Tottenham tactical innovation defeats Manchester City, the Frank era begins

When Brennan Johnson and Joao Palinia scored a record in the Premier League era when goals from Brennan Johnson and Joao Palinia helped Tottenham beat Manchester City 2-0 at the Etihad Stadium, the North London team set an unprecedented record in the Premier League era - becoming the first team to score in five consecutive away games against Manchester City. According to Opta data, Tottenham limited his opponent's expected goal (xG) to below 0.8 in this game, while Pap Saul's compression efficiency in the midfield is as high as 4.3 successful steals every 90 minutes (StatsBomb source). This victory not only put Tottenham in the second place in the standings, but also marked the initial success of coach Thomas Frank's tactical system: he tied the number of clean games that only completed in nine games last season by Ang Postkoglu in just two games.

Frank's core reform lies in the reconstruction of offense and defense balance. Tottenham's defensive loophole, which was averaging 13.66 shots per game last season, has now been compressed to 12 times; more importantly, he activated Risalisson's forward fulcrum role - the Brazilian contributed 2 goals and 1 assist in two games, and his success rate of taking the ball from last year to 65% (FBref data). This transformation is reminiscent of Klopp's transformation of Firmino when he first arrived in Liverpool: using tactical discipline to unlock players' potential. Senegal's new role in midfielder Saar is more interesting: his running hot zone shows that its coverage extends from the penalty area to the bottom line, becoming a metronome for offense and defense conversion.

Although the UEFA Cup championship has been locked in the UEFA Champions League qualification for next season, the real challenge for Tottenham Hotspur is the continued competitiveness of the league. Newcastle's weak offense after losing Isaac, and Villa's struggle to lose two consecutive games at the beginning all provided a window for North London teams to hit the top four. But Frank needs to be wary of historical lessons: Postkoglu also played impressive data early last season, but eventually collapsed due to a single tactic. Today's Tottenham seems to be standing at a fork in the road: Should we repeat the mistake of losing the attack or reshape the genes of the wealthy family with pragmatism? The penalty loss to Paris Saint-Germain in the August Super Cup has proved that the team is only one layer of window paper from the top level.