In many ways, the visit of Manchester United next Friday feels like the first game of the season all over again (with the terrifying added caveat that if we lose this first game of the season, our season could be dead in the water). *Gulp*.
The team could look completely different to how it did against Burnley in our final Premier League game before lockdown.
Jose Mourinho has Harry Kane, Son Heung-min, Moussa Sissoko and Ben Davies back from injury, none of whom featured against the Clarets.
Meanwhile, Dele Alli is now suspended and Jan Vertonghen is only likely to be used as a contingency as his contract winds down.
This was the XI which started against Burnley: (there was some variation in formation, with Dier dropping into a back five, but this was roughly it).
And this is my best guess for how we may line up against Man Utd…
Dier and Alderweireld were partnered together in defence in last week’s intra-squad practice match. I fancy Mourinho will stay loyal to Lucas over Bergwijn and save Ndombele for West Ham a few days later.
The full-backs and rest of the front three pick themselves. The only contention here will be how Mourinho balances up his midfield.
These lineups show a total of eight changes, plus Dier switching position. That is absurd because, although it may feel as though we have had a summer break, this squad is exactly the same as it was three months ago.
Absurd, but maybe not a bad thing considering our pre-lockdown form.
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That midfield worries me, are there enough hard tackling ball winners in it, Lucas and Son don’t offer much in the defensive side of things. I was at the United game and they destroyed our midfield, they continually broke out of their defence and tore through a non existent midfield and made the defence look like a a non league defence. As for the right hand side, they’ll tear us to pieces.