Chadder View: Tottenham must finish in Premier League top four this season
Tottenham supporters would have never predicted that the club could possibly qualify for the UEFA Champions League at the beginning of the 2023/24 campaign.
On the eve of our opening game of the season against Brentford in August, I was not feeling very optimistic.
We had just lost our greatest-ever goalscorer, we were coming off the back of an abysmal season and I didn't know too much about our new manager, Ange Postecoglou.
If someone had asked me for a pre-season prediction, I honestly would have suggested that we would finish sixth or maybe fifth at best, and I would have taken that.
Fast forward six months later, and Spurs have been completely transformed. Where I thought the likes of Manchester United, Chelsea and Newcastle United would kick on and finish comfortably above us, we have shown that we are moving in the right direction with an exciting young squad.
Players such as Pape Matar Sarr, Destiny Udogie and Micky van de Ven have taken to life in the Premier League quicker than I could have imagined, with Pedro Porro also looking like a man reborn.
Expectations were low among the fanbase at the start of the season, which in some ways probably benefited the players. However, those expectations have since risen, and the challenge now is for Postecoglou to meet those demands.
Tottenham must rise to the challenge
It would be awful if Spurs somehow missed out on the top four now.
After an incredible start to the season which saw us sitting top after 10 games, an injury crisis halted our progress. Had it not been for that miserable night against Chelsea, I honestly think top four would be guaranteed and we would in fact be competing for the title.
Nonetheless, what has happened has happened, and with a seven-point gap between us and Liverpool, it just seems too much to make up.
However, we are out of both cup competitions and Europe, and for the first time in over three months, we have our full-strength squad back together.
There are now no excuses for us not to rediscover our form from the early part of the season and finish as we began.
Aston Villa will probably end up being our closest rivals in the top-four race, and with UEFA Europa Conference League football for the Villans to consider, we must take advantage of our clear run.
The win against Brighton felt like the beginning of a new chapter and the end of our inconsistent middle part of the season.
The run-in starts now, and Tottenham must ensure they finish that run-in with the iconic Champions League anthem ringing loudly around the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
In other Tottenham news, Bryan King believes one "very clever" Brighton man outclassed a £43million Spurs ace.
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