Nottingham Forest v Tottenham Hotspur: Key stats and talking points

Roberto de Zerbi's Tottenham, who have lost both league games this season without scoring, now face a Nottingham Forest side who have beaten them in each of their last four encounters. BBC Sport takes a look at the key themes ahead of Saturday's meeting at the City Ground (15:00 BST). "It's the biggest problem, it's the biggest challenge and it's the biggest target to find the right mentality," De Zerbi said as he reflected on Spurs' defeat to Newcastle that left them bottom of the table. No points or goals from their two league games so far is not the start they envisaged after spending more than £300m on 10 new players this summer, but their beleaguered boss pointedly said: "You can't buy mentality in the transfer market." Despite their squad being refreshed by nearly a full team of new recruits, scars clearly remain at the club following their back-to-back 17th-place finishes and a dismal record of just 21 wins from 78 top-flight games (D16, L41) since the start of the 2024-25 season. [BBC] Another telling statistic that points towards a lack of fight is that it's nearly two years since the last time they won a Premier League game from going 1-0 down. They've lost 28 and drawn eight after conceding first dating back to a 4-1 victory over Aston Villa in November 2024. De Zerbi's team selections have also raised eyebrows so far. Mitigation comes in the form of a few key players not yet being fully fit, but picking Pedro Porro as an advanced right winger, Conor Gallagher as a 10 against Brentford and chopping and changing his midfield is yet to pay dividends. They will now attempt to avoid losing their first three league games in a campaign for only the fifth time in their history and for only the second time without scoring since the start of the 1974-75 season. The Lilywhites will have to rectify their poor recent record against a Nottingham Forest side who are targeting a fifth league win in a row against the north Londoners for the very first time, having won both league meetings 3-0 last season. After they opened the season with successive defeats to Leeds, Forest steadied the ship with an impressive showing in a 2-2 draw with Liverpool at Anfield in which their xG of 2.3 comfortably outstripped that of the hosts' 1.61. To the fore in that game was Morgan Gibbs-White, with the former Spurs target scoring his 13th Premier League goal of 2026 - the highest figure of any top-flight player this year. While the Tricky Trees may not have secured all of their transfer targets, a significantly quieter summer than in recent years still brought in quality to the City Ground. Following the mega sale of Elliot Anderson, they actually turned in a profit despite spending nearly £120m themselves on the likes of club record signing Liam Delap, Sporting Lisbon defender Ousmane Diomande and one of the Premier League's best right-backs in Daniel Munoz. Head coach Oliver Glasner will be keen to get the club back to winning ways at home given they've managed just one victory in their last 12 top-flight games at the City Ground. Following their loss to Leeds on the opening weekend they will also be desperate to protect an impressive record of having not lost their first two home games of a top-flight campaign since 1924-25. One of the tactical tweaks that's starting to emerge as Glasner moulds his team is them becoming more direct with their passing. Despite a small sample size of two matches, 20.9% of their passes have gone long which is up from last season's average of just 12.5%. [BBC]