The Guardian

Arsenal manager Renee Slegers spoke to BBC Sport about Kelly’s return: “She has been a really good addition to the squad. She’s got fire inside her and she has been showing that in the training. Hopefully, you will see some of that on the pitch today.

“She has integrated easily and smoothly with the rest of the group. She already knew a lot of girls because of her spell with Arsenal before and also from the England squad. We have seen the quality that she can bring in the final third during training. I am also very impressed with her willingness to work hard in training.”

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Tottenham manager Robert Vilahamn spoke to the BBC: “We need to have a really strong defence today. We need to make sure we are very disciplined. We will get a few chances but we need to be sure that we are very clinical with that. We need to do it together today.”

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Yes, Chloe Kelly is on Arsenal’s bench with Kim Little. Goalkeeper Daphne van Domselaar and defenders Leah Williamson, Steph Catley and Emily Fox, all return. Lia Walti also comes back with January signing Jenna Nighswonger deserving a quiet night on the bench.

For Spurs, Martha Thomas and Josefine Rybrink drop to the bench, while Anna Csiki and Matilda Vinberg come in.

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Preamble

If Chelsea stay beyond reach, still plenty to play for at Arsenal. Tottenham, less so, and we’ll get to that in a moment. Three points could be enough to see Arsenal overtake Manchester United in the table, and close the gap on league leaders Chelsea, though perhaps more realistically keep in the Champions League hunt. A crowd of 55,000 is expected at the Emirates, it’s a big day in north London.

Kick-off is at 12.30pm. Join me.

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Updated at 13.13 CET

A couple of years ago it was reported that Daniel Levy, the man in charge of Tottenham Hotspur, was lobbying to abolish promotion and relegation to and from the Women’s Super League. Levy’s vision was of a steady-state league, with no mobility and therefore no real jeopardy, where the same teams competed for the same stuff every season. How we laughed. As it turned out, he needn’t have gone to the trouble. It pretty much ended up happening anyway.

For Tottenham at least, a season that began replete with possibility has buffed down to a blunt point. Marooned in mid-table, eliminated from both cup competitions, safe from relegation and well out of the Champions League race, their last nine games – starting with the north London derby at the Emirates on Sunday – are essentially pure content, dead rubbers, puff football. Will they put in a strong run of results and finish in fifth? Or will they falter and slump to seventh? Tune in to find out!

And this has pretty much been the story of Spurs in recent years, barring a brief flirtation with relegation in 2022-23: an entire women’s football operation whose success basically turns on whether or not they can finish ahead of Everton. Almost invariably they beat the weaker teams at the bottom. Almost invariably they lose to the big four. Since winning promotion to the WSL in 2019 their record against Arsenal, Chelsea and the two Manchester clubs in all competitions reads: played 54, won two, drawn six, lost 46. All of which raises a salient question: what, really, is the big idea here? What is the growth plan, the blueprint for progress?

This is a question that gathers urgency when you examine Tottenham’s systems and processes in more detail. Under Robert Vilahamn, Spurs have sought to play an attractive, high-energy passing style of football that moves the ball quickly up the pitch to create scoring chances. And, you know, who doesn’t love that?

In practice, and certainly against the bigger clubs, it works out a little differently. Tottenham pass the ball out from the back. Tottenham get pressed. Tottenham panic wildly. At which point, Tottenham either lose the ball or lump it long. This season Spurs are second in the WSL for touches in their own defensive third and only eighth for touches in the attacking third.

And fair enough, this is a defined style. But not really a style that has ever felt sustainable or effective, or threatened to get the best out of the club’s attacking talents. Meanwhile a team that was renowned for being dour but hard to break down under Rehanne Skinner has become the second-leakiest defence in the league.

Naturally, there are mitigating factors here. The serial injuries to Kit Graham, one of the few players able to take the ball under pressure and progress it with class, have been a major blow. The arrival of Lize Kop in January finally seems to have addressed the chronic lack of a top-class goalkeeper comfortable playing the ball with her feet. New signings such as Olivia Holdt and Anna Csiki still clearly need a period of adjustment to the league. An overreliance on Eveliina Summanen was badly exposed by her injury in January.

But perhaps the brutal truth is that for some time now, Tottenham have been trying to play champagne football with Lambrini footballers. An erratic recruitment strategy has swung from spending big on older established stars to signing young players with potential, and still boasts far more misses than hits. Vilahamn’s stated objective is to get Spurs into the Champions League within three years, but if anything the gap to the elite is actually widening.

At which point, with regrets, it is necessary to mention the plight of the men’s team, but only because these appear to be common plights with a common root. In a landscape where the biggest clubs are becoming ever more assertive in the transfer market, Levy’s Spurs have remained largely reactive: unwilling to dig deep and invest the sums that might genuinely help them make the leap out of mid-table, unwilling to commit to a defined strategy or identity for more than a couple of years at a time.

Peer even closer and the parallels are unmistakable. The made-for-television acquisition of Alex Morgan in 2020 coincides almost perfectly with Levy’s phase of hiring celebrity managers such as José Mourinho and Antonio Conte, straining to project Tottenham as a Proper Big Club. The panic spree of 2022-23 when Bethany England arrived for a record fee and saved Spurs from relegation tracks neatly with the chaos and short-termism of Conte’s final season. Ivan Perisic is basically the male Amy James-Turner. “Abolish relegation” is basically Levy’s bespoke twist on the European Super League.

