Tottenham bottom of Premier League despite £300m summer spend - where do they go from here?

21.09.2026, 20:30 skysports.com

This time it was supposed to be different. After multiple false dawns for Tottenham Hotspur, the club had a manager with proven Premier League experience, and had handed him a £300m+ war chest - easily the biggest in its entire history.

Instead, Spurs find themselves bottom of the table after five games for the first time in 18 years, with their only goals a pair of consolation strikes on another dismal afternoon against Aston Villa at the weekend.

Things aren't quite as bad as the table suggests and had Tottenham taken any of a number of presentable first-half chances against Villa, they would have gone into the three-week international break silencing some of the noise around the club.

But instead, two points from five games and such a dismal record in front of goal has kept the spotlight firmly on them.

Though it is only five games, their struggles to find consistency have extended into a third consecutive season. Tottenham have now picked up just 18 points in 2026 and, since the start of 2024/25, still one fewer than a West Ham side who were relegated at the end of last season.

Roberto De Zerbi cannot avoid scrutiny forever, especially after a summer where he was given relative carte blanche in the transfer market and, a top-class left-winger aside, got most of what he asked for.

Speaking before the Villa game, he hinted he would have liked to have done things differently during the summer window, but the club had to respect Financial Fair Play and some players who had been earmarked for sale remained at the club.

That will not afford him much sympathy given the size of Spurs' spend. One of the outgoings who they were happy to let go, Luka Vuskovic, is thriving at Brighton. Meanwhile, the player he replaced, Jan Paul van Hecke, toiled in that Villa defeat and was dribbled past three times.

Regardless, Tottenham were always unlikely to be an overnight fix given money alone will not solve the sizeable task of changing course after finishing 17th in back-to-back seasons.

But fans still expected something more than this, especially from a head coach known for his man-management and getting the best out of limited resources, as he demonstrated across nearly two years on the south coast at Brighton.

Even one win would lift them out of the quagmire - and they will target a similarly under-pressure Man Utd side when the Premier League returns on October 10, live on Sky Sports. However, there are a number of issues of concern even after that mammoth spend.

The naive manner Spurs fell behind to Villa with Micky Van de Ven off the pitch injured and Andy Robertson inadvertently teeing up the opportunity, led De Zerbi to complain that "leaders have to be leaders" in such crunch moments. "We can't lose games in this way," he added.

But does his squad have enough of that kind of player? Van de Ven, Pedro Porro, Ben Davies, James Maddison and Archie Gray were named as De Zerbi's five-man leadership group last month, but none would be considered an out-and-out natural leader, who can hoist his team-mates up by their collars.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

This is nothing new. Despite long-standing allegations of being 'Spursy', in the last two years, that nickname has truly taken on a new form. Tottenham have not won a league game when conceding first in approaching two years and have picked up only nine draws from losing positions since.

It was the right time for Cristian Romero to move on in the summer largely because his aggression could often overstep the mark, but it has left a void which has not been filled.

Instead, it has been compounded by the further loss of perhaps limited but unquestionably combative midfielder Joao Palhinha. In De Zerbi's defence, he made no secret of his desire to keep him.

More worryingly, it does not appear a problem the head coach has a solution to. "It is difficult to explain," he admitted after Saturday's defeat. "In my 14 years as a coach, I've never seen a team like us, so fragile and inconsistent."

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

He need only look to the home stands if he needs any filling in from a fanbase who are all too used to seeing exactly that over the past two years.

Even without Palhinha he cannot complain too loudly about his midfield given the near £200m sanctioned to sign Sandro Tonali and Matheus Fernandes.

Tonali in particular should be fresh after a summer off from the World Cup, but has yet to hit the heights which made him a fan favourite for much of his time at Newcastle and convinced Spurs to break their transfer record to sign him.

The bizarre sideshow of Richarlison's future has not helped matters either, despite his own limitations. That too is only compounded by Spurs' lack of goals while last season's top scorer watches on from his own, albeit partly self-imposed, spell in exile.

Dominic Solanke has still not returned to full fitness and De Zerbi was almost apologetic for his out-of-form striker after his latest performance against Villa, saying "he's much better than this Dominic Solanke".

But with the average xG of Spurs' shots the lowest across the Premier League and their overall total better only than Coventry's, the real Solanke needs to stand up sooner rather than later - or Omar Marmoush re-find his scoring boots.

It is still very early days in the latest iteration of the Spurs machine, and given the significant turnover in players in the summer - over half of Saturday's starting line-up were not at the club last season - no surprise there have been some teething problems.

But the sight of a Premier League table showing two points, two goals and Spurs holding up the rest of the league will feel like a lot more than that.

There is still a feeling things will come good - there is undoubted quality in the squad and no-one needs reminding of De Zerbi's abilities. But his spells elsewhere have a habit of ending on a sour note. The hope is that it hasn't already set in here.

Watch Spurs take on Man Utd at Old Trafford when the Premier League returns, live on Sky Sports Premier League and Main Event from 4.30pm (kick-off 5.30pm) on Saturday October 10.

Play Super 6 for a chance to win £1m! Enter for free.