Igor Tudor’s tone has hardened. After insisting in his first press conference that he was “100 per cent confident” Tottenham would avoid relegation, the manager’s verdict following successive defeats to Fulham and Arsenal was far bleaker.
Following the 2-0 loss at Craven Cottage, Tudor didn’t mince words. “We lack when we attack. We are lacking the quality to score the goal. We are lacking in the middle to run. We are lacking behind to stay there and suffer and not concede the goal,” he said, adding: “You put the players [on the pitch], but then you lack defending, running and winning the duels. So what to do?” He also warned that Spurs were consistently late to contests: “Football is a sport of running and duels… I have a sensation that Fulham players always arrived before. Even with the brain, they arrived before us. We are always late.”
The statistics back up Tudor’s assessment. Tottenham have now gone 10 Premier League games without a victory and failed to take the lead in any league match during February. Their only top-flight lead since late January was a brief seven-minute spell at Burnley on January 24. Since the turn of the year, Spurs rank last in the league for being dispossessed and for total losses of possession.
Attacking issues are stark: only 35 percent of Tottenham possession sequences have progressed into the final third since January — a figure bettered only by Wolves and Burnley — highlighting a struggle to carry the ball into dangerous areas or sustain attacking phases. As former Spurs manager Tim Sherwood put it: “Look at the patterns of play Fulham had… it was the opposite of what Tottenham had.”
Defensively and in individual contests Spurs have struggled too. In the first half at Fulham they won only around 40 percent of duels and were frequently overrun. Tottenham sit bottom of the Premier League for aerial duels won and, since the new year, have lost more duels than any other side. Errors are also a recurring problem: Spurs have made a league-high five mistakes that led directly to goals in 2026 and have conceded more shots resulting from errors than any other team this calendar year. That vulnerability has helped produce the highest expected-goals conceded total in the division this year, making clean sheets hard to come by.
Tudor’s concerns about fitness are reflected in the numbers. Prior to the Fulham match, Spurs had been outrun by each of their previous five Premier League opponents. Even when they covered more ground than in any other league game this season at Fulham, Tudor felt the team still lacked the necessary intensity: “We are lacking in the middle to run.” Sherwood cautioned that raw distance isn’t everything — “It’s about when you run, how you run and when you stand still” — but the pattern is worrying.
Tudor has blamed fixture congestion and injuries for depleted physical condition: many players have logged heavy minutes with limited availability, he said, leaving the squad fatigued and unable to sustain a high press.
Looking ahead, the schedule offers little respite. Champions League fixtures return next week, increasing the burden on a side already showing signs of tiredness, low pressing intensity, costly errors and scant penetration into the final third. Until Tottenham fix ball retention, their duel-winning rate, defensive concentration and overall fitness, Tudor’s blunt diagnosis is likely to hold true.