JAN 14 — As I’m writing this, I’ve just finished watching the Tottenham Hotspur (Spurs) vs Everton game which was aired “live” on TV, which Spurs won 2-0. It was supposed to be our opening game of the season, but was postponed because of the London riots that happened last year.

As a Spurs fan who’s witnessing a frankly quite unbelievable English Premier League (EPL) season for my team, I’ve been anxiously hoping that this one game in hand advantage that we have over all the other teams (except Everton of course) for the past five months will yield a positive result, as before this game we were only three points behind second-placed Manchester United and six points behind Manchester City.

Now that we’ve finally got the game in hand business over and done with, and have fully taken advantage of it, we now find ourselves level on points with Manchester United and only three points behind league leaders Manchester City. If you told me before the start of the season that we’d be in this position in January I’d have probably laughed in your face. I’m still pinching myself wondering how we got here, with more or less the same team as last season, with the only additions to the first team being new arrivals Scott Parker and Emmanuel Adebayor.

It’s now January, which means that the transfer window is back open for a month, a period that football pundits have been calling the silly season every time it arrives as teams wishing to strengthen their squads or paper over some cracks scramble over whichever players are available for transfer. Prices in January can be very inflated as teams usually are very reluctant to part with any of their players in mid-season, as the £35 million (RM175 million) price tag on Andy Carroll amply showed last season.

I’ve always admired the way Spurs have gone about conducting their business as a club, which most people would describe as prudent. We have a sensible wage structure, with a fairly low wage ceiling compared to most teams in the top half of the EPL.

We rarely go nuts and break the bank for any player, as our modus operandi over the last few years has always been to buy them young and relatively cheap. We actually make decently healthy profits every time the club’s accounts are announced each year. And we have a pretty impressive track record when it comes to selling players and making a tidy profit from them, especially to Manchester United with Dimitar Berbatov (sold for £30 million, bought for £10.9 million) and Michael Carrick (sold for around £16 million to £18 million, bought for less than £3 million).

The star performers in the spine of our current team all also came in relatively cheaply, like Gareth Bale (bought as a youngster for around £5 million), Rafael Van Der Vaart (£8 million), Aaron Lennon (£1.75 million), Scott Parker (£6 million), Adebayor (on loan) and our 40-year-old goalkeeper Brad Friedel (free transfer), with only Luka Modric perhaps the most expensive one at £16 million. He’s worth every single penny especially when you consider the kind of player that he is now, easily worth at least £35 million in current market conditions.

We’ve very rarely bought big, and I totally understand that as we’re not a financial powerhouse like Man City, Chelsea and Man United are. With a stadium our size, we can’t even compete with Arsenal in terms of gate receipts. But as humble as all we Spurs fans have been all these years, there’s a sense that the circumstances that chance upon us in the EPL this year is a very rare one. Man United is quite clearly in a season of transition, with their new generation still coming to terms with what it means to a Man United player, resulting in performances that sometimes lack that self-belief that we all associate United with.

Man City, because of their boatloads of cash and hugely impressive squad with enviable strength in depth, are not going to find it easy coping with the pressures of being favourites to win the EPL, as their slip-ups in the last few weeks have patently demonstrated. Chelsea are also in the midst of transition as their old guard makes way for the young and new, as their erratic results this season have clearly shown. Arsenal can beat anyone on their day, but that day doesn’t happen often enough with the players they currently have in their squad, which is evident from their points tally so far. As they often say, the league table doesn’t lie.

So Spurs now find themselves in a hugely rare position. We’re well in it for a title challenge as we’re only three points behind the league leaders and level on points with the second-placed team. We’ve been in unbelievable form for the last five months, dropping very few points and winning games we’d expect to lose or draw in the last few seasons. And the way the team’s been playing clearly shows a group of players with confidence in themselves and in each other.

But we’re just a few injuries away from upsetting that confidence, especially in the striking department. Maybe now’s the time to gamble a little and buy big? Get a player who can further transform the team the way that Scotty Parker and Adebayor did when they arrived? It may be out of character for us to do that, as we’ve always strived to be prudent business-wise. But our results this season has also been out of character for us, and the way things are unfolding for other teams mean that we may never have a better chance at challenging for the title. So maybe now’s the best time to get a little silly?

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.