With news out that Harry Redknapp launched a bid to sign West Ham skipper Scott Parker it leaves us wondering whether or not he would actually improve the Spurs squad.

Tottenham will be hoping to secure a Champions League group stage place and for another successful Premier League campaign this season and Parker is not a player many would have expected them to be chasing this summer. Parker is a very good player as he has shown at Charlton and West Ham but Tottenham already have an abundance of midfielders at their disposal. Jenas, Huddlestone, Palacios, and O’Hara are all already competing for central midfield spots. Add to that youngsters Danny Rose and Adel Taarabt and you can’t help but think Tottenham should be prioritising other positions.

With Jonathan Woodgate’s playing career looking in doubt and the well documented fitness problems of Ledley King, Redknapp should be looking at bolstering his back line. Tottenham have a very talented midfield and front line and if they can bring in some good defensive cover they could just surprise a few people this season and have another very good campaign. Redknapp himseldf as mentioned a title challenge and with a bit of luck they may not be far off. There has been very little transfer activity at White Hart Lane this season and Spurs fans will be hoping this changes before the big kick off. Do you guys think Parker would improve the Spurs squad?

Well it’s not been the best season for either of England’s first choice centre halves so far. Enough has been written about John Terry’s problems and Rio Ferdinand’s chronic back injury to have caused meltdown on Google through searching for both issues. Thankfully, Terry’s form seems to be picking up again and Manchester United seem to have cured Ferdinand through a calming spell of rehabilitation.

The issue for England would seem to be cover for both players with several high profile replacements injured, retired or bang out of form. Capello has already shown that he rates Matthew Upson, and for all his Premier League problems, Upson is clearly the first choice as a back up centre half for the Italian. He’s been dependable and reliable for England when called upon though and is clearly on the plane to South Africa.

The only question mark would be West Ham United’s struggle in the relegation battle they currently find themselves in. Could relegation leave a hangover that could affect him? It will be interesting to see, but Upson should be strong enough to deal with whatever happens to West Ham. After that though, it becomes a bit of a lottery with a major question mark over another player Capello clearly rates, Ledley King.

What can be said about Ledley King, he simply defies science and common sense. King has been suffering for 4 seasons with a chronic knee injury that he picked up in pre-season training back in 2006. Now with no cartilage in his left knee, it is simply bone grinding on bone every time he plays, King has to have at least 5 days rest to recover. The problem is that fluid builds up in the knee, swelling it up after any vigorous exercise but it’s incurable.

For a player in this day and age to be able still perform without any real training week to week is astounding. Harry Redknapp rightly calls him a freak for being able to still continue at the top level and this will probably be his last major tournament for England. Even at 29, the toil of the injury will surely bring an end to the career of surely one of English football’s brightest talents far too early. Fully fit, it wouldn’t have surprised me if King had become a regular starter for his country. Unfortunately, we will never know.

Of the other two outstanding centre halves of this generation, one is seemingly more injury ravaged than King and the other retired after being consistently overlooked by Steve Mclaren. Jonathan Woodgate must have run over several black cats in his career, which like Kings, promised so much but has petered out in to a continual battle to even make it on a treatment table, never mind a pitch. When fit, Woodgate was a superb ball playing defender who could score a couple now and again. Time is certainly against him and he has no chance of being fit for the World Cup and maybe even the beginning of next season.

Jamie Carragher has stuck to his decision made back in July 2007 after being consistently overlooked by Steve Mclaren and no amount of pleading has seen him make himself available for selection. I kind of understand why he’d had enough, but hells bells, World Cups don’t just grown on trees. Yet, regardless of that, Carragher along with Wayne Bridge seem certain to stick to their principles. It’s a shame and Carragher is certainly deserving of more caps than he won.

Of the remaining contenders, Joleon Lescott has had a terrible season by the standards he set whilst at Everton. Injuries and criticism over the way he handled his £23 million move to Manchester City have certainly seemed to weigh on Lescott’s mind this season. Of course, his career at City along with his relationship with Kolo Toure is still in it’s infancy and it should settle down eventually, question is, will it settle down in time for the World Cup?

Phil Jagielka is another high profile candidate only recently returning to playing after a 9 month lay off through injury. He’s certainly impressed since joining Everton in the summer of 2007, but it could be a little too soon for him. He’s another that has impressed with the chances available to him at international level and looks set to be involved with the England set up in the European Championship qualifying rounds when they begin in September 2010.

The outstanding English centre half who is not an England regular for me this season has been Michael Dawson. It’s ironic that if King and Woodgate were fit, Dawson wouldn’t be playing, never mind captaining the side in King’s absence. In fact over the last 18 months, Dawson has come on leaps and bounds and has been playing excellently all of this season. Strong in the air, reliable and passionate, Dawson in my opinion, clearly deserves to go to the World Cup.