And so to the current “Stay Humble” era, in which two appealing progressive coaches try to impose their maximalist ideas with minimalist resources. It should embarrass Levy that the men’s team should have to play a bunch of exhausted teenagers in defence because of inadequate recruitment. It should embarrass him that there are more Arsenal academy graduates than Spurs academy graduates in the women’s first-team squad. That no home-produced player has started in the WSL for them all season.

It should embarrass him that when Chloe Morgan left in 2020 she accused Tottenham of treating the women’s team like second-class citizens, that the women were not even allowed to train on the same site as the men until – according to reports – a shocked Alex Morgan had to persuade Levy to let them do so. It should embarrass him that Spurs are so clearly paying the price for those years of undernourishment, and that while Chelsea redraw the lines of the market, they are barely treading water now.

But, of course, Levy – like many of his ilk – is basically post-embarrassment, an owner who has confused his longevity and impregnability for a kind of enduring genius. Whose strategy for the women’s team appears to extend no further than simply hanging in there until the really big money starts rolling in. Fifth, seventh: who really cares?

There are good people underneath him. Vilahamn – who recently signed a new contract – has the makings of a fine coach. A new centre of excellence in Enfield, given approval this week over the objections of residents and environmental campaigners, will doubtless start producing the Spurs players of the future. The vision is there. But for now the conviction is absent.

“One club” is one of Vilahamn’s favourite phrases. He meets his counterpart Ange Postecoglou on a regular basis. The two teams share backroom staff and facilities and recruitment expertise and a common vision of fast, attacking football. In a way, their fates are yoked together. But a shared blessing can also be a shared curse.

The worn-down, grim-faced Tottenham fans. The protest banners. The chants. It is a scene we are familiar with, the anti-Daniel Levy movement, mobilised on the High Road outside the stadium he built, and we are about to see it again.

The last time was before the Premier League game against Liverpool on 22 December and there were a couple of hundred there, along with the obligatory rubber-neckers, including the photographers who filed their pictures back to the news desks. It is amazing how the tight-angle shots come across. The tourists got out their cameraphones. Of course they did.

The organisers gave away black balloons, with Levy Out written on them, and the idea was for people to release them in the 24th minute of the game. The black was for doom and gloom; the number for Levy’s 24-year chairmanship.

Did anything happen? It was hard to make out a coordinated display. Luis Díaz had put Liverpool in front on 23 minutes and maybe that drew the focus. Then again, there was the sight of what looked like a couple of dog-poo bags blowing around the pitch for the remainder of Liverpool’s 6-3 win. The realisation would dawn; they were burst balloons. Either way, there was a metaphor.

Spurs had entered the game in 11th place. Four weeks earlier, with the team 10th, Ange Postecoglou had said there would be “a lot of scrutiny” on his position as the manager if they remained there at Christmas.

The club are 14th before Manchester United’s visit on Sunday and Postecoglou has indeed been questioned. He has overseen the collection of seven points from 11 matches. Spurs exited the Carabao Cup and FA Cup last week at Liverpool and Aston Villa respectively. They are still alive in the Europa League and that is huge for Postecoglou. Just as important has been his mastery of the narrative around his injury-ravaged squad.

The biggest takeaway during games from their horror run has been the lack of supporter calls for Postecoglou to go. There was mockery at Villa Park last Sunday for how badly his team played in the opening 20 minutes. But the diehards do not blame him in the first instance.

They blame the man who asked Postecoglou to manage for so many weeks with threadbare resources, especially throughout January when the transfer window was open. They blame the man who they believe has not gone deep enough with his investment in the squad, the lone constant from the past 24 years as managers of all profiles have come and gone with only one trophy delivered – the 2008 League Cup. They blame Levy.

It is the Change for Tottenham action group that have organised Sunday’s demonstration. The plan is for fans to gather at 2.45pm where Lordship Lane meets the High Road and march peacefully to the ground. After the full-time whistle, there is to be a sit-in protest in the South Stand Lower. “This is about passion, pride and protecting our club from greed-driven failure,” the group said. “To make it clear to the board that enough is enough.”

If previous actions have been underwhelming, it will be interesting to monitor this one because feelings are running high and the club have arguably never been lower in the Levy era. The 2003-04 season was a disaster under the caretaker manager David Pleat, who stepped in after Glenn Hoddle was sacked in late September. The team were never higher than 10th, grubbing around in the lower reaches of mid-table for most of it before ending up 14th. It was early days for Levy.

There was also the notorious two points from eight matches at the start of 2008-09 under Juande Ramos, which led to the call for Harry Redknapp. At about this time of the season, Redknapp had Spurs 17th but the trends were upward and they would finish eighth.

What makes it more frustrating now, more difficult to fathom, is that Spurs are firmly established among the financial elite. According to Deloitte’s most recent Money League for 2023-24 – published on 23 January – the club were the ninth-richest in world football with an annual turnover of £512m. This was during a season when they did not compete in Europe. Spurs’s most recent accounts for the year ended 30 June 2023 – published on 3 April 2024 – had shown record revenue of £549.6m.

