Tottenham Hotspur face a tough opening test as they welcome Everton to the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in the closing clash on the first Super Sunday of this season.
Tottenham will be looking to build on their sixth placed finish of last season whereas Everton will be looking to kick-start their first full season under Carlo Ancelotti on a high after making positive investment over summer.
Team News
Giovani Lo Celso is a doubt for Tottenham as he continues to struggle with an on-going groin injury which plagued him throughout the second half of last season and will be subjected to a late fitness test.
Japhet Tanganga meanwhile is ruled out with a thigh injury.
Everton will have Andre Gomes and Yerry Mina available after the pair recovered from respective knock and muscle injury.
Mason Holgate (toe), Cenk Tosun (knee), Jean-Philippe Gbamin (Achilles) and Fabian Delph (fitness) are definitely ruled out.
Stat Attack
- Tottenham are unbeaten in their last 15 meetings against Everton (W8, D7).
- Everton have failed to win any of their last 12 trips to Tottenham in all competitions (D4, L8).
- Spurs have scored in each of their last nine matches against Everton (W5, D4), although they kept just three clean sheets during that period.
- Everton are unbeaten in their last eight opening league games of a new season (W2, D6) dating back to 2012 after their 2011-12 opening weekend clash at Spurs was postponed due to London Riots.
- Tottenham are unbeaten in four of their last five opening weekend fixtures in a new season, including winning their last three such games (W3, D1, L1).
Prediction
Everton will be glad to get this fixture out of the way on the opening weekend given that going away to Spurs has often been a hoodoo for them this last decade but Ancelotti has added some proper creative quality in midfield , which is where the Toffees were often lacking last season in terms of service going forward creatively.
Tottenham meanwhile simply underperformed last season but have made some wise additions over the summer with Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg a strong central midfield signing, who should help add more energy to what was a lethargic area last season plus Matt Doherty who is certainly set to provide more creativity and pace up the flanks if he can get the correct service.
I therefore am expecting this game to be more about tactics and bedding in new signings, especially for Everton who could do with a result here to give them momentum and belief in that they can fight for European placings this season, although I have a slight feeling that a draw would be a likely result given how tight this fixture can be at Spurs’ ground.
Prediction: Tottenham Hotspur 1-1 Everton
Result: Tottenham Hotspur 0-1 Everton