Former Spurs midfielder was doing an analysis of Spurs on Sky Sports FC and delivered a rather damning verdict on the North London club as it is etching dangerously close to the drop zone.
Tottenham Hotspur find themselves in a precarious position as the 2025/26 Premier League season enters its final stretch, and ex-Spurs midfielder Jamie O’Hara has not held back in his assessment of why. Speaking on Sky Sports FC, O’Hara delivered a passionate and unflinching verdict on a club that, for the first time in nearly 50 years, is staring down the very real prospect of relegation.
Spurs currently sit 16th in the Premier League table, just four points above the drop zone with 11 games remaining. Sunday’s 4-1 home defeat at the hands of Arsenal in the North London derby extended their winless league run in 2026 to nine games. Jamie O’Hara believes the problems run far deeper than tactics or personnel as he also gave his verdict on talkSPORT’s radio show The Sports Bar following Spurs’ 1-4 humiliation at home to arch-rivals Arsenal.
“That is a mentality”
O’Hara’s central argument is not about quality — it’s about character. He had been hoping to see a “manager bounce” under new head coach Igor Tudor, particularly against an Arsenal side that had struggled in recent weeks. What he saw instead left him speechless.
“I was expecting the team to go into this game with a high attitude, a bit of passion, fight, relentless pressing,” O’Hara said. “The complete opposite. It was miles away from where I thought it was.”
Most damning of all was O’Hara’s view that the squad’s basic defensive work ethic had completely broken down. He pointed to the first 15 minutes of the Arsenal game specifically, where Spurs players were seen “passing on” runners rather than tracking them — a fundamental failure that, in his view, has nothing to do with ability.
“That is not about ability. That’s not about talent. That is a mentality and a culture at a football club.”
Damning Statistics
The numbers back O’Hara’s argument up. Spurs have been outrun in each of their last five Premier League games, and they rank bottom of the entire division for high turnovers — meaning they are losing the ball in dangerous areas near their own goal more than any other side. In the derby itself, Arsenal covered around four and a half kilometres more than Tottenham as a team.
“You can’t have Newcastle running nearly six kilometres further than you,” O’Hara said bluntly. “That for me is a culture and a mentality at a football club which is in disarray.”
Players “Looking at the Exit Door”
O’Hara went further, suggesting some players may already have one foot out the door — mentally checked out of the relegation battle and dreaming of bigger stages.
“These players want to be in the Champions League, playing nice football. They’re in a relegation fight, and that for me was the biggest thing I noticed. The heads are down. They’re looking for excuses.”
He singled out Xavi Simons — on loan from PSG — as an example of a player whose quality is not in doubt, but whose attitude in a fight has been found wanting. “Xavi Simons, you are in a relegation fight. You’ve got to play like you’re in a relegation fight.”
“Spurs Will Go Down”
The warning O’Hara issued was stark and unambiguous. He contrasted Tottenham’s mentality with the sides immediately around them in the table — West Ham and Nottingham Forest — who, he argued, have the grit and experience to scrap their way to safety precisely because they know what a relegation battle demands.
“The teams down the bottom, West Ham, Nottingham Forest, they’ll run. They’ll fight. They’ll scrap, because they know they’re in it. Spurs don’t want to be in it.”
With the club winless since last year and having not been relegated from the top flight since 1977/78, the stakes could not be higher. New boss Igor Tudor will be looking for his first win in charge when Spurs travel to Fulham on Sunday — a game that, given what O’Hara described, feels like much more than just three points.
“They haven’t got the stomach for a fight,” O’Hara concluded. “That needs to be addressed quickly, because Spurs will go down.”