Commercially, 2023-24 was a blockbuster period. The top-line figure of £247.4m was up £19.65m on the previous year and was helped by the stadium’s capacity to stage concerts and other sporting events. Levy has driven this, it is down to his business acumen and there is a part of him that surely believes he has held up his end. It is not as if he has failed to spend on transfers. He has overseen an outlay of £550m in net terms on players since the rebuilt stadium opened on 3 April 2019. Levy cannot play centre-half, the area where Postecoglou has been hardest hit by injuries.

Yet there are details within it all, taking in the kind of players bought, their profiles, the bets on potential. A line that damned Levy was provided by Deloitte, the one which showed Spurs’s wages-to-revenue ratio for 2023-24 was 42% – the lowest in five years and a number that was significantly lower than the other clubs in England’s “Big Six”.

If you do not pay the top wages, you do not get the superstar players. The 42% spoke to excessive caution, a lack of ambition, feeding the “profit over glory” criticism from protesting supporters. In this context, the optics of Levy’s salary are not great. According to Spurs’s most recent annual report, he received remuneration of £3.581m, plus an accrued bonus of £3m paid across the year.

For weeks, the game has been ablaze with Spurs takeover rumours. There is a buyer, agents and financiers have claimed. It is known that Amanda Staveley, the former Newcastle director who brokered the Saudi takeover at St James’ Park four years ago, has become a figure of influence at Spurs. The Guardian reported on Wednesday that a group of private Qatari investors were looking to get on board.

Spurs’s ownership structure shifted on 5 October 2022 when Joe Lewis, the billionaire businessman and ultimate benefactor, stepped back from his publicly stated position. He ceased to be a part of the Lewis Family Trust which controls Spurs, transferring it to unnamed members of his family.

The 88-year-old Lewis has subsequently endured a well-documented fall from grace. Charged with insider trading in the US on 26 July 2023, he was sentenced to three years of probation and fined $5m (£4m) on 4 April 2024.

The Lewis Family Trust owns 70.12% of Enic, the company that holds 86.58% of the shares in Spurs. Levy and certain members of his family own the other 29.88% of Enic. Lewis has two children, Vivienne and Charles, and the family’s interest at Spurs is being looked after by two trustees. Vivienne attends Spurs games but she does not have an input into the day-to-day running of the club.

The Guardian understands that the Lewis family are open to selling but what of Levy? He is consumed with Spurs, working around the clock to make them better and push the brand, especially in North America. Could he walk away? Perhaps not, which is why his staying on to run the club under new ownership if there were a sale ought not to be discounted.

Postecoglou is focused on the Manchester United match. He has had it circled in his diary for a while, describing it at the end of January as a “point for us to relaunch our campaign”, mindful as he was that some of his injured players would be back.

How is that looking? The goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario is poised to return to the starting XI and Destiny Udogie and James Maddison are expected to be in the squad. Brennan Johnson, Timo Werner and Wilson Odobert are back in training. Micky van de Ven, Cristian Romero, Radu Dragusin, Dominic Solanke and Richarlison remain out.

Postecoglou said that centre-half Van de Ven had been to see a biomechanical expert outside the club as they seek to get to the root of his hamstring issue and “make sure his body is better equipped to handle the kind of athlete he is”. Van de Ven – and Romero, for that matter – may have to be patient. It is not a commodity that is in plentiful supply at Spurs.

A women’s football academy will be built over public green space and a rewilded former golf course after Enfield council approved controversial plans by Tottenham Hotspur football club.

The council, which handed Spurs a 25-year lease for 53 hectares (130 acres) of Whitewebbs Park in north London, has backed plans for all-weather pitches, floodlights and a “turf academy” on green belt parkland rich in bats, newts and mature trees. In exchange Spurs will pay the council £2m.

Local people, who took the council to the high court to unsuccessfully challenge what they said was an unlawful enclosure of public space, protested outside the planning committee meeting.

Spurs’ planning victory followed Wimbledon’s controversial and successful plans to build 39 new tennis courts on the former Wimbledon Park golf course.

Alice Roberts, of the countryside charity CPRE London, said: “This is a dark day for parks. It’s beyond us why Enfield council is prepared to give away a beautiful public park to a wealthy private company for peanuts. They are supposed to be the custodians of public rights over the park. It has served the residents of Enfield for over 90 years. Now it’s gone for ever.

“We will continue to fight for Whitewebbs. For all other parks in the UK, we now need to take the fight to parliament. That’s because, in a previous round of this long battle, the high court ruled against Whitewebbs campaigners, effectively saying town halls can, with impunity, ignore public rights and treat parks as financial assets.”

Although the Greater London Authority (GLA) and Angela Rayner, the housing secretary, have the power to refuse or “call in” Enfield council’s decision, this is unlikely, with the GLA having last year rubber-stamped Wimbledon’s plans to develop the former golf course in south-west London.

Whitewebbs Park was bought by Enfield council for the public in 1931. Since the 1930s, the grassland section of the park was used as a public golf course, which closed in 2021. Since then, the area has reverted to nature, and is home to 80 species of bird and at least nine species of bat, as well as great crested newts and badgers. It is also thought to be the best site in north London for butterflies, with 29 species including the brown hairstreak, the purple emperor and the white-letter hairstreak.

Of the area of the park leased and managed by Spurs, 66% will remain open to the public, but 18 hectares will be fenced off for new pitches and facilities for the women’s football academy.

Spurs’s plans include converting the former golf club house into a cafe with toilets, dog-washing facilities, a resurfaced car park with EV charging ports and community space.