I was amazed when Ryan Shawcross was called up but Dawson overlooked once again, because he’s simply a better player at the current time. I doubt Capello picked the Stoke defender to deflect the criticism over the Ramsey challenge, but it was still a surprise. A pointless one in the end as he didn’t even get on the pitch, but the experience will have stood him in good stead. Shawcross is definitely one for the future though, along with Jagielka.

So for me, the final choice comes down to John Terry and Rio Ferdinand as first choice centre halves,  Matthew Upson and Michael Dawson and Ledley King, dodgy knee as well to make up 5, taking my squad to 12 players so far. King, despite the knee issue, offers cover in both central defence and midfield and deserves his last chance after cruelly missing out in 2006. So who would you choose?

With the season starting slightly earlier this year due to the World Cup, most teams in the Premiership have played 8 league games already. Last season, the 8th round of matches was played two weeks later, on the weekend of October 18th/19th. By the end of it, Tottenham were staring up at every other team in the league with a lowly 2 points. A 2-1 loss against Stoke City at the Britannia Stadium had left Spurs trailing Newcastle by 4 points and Stoke and Fulham by 5.

A club in disarray, the fans in despair, the players lacking leadership on or off the pitch, things were not looking good. Not since 1988* had Tottenham propped up the table, ironically on Halloween. That season was to shadow a remarkable turn around in events at White Hart Lane as the week continued to get worse as Udinese beat Spurs on the Thursday 2-0 with a implosion in the last 15 minutes. Juande Ramos cut a depressed figure on the touchline in Udine, a man completely at a loss to explain what was happening or it seemed able to arrest the decline.

Daniel Levy’s reign as chairman had seen plenty of ups and downs during the course of the 7 years that had led to this point. Ramos was supposed to be the marquee managerial signing to move Spurs onwards from the work of the underrated and under appreciated Martin Jol. It was fast becoming a disaster of epic proportions as the club lurched from crisis to crisis. After 5 managers in that time, Levy was under enormous pressure to finally deliver, yet here they were, bottom of the league, winless, shapeless and facing relegation.

After the defeat in Italy, Ramos made the usual “We can play our way out of trouble” statements, but they rang hollow in the ears of the Spurs fans. Other than a well deserved point at Stamford Bridge, there had been nothing to cling to in the way of optimism. No-one else could see where the win was going to come from, the team looked beyond help. On Saturday, October 25th as the fans prepared for another inevitable defeat the next day against Bolton, things couldn’t get much worse.

As Match of the Day finished, I flicked over to Sky Sports News, just to see if perhaps anything at all had happened. As the image flicked on, the newsfeed at the bottom of the screen suddenly went in to to overdrive. “Tottenham have sacked Juande Ramos, Gus Poyet and Daniel Comolli with immediate effect…..Harry Redknapp has been confirmed as the new manager of Spurs …. Discussion with Redknapp next on Sky Sports News.” Then the adverts kicked in. Damn it!

I’d had a drink, who wouldn’t when you’re team was bottom of the league and playing like Worksop Town. I rewound the pictures and watched it again. Yep, still said the same. I shot to the PC, went on the BBC football site. It was the top story, Breaking News. The I checked the Guardian, yep, same there. It was true. I ran to the bedroom and woke my better half up, she told me to stop winding her up. I insisted it was true, and probably to simply placate me, she got up and went downstairs with me to see for herself.

Chelsea fans don’t believe a lot, though living with a Spurs fan means you get used to false dawns on a seasonal basis. Sitting down, SSN burst in to life once more, BOOOOOOOOOM went the special effects, WHOOOOOOOOOOSH went the graphics and then it was confirmed by the presenters clearly excited that people would actually be watching for once late on a Saturday night. Redknapp was indeed the new manager of Spurs. I let out a hearty cheer! My other half wasn’t impressed at all, ” Oh no, I’ve always really liked Harry. What has he done that for!” Time for another drink I decided, my despair transformed in minutes to optimism! Ah the joy’s of football eh!

As managerial announcements go, for me, its quite possibly one of the oddest I’ve ever come across, late on a Saturday night, less than 24 hours before a team is due to play a match. I bet every newspaper editor was cursing Levy throughout the United Kingdom. Yet, in the 38 League games Redknapp has managed Spurs in now, his record reads Played 38, Won 19, Drawn 8 Lost 11.With this season’s excellent start, Redknapp has assured that for the first time in 4 seasons, Spurs are not playing catch up after a slow start. 16 points from 8 games is Tottenham’s best ever start to a Premiership season.

No Spurs fan thinks that we’ll win the League, or finish in the top 4, but after the year of hell that was the Ramos era, it’s a whole lot better. The oddity of Ramos’ tenure, Spurs won the League Cup, their first trophy in 9 seasons and a 5-1 victory against Arsenal, yet it will always be viewed as a dreadful year.  Two shots of sunlight do not make a summer, but at least Harry’s got Spurs fans smiling again.

