It is all on the line every single time Tottenham Hotspur step out on the pitch, as they are in a tooth and nail Premier League relegation fight with West Ham United. Although Nottingham Forest and Leeds United may still be mathematically in the battle, these two sides have done enough to pull away to the point where Spurs only hope is to keep above West Ham at all costs.
While Arsenal can help Tottenham out by winning against the Hammers this weekend, Spurs fans have learned to never count on anyone else for help, least of all Arsenal. And no true Spur will ever root for Arsenal to get a result anywhere, even if their main priority at this point is Premier League survival - Arsenal bottling the league to Manchester City would merely be a dessert to the main course.
On Monday Night Football, Tottenham will do direct battle with Leeds in a head to head relegation battle, and they will need to do much better than they did in their last direct relegation match, which was a 3-0 shellacking at the hands of Nottingham Forest before the international break which ended up being Igor Tudor's final game in the manager's seat.
Tottenham are favorites again
But Tottenham are a much better team now than then. They are night and day after the hiring of Roberto De Zerbi, who broke up a winless streak of 15 games, with the 2-2 draw against Brighton serving as the turning point to start a three game streak without a defeat.
Legendary Premier League striker and pundit Alan Shearer sounds like he is becoming a believer in the Spurs cause, and he predicts Tottenham Hotspur to beat Leeds United on Monday, citing their recent upturn in form. And he also heaped some deserved praise on Roberto De Zerbi.
Shearer said of Spurs, via Chris Cowlin, "Leeds are going to play a huge part in who gets relegated, because they play both Spurs and West Ham. It's fascinating, but I think with what I saw from Spurs last week, they may just have enough now to stay up. And I guess with the energy that they showed the other day, I think they'll have enough to beat Leeds at home. Spurs to win. Roberto De Zerbi has got a shift out of those players, and you didn't see any of that six or seven weeks ago. It looks like a brilliant move now to bring De Zerbi in when they did, that's the reason why they did it then, it was to get something different out of the players that they had not been showing, and it looks as if he's getting that difference now, which they've not had for large parts of this season, or for any of the season."
Now top pundits are picking Tottenham in games, whereas a mere few weeks ago, you had the likes of Jamie Carragher openly wondering if Spurs could beat anyone, including the worst team in the league, Wolves. Well, Tottenham shut them out, they upset Aston Villa last weekend, and now it's time to pick up three more points againts Leeds.