Following Sunday's North London Derby defeat against Arsenal, Tottenham have the little matter of trying to nullify Manchester City on Thursday evening. It is going to be another incredibly tough game for Spurs but they did cause a major shock at the Etihad Stadium last February after sealing a last-minute 3-2 win.
However, this time around they have Erling Haaland to try and deal with. The Norwegian international has been a huge success since his summer move from Borussia Dortmund, scoring an incredible 27 goals in 24 appearances for Pep Guardiola's men.
The 22-year-old comes into Thursday's fixture on the back of three games without a goal after drawing blanks against Chelsea, Southampton and Manchester United. Failing to register a shot on target in their 2-1 defeat at Old Trafford last Saturday, Red Devils boss Erik ten Hag outlined how to stop the hotshot, something which could prove very useful to Conte and Spurs prior to their trip to Manchester.
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"It’s always team first, always team, to control that, but of course our players who are responsible in particular for that, our centre-halves," said the Dutchman on BT Sport. "I think we have two really good centre-halves who are capable and experienced in positioning, anticipating, everything, but still they need the team to do the job.
"If the rest is not defending properly then you can be exposed and you don’t have a chance against the type like Erling Haaland."
Speaking in BT Sport's coverage of the Manchester derby, former United man Rio Ferdinand noted what Everton's Ben Godfrey did to the striker in the recent 1-1 draw to frustrate the City ace.
"We saw a couple games ago against Everton, Godfrey was really aggressive with him, tried to get under his skin, pushing and shoving, these are the questions you’ve got to ask of him," said the former centre-back. "He does score in this game but he doesn't seem to have the impact that he had in previous games.
"Just doing little niggly things can really take him out of his comfort zone and reduce his concentration levels - I’ve not seen Haaland react like this in the Premier League because no one’s got near him."
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