There is still plenty of work to do at Tottenham, the centre half issue needs resolving due the injuries King and Woodgate now have. The midfield have to learn to be able to play without Modric against big teams and not let Palacios do all the running, Keane needs to keep performing as he did against Burnley and Hull City. Defoe needs keep running and not get downhearted and the players outside the first 11 need to knuckle down and try and force themselves into Redknapps plans rather than whining to the media. Then maybe a top six place wouldn’t be out of the question, anything else would be a bonus.

*Spurs became the first team to be bottom of the First Division on Halloween in 1988 and not be relegated, actually finishing 6th as Gascoigne and Waddle combined to drag them up the table. The following season saw Spurs finish 3rd with Lineker joining the team as Waddle went to Marseille.

In British newspaper match reports of Aston Villa’s 2-1 away win against Tottenham Hotspur, almost all of the stories lead with sentences similar to this one found in The Sun: “Calamity keeper Heurelho Gomes messed up to leave Spurs rooted at the foot of the table.”

True, yes, but it doesn’t provide a complete accurate picture of what really happened last night at White Hart Lane.

All of the blame should be placed on the players at Tottenham Hotspur, not on the shoulders of Gomes. One blunder by Gomes was the difference in this game, but the scoreline could have easily been 4-1 or even 5-1 to Aston Villa. Spurs were that awful.

The three things most missing from Tottenham are desire, confidence and rhythm. They’re not hungry to win. They look lacklustre when going in for 50/50 balls. They look beaten, partly due to a lack of confidence. And lastly, they’re having a lot of difficulty establishing a rhythm. Three or four passes in a row were a rarity for Spurs last night. Plus, the team weren’t getting into open spaces to provide options for Spurs players to pass to.

Spurs were completely outclassed by Aston Villa who were by far the better team last night. Villa had a much easier time creating goalscoring chances while it seemed like rocket science for Spurs. It was a fantastic team performance by Villa, who passed the ball around with ease and lots of one-touch passes. Plus, Villa had a lot more pace down the wings with Ashley Young and Gabriel Agbonlahor in tremendous form. Gareth Barry was incredible, too. In fact, it’s not fair to the rest of the team to single out just Barry, Young and Agbonlahor. The entire team performance was amazing. If they continue playing like this, they’ll soon be in the top three.

Most football supporters ignore the league tables for the first few weeks of the season. But, after four games, it’s no surprise that Tottenham are bottom. Juande Ramos has a ton of work to do with this team, but the first thing he needs to get them to do is to play with desire. Right now, they look like a confused team with no leader. Jonathan Woodgate was their captain last night, but he’s no John Terry. Spurs needs someone who can command respect and fear. Someone who can single handly change a game by taking control and setting an example for a team to play better.

Luka Modric still hasn’t come to grips with the English game and is making far too many mistakes. Debutant Roman Pavlyuchenko showed glimpses of brilliance but Villa’s defenders did a terrific job of limiting his chances in and around the penalty area.

Don’t forget that the one goal that Spurs scored in this game was a fluke rebound off Darren Bent. The striker had a terrible game with few clearcut chances, but when he did get a chance, he couldn’t score.

Also don’t forget that while the headlines victimize Gomes as the culprit who “lost” Spurs the game, it was Gomes who pulled off several herculean saves to prevent Villa from scoring.

In response to the defeat, Ramos told BBC Sport that “I’m not going to carry out an assessment after one game. Hopefully with calmness and experience we’ll get a positive result.”

To me, Ramos’s response is as passive as his Spurs team. This was another woeful performance from Tottenham. The third of the season thus far (the exception being against Chelsea where they played at a much higher level).

At this rate, with Ramos’s laissez faire atmosphere, Tottenham could be in for a very long season. After playing Wisla Krakow in the UEFA Cup on Thursday, they face a must-win match at home against Wigan on Sunday followed by a trip to Fratton Park to play Portsmouth the week after. Six points from the next two Premier League matches is a must for Juande Ramos. Otherwise, the Tottenham fans will start to turn on him.

We thought it’d be fun to pick our all-star injury football team featuring those Premier League players that always seem to be injured. Thanks to the EPL Talk readers who participated in last weekend’s EPL Talk Chat for the idea.

1. Chris Kirkland
2. Gary Neville
3. Mikael Silvestre
4. Jonathan Woodgate
5. Ledley King
6. Owen Hargreaves
7. Kieron Dyer
8. Tim Cahill
9. Craig Bellamy
10. Michael Owen
11. Louis Saha

Subs:
Andy Johnson
Mark Viduka
Valeri Bojinov
Emile Heskey
Didier Drogba

What current players are missing that should be featured in this squad? Click the comments link below and let us know.