Here are our Tottenham talking points after their 2-1 defeat at Chelsea left the north London club with a nervy final day of the Premier League season
The dignity of Tottenham Hotspur is at risk. The once great club has been dragged through the mud this season and now an embarrassing campaign can only be salvaged on what will be the tensest of final days.
How it's come down to this - the decisions made on and off the pitch, the turbulence and trouble that has trickled down - must be forensically examined in the aftermath regardless of whether Spurs - or Leeds - save the north London club's Premier League fate.
A gradually gathering shambolic snowball has rolled Spurs to this point where 90 minutes of football played 12 miles apart in London will decide whether the country's first club to win a double and Britain's first European trophy winners will suffer their first relegation in almost half a century.
It is exactly a year to the day since Spurs held aloft the Europa League trophy in Spain and they must now half the process of completely collapsing in on themselves within 12 months.
Roberto De Zerbi made the point clearly to football.london in the aftermath of the club's latest mental block at Stamford Bridge.
"Sunday is the final for Tottenham, not Bilbao against Man Utd. The most important game is Sunday, because last season they played for the trophy, now we play for something more important than the trophy," said the Italian.
"Because the pride, the history of the club, the dignity are more important than the trophy. The trophy you can win, you can lose, nothing changes in your life.
"You can have one trophy more, but the most important thing is to keep the dignity, to keep the pride, to go on holiday like this [head up], and not like this [head down]."
Spurs' trip to Chelsea ended in the way most of them do. They only needed a single point to all but stay up and instead continued a rotten run at the stadium in SW6 that has seen them win just once in the Premier League era.
The Blues did not even need to be that good, just marginally better than Spurs and able to take two gifts. One was the space afforded to Enzo Fernandez to fire home from outside the box and then Randal Kolo Muani's horrendous pass to nobody in a yellow shirt in his own half that set Chelsea away for Andrey Santos to slide home.
Tottenham in contrast cannot accept gifts. They could not hold leads against Brighton and Leeds and they could not overcome a Chelsea side that had not won in eight matches and had only played three days earlier in the FA Cup final. Spurs had been given eight days to prepare and recover due to the postponement.
Yet Tottenham only really looked the fresher team in the opening stages, with Mathys Tel's header against the post a sliding doors moment, and in the final 20 minutes when they threw what options they had at Chelsea.
De Zerbi was in the process of setting that up when Kolo Muani gifted Chelsea the ball for their second goal. James Maddison, Pape Matar Sarr and Djed Spence could only watch on in horror as they waited to come on beside the Italian as the hosts ran through to score.
Tottenham must surely top the stats in goals conceded while substitutes are waiting to come on to the pitch and add to that daft fouls given away against opposition defenders who are going nowhere with the ball.
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Sarr did come on to influence the game with his backheel from Pedro Porro's ball falling perfectly for Richarlison to score his 11th Premier League goal of the season.
Tottenham's attack sums up the shortages De Zerbi is dealing with right now. Tel and Kolo Muani only give flashes of what they could be rather than the consistency of service that a striker needs.
Richarlison often found himself battling alone and without any real sight of the ball, but when it did come, he would head wide or at the goalkeeper until that 74th-minute goal.
The Brazilian is an odd striker, not poor by any stretch of the imagination as his goal tally shows but not truly good enough to be more than a helping hand rather than the guiding one.
Maddison's arrival brought the next step up in his level after his tentative Leeds debut. At Stamford Bridge he was busy and tried to make things happen and he should have scored the relegation saving goal in the 84th minute only to take a split-second too long to strike the ball and see Jorrel Hato slide in to block it.
He tried to make things happen and the difference in having a playmaker finally on the pitch was clear. In an alternate universe, De Zerbi has Maddison, Kulusevski, Xavi and Kudus all on the turf together wreaking havoc. That unfortunately is not this reality.
There was yet more penalty box controversy for Spurs after the previous week's ungiven spot kick for Maddison. This time Micky van de Ven was wrestled to the ground by Marc Cucurella, who was booked, but referee Stuart Attwell and his officials decided Tel's corner had not yet been kicked, although various replays and angles suggest that was not the case.
Spurs don't get calls like that. They have not been awarded a single penalty this season in the Premier League yet there is little of the noisy outrage on or off the pitch from the club towards the powers-that-be that there would be from a bigger side, making their presence felt and reminding everyone to watch their treatment.
Even in the final seconds of the game, Chelsea goalkeeper Robert Sanchez fell on the ball for a good six or seven seconds and then held it for around the same amount of time. Attwell should have awarded Spurs a corner as their players were telling him, instead he blew for full time. It summed up everything in a moment.
"If we speak about the penalty with Leeds, today we can speak about what you want but we lose focus and we lose energy," said De Zerbi. "My focus is to stay on the pitch, to stay in the best first XI I can decide for Sunday and to transfer what I think about this game, about the football and to prepare in the best way the players."
