Tottenham's latest two Premier League matches could indicate Antonio Conte is taking his new side a step closer to success found under Mauricio Pochettino.
Conte is unbeaten in all nine league games that he has been in charge of at Spurs, despite being knocked out of the Carabao Cup with a defeat in both legs of the semi final, against Chelsea.
The Lilywhites are still in the FA Cup, after beating Morecambe and will play Brighton in the next round, as well as sitting fifth in the table and being just a point behind fourth place West Ham with three games in hand.
This means that some silverware is still on the cards for the north London club, who are still looking to end their almost 14 year trophy drought.
Tottenham have played just two league games so far this year and the first was a New Year's Day fixture against Watford.
After having 21 shots throughout the game, with nine on target, it took the Lilywhites until the 96th minute to get the winning goal.
Davinson Sanchez won the game for his side and Conte praised his team, after the tie.
"I think we were very good to have the right passion and not lose the balance," he explained. "When you find a well organised team you can become a bit nervous if you don't score but I think at the end we deserved to win."
Spurs' fight until the end got them the three points and this was the same case when they made the trip to Leicester on Wednesday.
The trip to the King Power Stadium was no different in the final third as the visiting side had 27 shots at goal with ten on target, but they couldn't salvage the win until the final minutes of the game.
It was Steven Bergwijn who came on when his side were trailing 2-1 and got both goals to win Spurs the game.
Conte, again, praised his players for their fight until the final whistle.
"At the end my players showed great resilience, great desire. Don't give up. This must be our philosophy, don’t give up and fight until the end," he said in his post match press conference.
"They showed me great desire. When we had equalised, we got the ball and we wanted to restart the game and to try to win. I think it was good for me to see this type of attitude from my players."
This was then echoed in his pre-match press conference, ahead of the Chelsea clash.
"For sure we have to continue in this way because in these two last games we showed a great resilience, great will, a great desire to fight until the end, to believe you can win until the end and this is very important for the mentality, for the belief of the players, for what we are doing in this period, for the work we are doing together."
Without this determination and fight, Spurs may not have got three points from either game and their ability to do this must be partly down to their improved fitness.
Under Nuno Espirito Santo, Tottenham had the worst distance covered statistics in the league but with the arrival of Conte, they now have some of the best.
This is similar to what was required under Mauricio Pochettino, who also got this same fight out of his players, most notably in their Champions League semi-final turnaround against Ajax.
After trailing 1-0 in the first leg and being 2-0 down at half time in the second, it didn't look good for the Lilywhites in the final 45 minutes of the game.
However, a Lucas Moura hat-trick changed the game completely and took Tottenham to the final, as they scored the last semi-final goal in the 96th minute.
After the Lilywhites lost to Leicester in 2017, Pochettino questioned the fight of his players.
"We need to learn from this game, that we need to start every game with the first idea being fighting and competing," he admitted.
"If you don't compete and fight in the Premier League, the gap, or the quality, is even and you are sure that you are going to struggle."
After that game Spurs had improved results, including beating Arsenal, Chelsea, Man United and winning 5-4 in their second fixture against Leicester, on the last day of the season.
The end of that season and the following one, Tottenham finished inside the top four, indicating the influence Pochettino had and the key message of 'fighting and competing'.
Now Conte has come in and already spoken about this same fight that needs to continue in the Tottenham side, to ensure they can get the same results they have had in their last two league fixtures.
The Italian has already spoken about his aims for the season.
"We want to continue to work very hard, continue to try to fight and give our best," the 52-year-old explained. "This must be our target, that at the end of the season we are sure we gave everything and the position we reached in the table means we deserved this position."
Spurs will want to get back into the top four and this can start with their trip to Stamford Bridge on Sunday, especially as Spurs have already lost to Chelsea twice this month.
However with the Blues coming into the fixture on the back of a defeat and a draw and the Lilywhites going into it on the back of a victory and the return of Eric Dier, Tottenham will hope they can bring this fight and desire to try and secure all three points.