Ergin Erbil, the Labour leader of Enfield council, said: “We welcome the commitments made by Tottenham Hotspur Football Co Ltd (THFC) to improve the surrounding green space. THFC have committed to planting 2,000 trees, improving biodiversity, repairing footpaths, and improving public access within in the park.

“We believe this project will bring exciting opportunities to Enfield, including job opportunities, apprenticeships, and enhanced sports facilities. We know our borough will benefit from a world-class football training ground for women’s football, one of the fastest-growing sports in the world. We are also pleased to report that the new training grounds will be accessible to youth teams, grassroots football clubs and community groups.”

Local resident and lifelong Spurs fan Pratik Sampat said: “This beautiful, biodiverse area is going to get half-consumed by plastic pitches and fences. They will tidy it up and it will look like any park and it won’t have that raw, natural feel. It’s gone and the benefits in the long term accrue to this mega-corporation with very little benefit accruing to the people of the borough.”

Campaigners are taking legal advice over further challenges. Sam Gracie Tillbrook, chair of Guardians of Whitewebbs, said: “I went through a mental health crisis in lockdown and visiting Whitewebbs Park was one of the only things that allowed me to feel at peace. The loss of such a large part of the park will feel like removing a part of me. The community this park has built around it is something very special, and it brings profound sadness and distress to think that we are so close to losing it. We must save Whitewebbs.”

Campaigner Ed Allnutt said: “Whitewebbs is our public park, part of the green lung of Enfield. Spurs’s plan to privatise it and make it part of a billionaire football empire is daylight robbery.”

A Spurs spokesperson said: “We are delighted that Enfield council’s planning committee has voted to approve our proposals. This is a special site and one we know extremely well, being based next door. Our proposals will secure its future with a green use and ensure it remains an open and inclusive place for local people to enjoy.

“We shall improve local access to nature and habitats, provide new facilities for visitors, community groups and sports clubs, and put Enfield on the map as a champion of the women’s and girls’ game with a best in class academy.”

Daniel Levy could be given the chance to stay on at Tottenham by a consortium seeking to buy the club. The Guardian has learned that a group of Qatari investors are willing to give Levy a long-term contract to continue running Spurs as executive chairman.

Retaining Levy would be a controversial move given the antipathy towards the chairman from many Tottenham fans, but the investors are keen to retain his expertise.

They want control of Spurs but the proposed takeover could take the form of a phased buyout. Under one model being considered by the investors, Levy would be offered a management contract to run the club, which would remain in place even if Enic, that owns 86.91% of Tottenham, becomes a minority shareholder.

Levy has been the most influential figure at Tottenham since 2001, when Enic bought 29.9% of the club from Alan Sugar before gaining full control six years later. Under Levy’s leadership Spurs’s financial position has been transformed, with the 63-year-old masterminding the building of their new stadium and establishing Tottenham as one of the richest clubs in Europe with an annual income of more than £500m.

Tottenham have been open about the fact they are seeking outside investment, with Levy saying last year that the club needed “a significant increase in its equity base”. The financial services group Rothschild has been appointed to advise on investment talks but there is also outside interest in a takeover. Sources at the club insist they are not currently involved in negotiations on a takeover.

Tottenham have been the subject of longstanding interest from potential investors in America and the Middle East, but no one has met the £3.75bn valuation.

The identity of the Qatari bidders is unclear, but the Guardian has been told they are private individuals rather than the government-backed Qatar Sports Investment (QSI) or Sheikh Jassim, who tried to buy Manchester United two years ago.

In recent years Levy has held talks with several Qatari entities without closing a deal. In 2016 Tottenham entered negotiations with QSI about a naming-rights deal for the new stadium, and two years ago QSI approached the club about a minority investment.

The former Newcastle director Amanda Staveley, who brokered the Saudi takeover at St James’ Park four years ago, held talks with a Middle Eastern group about making an offer last year. In 2023 the Financial Times reported that a bid was being prepared by the Iranian-American billionaire Jahm Najafi.

Tottenham fans chanted “Levy out” during much of Sunday’s FA Cup fourth-round defeat at Aston Villa. For all the criticism of Levy, he has approved a £550m net spend on players since the new stadium opened six years ago.

Since 2022 Enic and Tottenham have been controlled by the billionaire Joe Lewis’s family trust, which is managed by two independent professional trustees on behalf of beneficiaries that do not include Lewis.

Newsflash: the Tottenham diehards who travelled to Villa Park are rather keen for Daniel Levy to sell up and leave their club. The refrain against the chairman pounded throughout this FA Cup tie. What they would also like is something more from their team.

When Spurs previously faced Aston Villa, they beat them 4-1 at home in early November and it has been pretty much downhill since, just just eight wins in all competitions, a slide from seventh to 14th in the Premier League.

Ange Postecoglou can now reflect on another route to silverware being blocked off, three days after the Carabao Cup semi-final exit at Liverpool. His numerous injured players (11 at present) cannot return quickly enough but what is left of the season?

Spurs can say that they created a few chances and they fought until the end. There was a goal for the new arrival Mathys Tel in stoppage time, which hinted at a ludicrous comeback, but it was just an illusion. Villa were far superior, more cohesive, pleasingly hard-running and they can look forward to an appearance in the fifth round for the first time since 2015 thanks to goals from Jacob Ramsey and the outstanding Morgan Rogers. The only issue for Unai Emery was the profligacy of his team. They could have won by a fistful.

