Are Tottenham Hotspur supporters now simply resigned to their fate? On Sunday, fans lined the streets for what many were calling the club's biggest league match in a generation. The support was fantastic but, once again, fans were let down by the team on the pitch. Igor Jesus broke the deadlock for Nottingham Forest, heading home a corner on the cusp of half time, and Spurs simply capitulated from there, ultimately ignominiously beaten 3-0.
As a result, Tottenham's wait for a first Premier League win of 2026 goes on, losing eight of 13 fixtures since their most-recent win, this coming at Selhurst Park on 28 December. Only three clubs in Premier League history have ever endured a longer start to a calendar year without winning.
Longest streaks without a Premier League win to start a year
Clubs | Year | Winless games | Points yielded | League finish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Derby County | 2008 | 18 | 4 | 20th |
Sunderland | 2003 | 17 | 1 | 20th |
Middlesbrough | 2017 | 14 | 6 | 19th |
Tottenham | 2026 | 13 | 5 | TBC |
The three clubs with longer winless sequences to commence a calendar year, unsurprisingly, were all relegated. Derby County hold the record in this regard, as they do for being the worst Premier League ever, ending up with only 11 points in total in 2007/08. Sunderland similarly did not win a single match during the second half of the 2002/03 campaign, astonishingly losing 16 of 17 outings.
Well, both the aforementioned Derby and then Middlesbrough nine years later are yet to return to the top-flight, albeit Kim Hellberg's Boro could be about to change that. Nevertheless, history suggests that, despite having been a top division outfit for 48 years, there's no guarantee that Spurs will bounce straight back up, if the worst was to happen in May.
There is though still hope. With seven fixtures remaining, Spurs aren't even actually in the bottom three, one point clear of West Ham. However, if you are an optimistic supporter, perhaps analysing their remaining matches, specifically how they fared in the corresponding fixture under Ange Postecoglou last season, might not be what you want to see.
Tottenham's remaining fixtures: scorelines from last season
Date | Fixture | Last season's result |
|---|---|---|
12 April | Sunderland (A) | Southampton 0-5 Spurs |
18 April | Brighton (H) | Spurs 1-4 Brighton |
25 April | Wolves (A) | Wolves 4-2 Spurs |
2/3 May | Aston Villa (A) | Aston Villa 2-0 Spurs |
9/10 May | Leeds United (H) | Spurs 1-2 Leicester |
17 May | Chelsea (A) | Chelsea 1-0 Spurs |
24 May | Everton (H) | Spurs 4-0 Everton |
Note: Southampton substituted in for Sunderland; Leicester substituted in for Leeds.
If Tottenham match last season's results, they will accumulated only six more points, losing five games in a row before beating Everton on the final day. This though is not even a fair comparison, given that Spurs' 5-0 win at Southampton, the night Russell Martin was sacked, was certainly an easier fixture than their upcoming trip to the Stadium of Light promises to be.
Their visits to Villa Park and Stamford Bridge in May look especially challenging, especially given that the Blues will be ultra-motivated to send Spurs down. Nevertheless, given Tottenham's current form, every game is particularly daunting.