Tottenham's Pre-Season Focus: Friendly with Getafe

Tottenham slip back into the shadows this afternoon, their pre-season work continuing not under stadium lights but behind the gates of Hotspur Way, where a 70-minute friendly with Getafe will say more to Roberto De Zerbi than any glossy tour video.

The travel is done. New Zealand and Australia are in the rear-view mirror, the jet lag fading, the tan lines still fresh. Spurs return to London with momentum: unbeaten across their summer schedule so far and chasing a fifth straight game without defeat as the Premier League opener creeps into view.

The last act of their trip Down Under was pure theatre. Ten men, London rivals, and a winner with almost the final touch of the game. Reduced when Kevin Danso saw red, Spurs still found a way to floor Chelsea, Richarlison striking at the death to seal a 2-1 victory that felt like more than just another friendly. It was a small statement about character, about resilience, about the willingness to keep swinging when the odds tighten.

Now comes the quieter graft.

Getafe at Hotspur Way will not bring the noise of a packed stadium or the spectacle of a global tour, but it will bring something De Zerbi needs even more: control. Controlled minutes, controlled scenarios, controlled tests of shape and discipline. Seventy minutes is long enough to expose weaknesses, short enough to manage legs two weeks out from Brentford.

Spurs look sharp, but they are not finished. The patterns are emerging, the ideas are clear, yet De Zerbi still has details to smooth out before the serious business starts. Combinations in possession. Reactions when the press is broken. How his side cope when, as against Chelsea, they are forced to play short-handed.

This afternoon’s closed-door exercise will not make headlines. It will, though, help decide who walks out in west London in a fortnight’s time – and who is still fighting to convince the new man in charge that they belong in his first Premier League XI.