It was an occasion when the tone was set early, Villa flying out of the blocks, Spurs so porous. Try as the visitors did, they could not reverse the flow. The first Levy Out chants were heard in the second minute and by then Spurs were one goal down.

The breakthrough was all about the cut and thrust of Rogers, who swayed around Lucas Bergvall and sprinted up through the lines before going left to Ramsey. From a Spurs point of view, it was too easy for ­Rogers. What Postecoglou really did not need was for his goalkeeper, Antonin Kinsky, to offer a passable impression of a hologram. Ramsey’s shot went through him.

The stadium bounced to a raucous beat, the presence of Marcus ­Rashford in a Villa jersey for the time since his loan signing from Manchester United – albeit only as a ­substitute – a part of it. There were placards bearing his name, demands for his shirt; a tremendous roar when the announcer got down to him on the team sheet.

Emery brought on Rashford in the 66th minute. It was his first action since 12 December and his deep freeze under Ruben Amorim at Old Trafford. Playing as the No 9, he ­clattered Kevin Danso with a stray arm and followed through into Archie Gray as he attempted a shot. In short, Rashford was rusty.

The opening 20 minutes were an ordeal for Spurs and it said plenty that the travelling supporters resorted to gallows humour. “We’re fucking shit,” they chanted after an excrucia­ting attempt to play out from the back had failed. There was also: “How shit must you be, it’s only 1-0.”

Villa were rampant in the first half, storming through Spurs’ flimsy ranks time and again. Rogers enjoyed himself in the space behind Donyell Malen, who Emery had started up front. Ramsey got plenty of joy off the left. Villa worked Kinsky on a handful of occasions before the interval, especially during the initial onslaught, and he mixed decent stops with wobbly moments, failing to get the ball away to the side with some of his parries.

How was it only 1-0 at half-time? Even more crazy was that if Son Heung‑min had taken a golden chance on 24 minutes, it might have been all square. Instead he shot too close to Emiliano Martínez after Mikey Moore’s cross. Ezri Konsa had tried to get back with Son only to pull up with what looked like a ­muscle injury, a worrying development for Villa given their fitness issues in ­central defence.

Spurs had flickered towards the end of the first period and they dug out a foothold upon the restart. With Yves Bissouma on for Moore, they had a better balance. Son was denied by a saving challenge from Konsa’s replacement, Lamare ­Bogarde, and there was the moment when Pedro Porro teed up the Spurs captain. Except that Son looked for Bissouma rather than taking the shot himself and the chance went begging. It was another illustration of Son’s tentativeness.

Spurs’ vulnerabilities did not go away. Ramsey was denied one‑on‑one by Kinsky and Villa were two in front by the time Emery sent on Rashford and another glamour loan signing, Marco Asensio, for their debuts. It was Malen playing the give‑and‑go with Leon Bailey and when he crossed and Porro could not clear, Rogers lashed high into the net.

Ange Postecoglou believes he could “destroy” some of his young players’ careers if they are exposed to the spotlight too early given the criticism levelled at his Tottenham side after their 4-0 defeat by Liverpool in the Carabao Cup semi-final second leg.

The Tottenham head coach is expecting to field a similar starting lineup against Aston Villa in the FA Cup fourth round on Sunday to the team that were thrashed 4-0 at Anfield as he waits for the return of several key players from injury.

The teenagers Dane Scarlett – who is ineligible to face Villa after playing for Oxford in an earlier round while on loan – Oyindamola Ajayi and Mikey Moore all scored in the 3-0 win over Elsfborg at the end of January that secured progress to the last 16 of the Europa League. But, having seen some of his more experienced players singled out for their poor performances against Liverpool, Postecoglou – who will be without Richarlison as a result of the calf injury he picked up at Anfield – stressed he has a duty to protect those who are taking the first steps in their professional careers.

“It’s one thing to put them on late in a European game but I’m not going to expose young players to that … we saw what happened and our players are now getting criticised,” he said of the outcome at Anfield.

“Most of them will be able to handle it but I wouldn’t want to expose a young player to something like that, especially the way the world is today. You know, we don’t want to make determinations in a snap instance and destroy careers. I’m not going to expose young players who I don’t think are ready for that.

“So we don’t have the opportunity to rotate but I think it will be a similar kind of team that rolls out on Sunday. We’ve been doing this for quite a while now for the last three months and we have handled that pretty well at times and that’s what we will try and do on Sunday.”

The new signings Kevin Danso and Mathys Tel both made their debuts at Liverpool, with the latter coming on as a second-half substitute. Postecoglou expects the France Under-21s forward who has joined on loan from Bayern Munich to have an immediate impact.

“We’re going to have to lean on him a fair bit now. But he came here to play,” he said. ““His physical condition is not too bad. He hasn’t played a lot but watching him in training and last night, he was still moving quite well. We have to be careful with him, also. But he came here to play and he’ll get an opportunity to do that.”

Put yourself in Ange Postecoglou’s shoes for a moment. The Carabao Cup semi-final second leg against Liverpool at Anfield on Thursday has been trailed for a good while as a kind of personal D-day. There have been questions about whether the Tottenham manager will even reach it – specifically after dismal Premier League defeats by Everton (away) and Leicester (home).

