad thing, it's a case of horses for courses and in his current surroundings, at the current time, he is the perfect antidote for Tottenham. They have got through several managers in the past five or six years and for all that time they have had a Director of Football at the club who would set the agenda so far as transfers were concerned and managers had to work under them. Redknapp very much sticks to the Frank Sinatra mantra, that is to do it "My way" or not do it at all and given Spurs's general lack of success under their years of the previous structure, it might well be that this more simple structure is better suited to them. Redknapp as a plain speaking Londoner certainly has the common touch with the supporters at White Hart Lane, given that they are pretty plain speaking themselves.

On the pitch, Redknapp will have quickly summised that his team are heading in the right direction but that he still needs a few reinforcements before his team is back where he and the club's supporters would like it to be, namely in the top 5. There are a few areas that need addressing in order for this to happen. Spurs's keeper Gomes has come from the Dutch league and is not used to being put under so much pressure from opposition forwards and so far he has been badly exposed. His decision making in coming for balls has been quite some way off the mark, to the point where he has been a risk to his own team mates' welfare. I would expect Spurs to sign a keeper in January, at least to give him some competition.

Elsewhere, I would expect Redknapp to be looking at bringing in a centre back and possibly a full back given injuries and lack of options at the back. Spurs are still reliant on Ledley King and given that he is unlikely to ever be in a position where he can play two games a week again, this is a problem. In midfield, they seem a bit short of a really imposing anchoring player who can be the heartbeat of the team and protect the back line. They are generally fine when in possession but when they lose possession, this can leave them exposed to the counter attack. I am also not entirely convinced by the signing of David Bentley. £16 million was a lot of money to spend on a right sided midfielder given that Spurs already had a better player in that position on their books and who is currently playing in that position while Bentley has been moved out of position. The loss of Berbatov and Keane over the summer and of Defoe last season has also meant Spurs are short of a regular and reliable goalscorer.

I do not doubt that Redknapp will see Spurs some way safe by the end of the season, but I hope that Spurs's progress is curtailed with a defeat on Saturday. United should have some unfinished business with Redknapp given that his Portsmouth team were responsible for knocking Manchester United out of last season's FA Cup at the quarter-final stage. Portsmouth would go on to win the competition while Manchester United would win the Premier League and the Champions League. But United dominated Portsmouth in that cup tie and really should have beaten them, and looking back, had United won that match, they would have had a fantastic chance to complete their second Treble, following on from the one in 1999. That Treble was unprecedented, so I can only wonder on what superlatives would have been conjured up had a second Treble come to fruition in 2008. Ifs and buts I suppose.

On a more important level in the here and now, United need the 3 points as they will not be in action in the following round of Premier League matches due to their participation in the World Club Championship, a reward for winning last season's Champions League. That will mean playing catch-up and with a homecoming match at Stoke City on Boxing Day, which does not look like the ideal match in which to be dusting off the cobwebs, United really need to take 3 points at White Hart Lane in order to ensure they are not putting too much pressure on themselves heading into the New Year. United are not quite at their fluent best at the moment and are giving teams chances.

With Evra and Ronaldo both missing and Wayne Rooney not at the level of form he was at during the early weeks of the season since returning from a spell on the sidelines, this looks like an opportunity for Spurs to get something out of the game and I can personally see a strong possibility of a repeat of last season's 1-1 scoreline in this fixture.