Roberto de Zerbi remains steadfast in his belief that Tottenham Hotspur are on the right path, despite their glaringly obvious struggles in front of goal this season.
Spurs have endured a wretched start to their Premier League campaign, with just two points from a possible 12 and they have yet to score a goal across any of those games. The only small crumbs of comfort came from goalless stalemates with Nottingham Forest and Everton although they mustered just two shots on target in those two games combined.
It has contributed to a rather morbid feel around Tottenham, despite their mammoth summer outlay on new players – an exercise that was done with the intention of avoiding yet another embarrassing season after back-to-back 17th-placed finishes.
Their only saving grace has arrived in the Carabao Cup, where they dismantled Championship side Charlton Athletic 5-1 last month in the second round to restore some much-needed confidence.
Spurs now travel up to Liverpool on Tuesday in the third round looking for a much-needed fillip and with de Zerbi still full of belief in the way he’s going about things. “For sure we have to improve,” said the Italian. “For sure I have big confidence in my players.
“They are very good players. We have to improve, yes. We can say it’s the coach’s responsibility if we don’t score, yes. I accept, no problem. We didn’t win any game so far, yes. We have to improve. We are sorry. We are disappointed for that.
“But I think also we have other positive things, like I said, we didn’t score goals, we didn’t suffer nothing, in both of the last two games. And from the things we have to improve, we start our work. But nothing change in my project, in my idea. I’m sorry for the result, yes, for the goals we didn’t score, yes.”
The challenge now awaiting Spurs is a trip to Anfield to face a new-look Liverpool still in the early stages of Andoni Iraola’s tutelage. The Spaniard remains unbeaten across five games so far, although there were a few murmurings of discontent at last weekend’s goalless draw at home to Fulham.
Referring to that clash, Iraola said that it was “probably the most frustrated” he has been since taking over, adding that the result was “a step backwards.”
He added: “We were not good enough, especially offensively. It was frustrating, yes.”
He indicated that changes are likely as he shuffles his pack. Confirming that back-up goalkeeper Giorgi Mamardashvili will come into the side on Tuesday, Iraola said: “I think we will see tomorrow players we haven’t seen still and I am really looking forward to seeing. I feel they’re going to play well and help us and they still haven’t had their chance.”
Liverpool are the record winners of this competition with 10 final wins, the latest coming in 2023-24. Spurs are four-time winners, the most recent back in the 2007-08 campaign.