Postecoglou’s job security has been a major talking point as his team have slid to 14th in the table and the first thing to say is that the Spurs chairman, Daniel Levy, has sacked managers who have been in better positions. The lack of a compelling, available alternative – internally or externally – has helped Postecoglou.

Postecoglou battles on to Anfield, boosted by progress into the Europa League last 16 and the critical league win at Brentford on Sunday, and it is always going to be an emotional occasion for a guy who was in thrall to Liverpool as he grew up in Australia; a devotee of their great teams of the late 70s and early 80s. Spurs are 1-0 up from the first leg and for a romantic like Postecoglou, there is a script to be written.

This is the bit where reality intrudes. In the red corner are the outstanding team of the season so far, chasing four trophies; settled, pretty much all of their players in good physical condition. The Liverpool manager, Arne Slot, has a theory that his squad are getting stronger rather than feeling the fatigue, based on how they are growing under his leadership, understanding him and his methods with exponential levels of clarity.

Winning, of course, breeds confidence. It generates momentum. And a word, too, for Slot’s expert rotation of his admittedly rich playing resources; the courage of his convictions. At Southampton in the quarter-final of the Carabao Cup, the tie had threatened to turn when the home team scored on 59 minutes to cut Liverpool’s lead to 2-1. Slot had left a host of key players on Merseyside. Now he doubled down, withdrawing the midfield mainstay, Alexis Mac Allister, and introducing the academy prospect James McConnell. It is just a small example but an instructive one. Liverpool would close out the win.

Postecoglou is without 10 injured players for the Anfield showdown. He has regularly run with a double-digits absentee list over the past couple of months. It is tempting before kick-off to want to mention Dane Scarlett to make it up to a full XI; the striker, recalled from his loan at Oxford, is cup-tied.

Postecoglou includes his outfield signings from the winter transfer window – Kevin Danso and Mathys Tel. Both arrived late and have barely trained with their new teammates. It stands to be a fiery baptism. Elsewhere, numerous players are running on fumes. Playing and training in Postecoglou’s high-intensity style is demanding. When there is little to no respite, the matches coming every three to four days, red zones are entered, breaking points reached.

There are 6,000 masochists in the away end. “Why do we do this?” they ask themselves on the journey north. Because it is what they do; a ritual, a religion. And because of the hope, which Postecoglou is so good at nurturing in those pre-match media conferences. When you listen to him, so convincing and invested, it is as if all of the physical and psychological blows that have rained down will be overcome.

It was interesting to hear Postecoglou talk on the Friday of last week about the home game against Manchester United next Sunday being “a point for us to relaunch our campaign”. It was because he believes he will have at least two or three of the injured players back for it; the majority of them should return over the next fortnight. Spurs have a couple of free midweeks. They go to Ipswich on Saturday 22 February. The flaw in it all is that the season could have a hole blown in it by then.

There was no sign of the cavalry at Anfield, nor will there be for Sunday’s FA Cup fourth-round tie at Aston Villa. And we can now count a full injured XI without Scarlett after Richarlison’s misfortune against Liverpool. He damaged a calf and was forced off before half-time.

Postecoglou has traded heavily on the hope of a brighter future; he has practically tied his continued employment to it. It will be OK. It has to be OK. How can you condemn a manager working under such impossible constraints? He would be able to explain away a defeat against Villa. He plainly needs the United and Ipswich matches. And is there not the tantalising prospect of a run at the Europa League? Win that and the season would be a success, even if they finished 17th in the league.

Can Postecoglou drive the needed improvement after he and the team have fallen so far? There were troubling signs at Anfield, the mitigating factors not withstanding. Postecoglou started with what most people consider as his pragmatic option – in other words, Dejan Kulusevski on the right wing, three more solid central midfielders.

The plan seemed to be to stay compact, not to commit too many runners forward. But that was not it, Postecoglou would reveal. He wanted his team to play as normal – with aggression, putting pressure on the opposition; with boldness in possession. None of it happened.

There was a glaring lack of leadership from the senior players and that started with the captain, Son Heung-min. Above all, there seemed to be a shortage of belief, which was understandable on one level; unforgivable on another. “When the reality of it out there hits you, it’s a bit different to maybe what you envisioned in your head,” Postecoglou said.

The reality of Spurs’s plight is clear and the discussion must surely take in how the high number of muscle injuries are not entirely down to bad luck. A part of it has to be load management. What is equally clear is that Postecoglou cannot dream forever of tomorrow. He needs something today.

Ange Postecoglou mused recently about hope and the inherent futility of it in terms of the way things have gone for Tottenham this season. Every time the manager had seen “light at the end of the tunnel”, he said, it had “usually been an oncoming train”.

He was talking about the club’s injury situation, the crisis that never seemingly ends, and yet the line about the train was an appropriate way to describe Liverpool, who did not so much roll into the Carabao Cup final, their first such showpiece under Arne Slot, as steamroll their way there. They refused to countenance any other outcome. They utterly flattened Spurs.

Who can stop Liverpool this season? It is the question on everybody’s lips as they look down from the summit of the Premier League and eye glory in the Champions League and FA Cup, too. Nobody believed Spurs would do so here, probably not the diehards who made the trip north and possibly not even the players themselves – certainly not once the reality of what they were facing dawned on them.