A late Maddison free-kick sailed up and into the Tuesday night air as the midfielder threatened to be the saviour and De Zerbi and the 29-year-old admitted that people must temper their expectations with him.
"James Maddison can't play more than 20 or 25 minutes. I have medical staff behind me, I am not a doctor, I am not a physical coach and I have to follow what they say, no? But I think we can stay up with James and without James," said the Spurs boss.
Maddison added: "Anyone who has worked in football or has been through this injury, it is not as easy just to drop back in.
"It would be catastrophic for my career if something was to happen and we weren't safe or if we didn't follow the protocols from the specialist, but obviously I want to help the team as much as I can so let's see where we get to."
He went on: "Obviously I've been out for a long time so I'm not going to be at my fluid and fluent best, but I feel good and I've just got to try and help the team with whatever many minutes I can.
"I've obviously had a massive injury, so it's one of them you have to respect the injury a little bit and that's probably why I am not starting games, but I’ve been out for a little while and I am going to do what I can on Sunday.
"I did tonight, it wasn’t enough but we’ve got to keep trying and keep battling for our fans."
Maddison paid tribute to the noisy Spurs travelling faithful as they sang throughout the night whatever the scoreline was. The midfielder made it clear just how horrendous a season he has had to watch from the sidelines.
“We've got to give everything for this club, for the badge and for our fans. It is unacceptable and a little bit embarrassing that we're in this position as Tottenham Hotspur but it's the reality unfortunately and it's up to us to get out of it," he said.
"Sunday is going to be a big day. We're going to need everyone, we're going to need our fans who were absolutely unbelievable today by the way. Even at 2-0 down you could just hear them and I genuinely think we've got the best away support in the league. We need to repay them with a good performance and some points on Sunday to secure Premier League survival."
De Zerbi has kept a settled team for the past three games but he could be inclined to give the midfield a bit more forward momentum than it has recently.
Rodrigo Bentancur was Spurs' best player on Tuesday night with his calmness on the ball but alongside him, Joao Palhinha is less adept at playing the quick, calm passes required of a De Zerbi team.
Yves Bissouma has not featured in the past couple of games but the Mali midfielder does try to progress the ball quickly higher up the pitch and he was bright against Brighton at home before a trademark restrictive booking.
Spurs must be bright and brave at home against Everton on Sunday. They must look to win their first Premier League game at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in 2026 rather than hope for the point that would save them if Leeds cannot.
Everton have not won in six Premier League games but that's fewer than Chelsea, who found Dr Tottenham was able to make a house visit across the capital to soothe their ills.
Spurs must find something from within that has been lacking for much of this season and do what they need to do on Sunday.
They need everyone behind them on and off the pitch, whether that's the fans inside the stadium or the injured players willing them on from the sidelines and speaking to them throughout.
Ben Davies and Dominic Solanke were with the team at Stamford Bridge, the Welshman having travelled away with them to Villa as well as being at the home matches. Cristian Romero was praised by De Zerbi on Monday for his influence in recent weeks, sitting in on team meetings while injured and coming into his office every morning to discuss the team.
"Cristian Romero is a big player, you know he is a big player, but he is an amazing guy because he has been a great captain in my time even though he didn’t play," the Italian told football.london .
"We are talking by phone and when he stayed here, every morning he came in my office and he was inside of the season."
Argentinean media claimed that Romero had put off his rehabilitation in his homeland in order to remain in London with the team but there have been claims the 28-year-old is now back in Argentina to watch his boyhood club Belgrano in their Primera Division final against River Plate on Sunday.
It would be ammunition for his critics even after that initial decision to stay in London and the way Romero has acted as a captain in recent weeks, to be out of the country for Tottenham's huge do-or-die match of their own this weekend.
If he is absent, then Spurs must do it without their injured skipper on the sidelines and they must do it without him on the pitch. The club is bigger than one man and ultimately the 11 men on the pitch and the five or so who could come on must save the day and the season.
"It's non-negotiable," said Maddison. "We have to [get over the line] for this club."
If Spurs make it through this week and remain a Premier League club then next season could promise so much more, with full De Zerbi football and mostly a game a week to allow for the best version of it. They will also be a club desperate to avoid any repeat of this terrifying season by spending what it needs to in the transfer market.
That's only possible though if the Lilywhites walk through the right door on Sunday afternoon.
It says plenty about this rotten campaign that on a night when their north London rivals won the title, it won't have brought anywhere near the outrage at Spurs that it would have in other years. That's simply because they are in too much of a mess to care about that lot down the road.
They've got far bigger problems to deal with on Sunday and if they don't fix them, then what lies beneath is unthinkable. If ever there was a time to finally remember their forgotten motto this season it is this weekend. Tottenham Hotspur must dare and for their own sake they must do.
