Tottenham Hotspur began the 2026-27 Premier League season without scoring in their opening three matches, marking their first such start since the 1974-75 campaign [1, 2, 3]. The club spent more than £300 million (nearly $400 million) on new players over the summer, contributing to a record Premier League outlay of £3.49 billion [1, 2, 3].
Manager Roberto De Zerbi acknowledged the challenges in quickly integrating the new squad, noting the team only began training together last Thursday after the transfer window closed [1, 2, 3]. "We bought very, very good players but you can't just build the team with the names like in Football Manager," De Zerbi said [1]. He added the team must "improve in every part of football, organisation with and without the ball," and "take better decisions in the final third and keep more calm when very close to scoring" [1].
Tottenham earned their first point of the season with a 0-0 draw at Nottingham Forest on September 5, ending losses to Brentford and Newcastle [1, 2, 3]. During the match, a Nottingham Forest goal by Neco Williams was disallowed for handball after a video assistant referee (VAR) review, preventing Forest from securing their first win of the season [1, 2, 3]. Forest manager Oliver Glasner criticized the VAR call as "guessing" and said the threshold for intervention should be very high, calling it a "wrong intervention" [3].
De Zerbi expressed some optimism despite the goalless run. "No. We could have scored three or four goals today," he said after the draw. "We started just last Thursday to work all together and to create, to build the team, to build the organisation. It's not enough the paper, the transfer market" [2]. He described the team's defensive effort as good and emphasized the need to keep improving offensive decision-making [1, 3].
Tottenham's next fixtures will test whether the squad can overcome their early struggles and start converting chances as the season progresses.