It was over, really, when Mohamed Salah scored from the penalty spot early in the second half to give them the aggregate lead – his 26th goal of the season. At that point, Spurs were just about still in it but by now absolutely nobody believed they were. The evidence had been mapped out in graphic detail across the Anfield turf where Liverpool were quicker, sharper, hungrier. Simply remorseless.

Spurs could point to a single flicker in front of goal, the moment on 78 minutes when Son Heung-min pulled off a step-over and blasted against the bar from a tight angle. They had just five shots in total; the rest were eminently forgettable. None was on target.

There were the inevitable “Sacked in the morning” chants for Postecoglou from the Liverpool supporters; they have tracked him for weeks and, well, he is still here.

Next up for Postecoglou is Sunday’s FA Cup tie at Aston Villa. What had to hurt him was how little of the adventure and personality he demands were on show. Spurs went with a whimper. And, of course, another injury, Richarlison forced off at the end of the first half to join the 10 players who did not make the trip because of various problems.

It was easy to feel that Liverpool wanted to right a couple of recent wrongs against Spurs from matches in London. There was the Luis Díaz disallowed goal farrago but more pertinently, perhaps, the first leg of this tie, when the midfielder Lucas Bergvall ought to have been sent off rather than allowed to stay on to score the only goal. They did not allow Spurs to play and how they came to do so themselves.

Liverpool turned up the heat as the first half wore on. They dominated possession and their press became an increasing problem for Tottenham. Slot’s team camped in opposition territory and the breakthrough had been advertised, Szoboszlai seeing a goal ruled out for offside from a Salah pass.

When the opener came, it followed a loose Yves Bissouma pass but the error did not happen in a vacuum. This is what Slot’s Liverpool do to you. The ball was worked wide to Salah and when he crossed with the outside of his boot and Darwin Núñez brought a dose of chaos in the centre, it ran for Gakpo. His feet were planted but he was able to summon the power. Should Antonin Kinsky have done more to keep out the shot? Possibly. The goalkeeper was erratic.

Kinsky just about tipped a Salah volley on to the top of the bar in the 44th minute and that was when Richarlison was down at the other end with a calf problem, Liverpool playing on. Richarlison had clashed at the outset with Van Dijk, accusing him of throwing an elbow in his direction. It is fair to say that sympathy from the Kop was in short supply for the former Everton player. Postecoglou introduced Mathys Tel, his new outfield signing, having started his other one, the centre-half Kevin Danso. For both, it was a grisly welcome to the club.

Kinsky was in the spotlight at the start of the second half. Liverpool brought still more intensity and the goalkeeper did well to repel a Szoboszlai header from a corner. And yet moments later, when Salah played a teasing ball into the area for Núñez, it was possible to foresee the disaster. Núñez was always going to be too quick, Kinsky was never going to pull out of the attempt to claim the ball. All he touched was Núñez. Salah picked out a top corner from the spot.

Liverpool were in no mood to preserve what they had. Gakpo and Ryan Gravenberch both hit the woodwork before Conor Bradley played in Szoboszlai with a lovely first-time pass. The finish was never in doubt. Nor was that from Van Dijk when he rose to meet a corner. Liverpool march on.

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Updated at 21.28 CET

The corner is cleared and Liverpool break ominously until the ball hits Szoboszlai on the back, allowing Spurs to counter the counter. Sarr’s pass is cut out.

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It’s one of the all-time great debut seasons – not just what he’s achieved but the lightness of touch with which he has done it. As a neutral, I love him. The season isn’t over so we need to reserve a bit of judgement, but there are very few examples of somebody replacing an iconic manager so seamlessly. Joe Fagan is one but he had the huge advantage of being an insider.

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The free-kick is too far out for a shot. Son flips it in and it deflects behind for Spurs’ first corner.

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Kinsky caught Ben Davies while jumping for the ball. Davies had a small cut down his forehead and will need treatment.

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Updated at 21.28 CET

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Liverpool take the free-kick short and work it across the field. Eventually Salah’s deflected shot is comfortably saved to his left by Kinsky.

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Updated at 21.08 CET

Ouch. That last sentence is the most savage twist since Psycho.

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Updated at 21.03 CET

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“Hi Rob!” says Joe Pearson before getting down to brass tacks. “I love you, man, but you keep putting Alisson in the team when you already told us that Kelleher was replacing him.”

Ach! Force of habit. I can confirm Kelleher is in net.

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“Kudos to Spurs for signing Kevin Danso,” says Peter Oh. “Apparently they gazumped Wolverhampton for his services. Personally, I wish he had opted for Molineux, because Danso’s With Wolves would have been box-"office gold.”

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A reminder of the teams

Liverpool (4-3-3) Kelleher; Bradley, Konate, Van Dijk, Robertson; Szoboszlai, Gravenberch, Jones; Salah, Nunez, Gakpo.

Substitutes: Jaros, Endo, Diaz, Mac Allister, Chiesa, Elliott, Jota, Tsimikas, Quansah.

Spurs (4-3-3) Kinsky; Gray, Danso, Davies, Spence; Sarr, Bentancur, Bissouma; Kulusevski, Richarlison, Son.

Substitutes: Austin, Porro, Reguilon, Bergvall, Ajayi, Cassanova, Olusesi, Moore, Tel.

Referee Craig Pawson.

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Updated at 20.59 CET

“Tell Phil Moseley that from my point of view, 30 miles or so from him in Durham, North Carolina, the more likely outcome here is a heroic, dramatic Spurs win tonight, followed by an abject, tail-between-legs disappointment at Wembley,” says Gregory Phillips.

