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Spurs Odyssey Preview - Aston villa v Spurs, 20.10.13

· Last Season's Corresponding Game - Villa 0 Spurs 4!
· This week - last year
· What happened in the Premiership in Match 8 2012-13

· See the current injury list for all Premiership Teams
· All the Spurs Stats you could hope for here! THFC6061 Sports Stats

Full Record of Spurs -v- Aston Villa

 
Prem          Pl  W  D  L   For-Ag  Pts
Home          21 10  7  4   32 -22  37
Away          21  4  8  9   21 -26  20
======================================
Total(Prem)   42 14 15 13   53 -48  57
======================================
Football Lge
Home (Div 1)  47 25  6 16   99 -77  62
Away (Div 1)  47 17 11 19   72 -75  48
======================================
Total(Div 1)  94 42 17 35  171 -152 110 
=======================================
Football Lge
Home (Div 2)   2  1  1  0    4 - 3   3
Away (Div 2)   2  0  1  1    1 - 3   1
======================================
Total(Div 2)   4  1  2  1    5 - 6   4
======================================
Total(Prem)   42 14 15 13   53 -48  57
Total(Div 1)  94 42 17 35  171-152 110
Total(Div 2)   4  1  2  1    5 - 6   4
======================================
Grand Total  140 57 34 49  229-204 171
======================================

Last Six Premier League results:-

Aston Villa - LLLWWD

Chelsea    2-1   A. Villa
A. Villa   0-1   Liverpool
A. Villa   1-2   Newcastle
Norwich    0-1   A. Villa
A. Villa   3-2   Man City
Hull       0-0   A. Villa

Spurs - WLWWDL

Spurs      1-0   Swansea
Arsenal    1-0   Spurs
Spurs      2-0   Norwich
Cardiff    0-1   Spurs
Spurs      1-1   Chelsea
Spurs      0-3   West Ham

Pos           P  W  D  L   F-A   GD  Pts
 6. Spurs     7  4  1  2   6-5    1   13
10. A. Villa  7  3  1  3   9-8    1   10 

Be up for this one, Spurs!

Spurs have won their last three games against Aston Villa 10-0 on aggregate, but the team needs to wipe that slate clean and go into Sunday's Sky game with a fresh attitude toward this opposition, and to the Premier League in general. I for one have yet to forgive and forget the last Spurs performance at home to West Ham. That result alone will give Paul Lambert's young charges the belief that they too can do a "smash and grab" against supposedly high-flying Tottenham Hotspur.

After losing the league cup game at home against us 4-0, Villa surprised everyone with a 3-2 win over Manchester City, who had been 2-1 up, and seemingly on their way to a routine victory, before Bacuna and Weimann scored goals in quick succession to make it three goals and three points for the delighted Villa fans, Holte End and all. That was the second time this season that Villa surprised allegedly superior opponents, after their opening day win against Arsenal at The Emirates stadium.

Perhaps Spurs can draw encouragement for the remainder of the season with the knowledge that all the top rated teams have suffered shock results. Chelsea can probably be exempted from this remark, as they lost 1-0 at Everton on a day when they had the chances, but things did not go their way.

The bottom line is that Spurs suffered a set-back against West Ham, and they'll be lucky to get back in the top four quickly, with all the teams above them bar Southampton surely hot favourites to win their games. Some of the Spurs squad will be on a high, following the International break in which England and Belgium qualified for Brazil, where of course the home team will play. Brazil had two quite low key friendlies against South Korea and Zambia, and our man Paulinho was treated fairly gently, playing 69 minutes and 63 minutes respectively.

A lot has been said of course about Andros Townsend, and his excellent performances in both England's crucial wins. No one, perhaps not even Andros himself, would have dreamt he would have such an impact upon the national team, and that he would put himself in the reckoning for that trip to Brazil. At the start of the season, when Townsend was selected for the England squad, Andre Villas-Boas cautioned the England leadership against building Townsend's hopes too high. Now it would seem that AVB has a dilemma over who to play in that right side slot with Lennon back in training, and record signing Erik Lamela champing at the bit to prove himself with his new club, and at International level too. Lamela was a late substitute in Argentina's 3-1 win over Peru, then played the first 75 minutes against Uruguay, against whom he was yellow carded. Lamela has yet to hit the net this season at any level.

Incidentally, despite beating Argentina who topped the South American qualifying group, Uruguay finished fifth, below Ecuador, and will have to play off against Jordan for the right to play in Brazil. They will be there though, won't they?

Villa will field a stronger team on Sunday than that which lost the Capital One Cup game to Spurs late last month. Christian Benteke could be available after his absence with a hip injury, and we are likely to see something of summer signings such as Antonio Luna, Leandro Bacuna, alongside the speedy Gabriel Agbonlahor and Andreas Weimann, who are suited to the likelihood of Villa playing a counter-attacking game.

With Spurs winning 9 of the last twelve games against Villa, and not having lost at Villa Park since New Year's Day 2008, their fans probably think of us as their bogey team, but it hasn't always been this way. Our dramatic 4-0 win on Boxing Day, led by a Gareth Bale hat-trick was only our fourth away league win in the Premier League here, and it was only that result which gave us a slight margin of superiority over "The Villans" in Premier League football.

It was not always that way. In November 1994, Dean Saunders scored an agonisingly late, late winner against Gerry Francis's Tottenham at White Hart Lane in what was an exciting 4-3 game for anyone but Tottenham fans. I think it was the following year that Villa goalkeeper Mark Bosnich became a hate figure for Spurs fans, when Villa again beat us at The Lane (1-0), and the man who had clattered Klinsmann the previous season at Villa Park did the worst possible thing at White Hart Lane by giving a Hitler salute.

It took us eleven seasons to win a Premier League game at Villa Park, and that was thanks to a Teddy Sheringham goal in January 2003, in his second spell as a Tottenham player.(Villa 0 Spurs 1 - 18.01.2003)

Why, Villa would even go above us if they win on Sunday! What more incentive could they need? It is certainly not going to be a walk in the park for a Spurs team that needs to be up for this game, as much as they should be for any game. I am going to predict a Spurs win but I think it will be close, and could be 2-1.

Sunday's match referee will be Phil Dowd, who we haven't seen in charge since we beat Newcastle 2-1 at home in February.

· 15 years ago this week - George Graham lost his first game in charge in a 2-1 defeat at Leicester

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