Hoddle adds some style – now for the substance

As Glenn Hoddle's trusty assistant, John Gorman, drove him home from Craven Cottage on Thursday night following victory over Fulham in the Worthington Cup, there was an early reminder on the car radio that however well Tottenham Hotspur's journey along the glory, glory road is progressing, there is still some distance to go.

As well as paying due respect to the team's 2-1 success away to their London rivals, the sports bulletins were bursting with the news that Leeds United had found another £11m from apparently bottomless coffers to lure Robbie Fowler away from Liverpool, regarded by many as their closest challengers for the Premiership title.

It was confirmation that a clearly defined Big Five currently exists in English football just as much as at the time when Hoddle was a part of Spurs' last serious championship challenge and Tottenham and Everton, rather than Chelsea and Leeds, counted themselves among that élite group. Fifteen years on, Hoddle is reunited with the Spurs manager of the day, David Pleat, who now occupies an office at the training ground just down the road from Chigwell Village with "Director of Football'' on the door. It looks like a promising partnership again and should stay together longer this time; Hoddle, tracksuited and football-booted behind his desk, is clearly in it for the long haul, unlike his period at Southampton, which was a mere rehabilitation exercise before coming "home'' last spring.

The back end of last season, dominated by injuries and constant speculation over Sol Campbell's future, was a write-off, but Hoddle could not lose, even though the team did in their FA Cup semi-final against Arsenal. The time to judge White Hart Lane's returning hero was once his summer acquisitions had shown how well they could blend into an underachieving team; and the quarter-time verdict is highly favourable. Going into tomorrow's Premiership game at home to Bolton – coincidentally their next Worthington Cup opponents – the little numbers opposite Tottenham's name indicate five defeats in 14 games, of which only one has been by more than a single goal (the 5-3 epic at home to Manchester United) and only one has come against a team outside the acknowledged Top Five.

"Blackburn away was the only game where we let ourselves down,'' Hoddle said, with reference to a 2-1 defeat early in the campaign. "Against the top five we've played very well and it will be interesting to see how we do in the return games after Christmas.''

Equally interesting will be the form before then: Bolton at home is the first of half-a-dozen eminently winnable matches which could make for as happy a Christmas as the Lane has enjoyed in years. Jingle all the way; winning away games is an area that Hoddle, with his sense of Tottenham history, has identified as being ripe for improvement.

Another is seeing off the likes of Bolton: "In the past Tottenham haven't raised themselves for games that on paper they should have won. Of course there are no easy games – Bolton's win at Man United proves that. So we have to recognise that football's not played on paper and make sure we perform.''

He could hardly ask for more from his new recruits. Goran Bunjevcevic, the only one of them without Premiership experience, has understandably taken longest to settle in and only returned on Thursday from a painful facial injury.

Of the rest, Dean Richards, Christian Ziege, Gus Poyet and Teddy Sheringham have been simply outstanding in their respective positions, which cover every area of the pitch. That indicates how much the team needed strengthening, but also how well Hoddle and Pleat have recruited. Equally significant is the fact that those four players cost a modest £15m in total; modest in comparison to Leeds, whose last four signings (Rio Ferdinand, Robbie Keane, Seth Johnson and Fowler) have set them back £50m.

"The Robbie Fowler signing certainly suggests there's a top five in financial terms,'' Hoddle admitted. "That goes almost without saying. The likes of ourselves, Villa and Newcastle are looking to become one of those top clubs. And don't forget that Ipswich ended up in the top five in the League last season.''

A similar achievement is within Tottenham's compass, while a cut-price ticket to Europe is available via the Worthington Cup, which they have sensibly made a higher priority than several other clubs. As Hoddle puts it: "We looked upon it as possibly five matches away from a European place. If we are in the Uefa Cup next season and doing very well in it, nobody will be concerned about how we got there. So we've given it a high priority right from the start.''

The style under Hoddle has been pleasingly true to club tradition. Eight games this month will tell us how much substance there is to the new, old Tottenham.