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“Is there a case to be made that the League Cup is more enjoyable competition than the FA Cup?” asks Michal Pac Pomarnacki. “It’s over and done with pretty much halfway through the season and unlike the FA Cup it does not take up any full weekends. Most of the games are played in the evenings/late afternoon adding to the spectacle. Maybe it’s me being a Liverpool fan, but I’ve always preferred the League Cup to the more revered FA Cup.”

As a child of the eighties I’ll always have a fondness for … actually both competitions were great in the eighties so scratch that. I guess the FA Cup will always be more prestigious but I see your point about the League Cup being more enjoyable.

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“Come along Mr Mosley, don’t be too fatalistic,” says Dean Kinsella. “The whole thing with being Spursy is that one day they perform much worse than they should and the next they are marvelous (eg the City thrashing in November). Tonight could well be one of those marvellous nights. Why not?”

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A pessimist is never disappointed (part 2)

“Ah, Rob, you had to go and mention the Q-word!” says Matt Dony. “I’m still expecting a sticky patch in the league, and for Arsenal to sneak through. What Slot has done, with essentially last year’s team, is astonishing. Winning just one trophy in his first season would be an achievement. Four trophies is surely too much to hope for, even in the craziest late-night, Stinking-Bishop-and-red-wine-induced reveries.

“Fighting on four fronts is ridiculous. And it has the added complication (which I’m surprised isn’t stressed more) of swapping between four different match balls. We all laugh when a manager gets in a strop over a particular ball, but the fact is they are all different and behave differently. At the pointy end of the season, where Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League games come thick and fast, constantly swapping ball must be a genuine challenge.

“Anyway. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For now, I’ll just worry about tonight. (Heavy emphasis on ‘worry’. Being a football fan really isn’t as much fun as it should be, is it?)”

Funnily enough Roy Keane made exactly the same point about the balls on Stick to Football this week.

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The winners will meet Newcastle, who completed a 4-0 aggregate win over Arsenal last night, in the final.

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“Good afternoon from Raleigh, North Carolina,” writes Phil Moseley. “Can’t watch the game as I don’t subscribe to Paramount Plus, so relying on you to chart our inevitable pasting by Liverpool, falling at the last or last-but-one hurdle yet again in the Levy Era.”

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Team news: Danso starts

Arne Slot makes four changes from Liverpool’s win at Bournemouth. Caoimhin Kelleher, Conor Bradley, Curtis Jones and Darwin Nunez come in for Alisson, the injured Trent Alexander-Arnold, Alexis Mac Allister and Luis Diaz.

Spurs’ new signing Kevin Danso starts in defence, with Mathys Tel among the substitutes. Ange Postecoglou has left out Pedro Porro, which is a surprise. Pape Sarr replaces Mikey Moore in the only other change from the weekend win at Brentford.

Liverpool (4-3-3) Kelleher; Bradley, Konate, Van Dijk, Robertson; Szoboszlai, Gravenberch, Jones; Salah, Nunez, Gakpo.

Substitutes: Jaros, Endo, Diaz, Mac Allister, Chiesa, Elliott, Jota, Tsimikas, Quansah.

Spurs (4-3-3) Kinsky; Gray, Danso, Davies, Spence; Sarr, Bentancur, Bissouma; Kulusevski, Richarlison, Son.

Substitutes: Austin, Porro, Reguilon, Bergvall, Ajayi, Cassanova, Olusesi, Moore, Tel.

Referee Craig Pawson.

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Updated at 20.59 CET

Read Jacob Steinberg’s preview

Fresh from overseeing a dogged 2-0 win against Brentford on Sunday, Postecoglou sat down and spoke for 43 minutes before a moment that could define his time in north London. The head coach considered the chance for Spurs “to make a big impact” by going to Anfield and building on their 1-0 win in the first leg. He thought about his captain, Son Heung-min, still being trophyless after nearly 10 years at the club. He seemed energised by sealing deals for the centre-back Kevin Danso and the French forward Mathys Tel at the end of a difficult transfer window.

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Rules and regulations

The tie will go to extra time if necessary, then penalties

There’s no away goals rule

VAR is being used

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Preamble

Evening. Brian Clough, Jose Mourinho, Pep Guardiola and George Graham have one thing in common, and we’re not talking anatomically. The League Cup was the first of many trophies in their glorious eras at Nottm Forest, Chelsea, Manchester City and Arsenal respectively. It was also the starting point for Gerard Houllier at Liverpool, Ron Saunders at Aston Villa and Manuel Pellegrini at City.

The elimination of Arsenal last night means somebody will win their first major trophy in English football at Wembley on Sunday 16 March: Eddie Howe, Arne Slot or Ange Postecoglou. Slot and Postecoglou’s teams meet at Anfield tonight for the right to face Newcastle in the Carabao Cup final.

Spurs lead 1-0 from the first leg a month ago – a month! – but Liverpool are understandable favourites given the performances of both teams this season, and the population of their treatment rooms.

Postecoglou’s mood has been improved by consecutive wins, and clean sheets, not to mention the signings of Kevin Danso and Mathys Tel; Liverpool are romping to the league title and are still in contention for the quadruple that eluded them in 2021-22. Then, as now, the League Cup is the only place to start.

Kick off 8pm.

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