Is Thomas Frank already facing a reckoning as Tottenham manager?

The boos were loud and clear. Tottenham Hotspur’s fans were unhappy at the performance their team had just produced in a 1-0 home defeat to Chelsea, and with good reason. Spurs were insipid. They generated just 0.10 in Expected Goals and just three shots in the entire match. Chelsea barely broke a sweat strolling to three points.

Results-wise, this season hasn’t been so bad for Thomas Frank’s side. Tottenham are sitting sixth in the Premier League table, having lost just three of their opening 10 fixtures. Yet there is a growing sense that Frank-ball isn’t working. The Danish coach is already facing a reckoning as Spurs manager.

“That hurts massively,” Frank said after the home loss to Chelsea, the boos from his own fans surely still ringing in his ears. “I have never been in charge of a team that has created that little in one game. I will look into what we can do to make it better. That is one thing but I think everything is linked.”

At first, Frank’s style of play looked to have liberated Tottenham. In the opening few games of the season, they were quick into the attack with their best result and performance coming in the 2-0 away win over Manchester City. The Super Cup display against Paris Saint-Germain was also encouraging in this respect.

However, Spurs now appear to have lost that attacking verve and are getting bogged down in midfield. They lack a natural ball progressor in the centre of the pitch. Joao Palhinha has given Tottenham some steel in midfield after joining from Bayern Munich, but the Portuguese is limited in possession.

Similar could be said of Rodrigo Bentancur, who has regressed as a ball-playing midfielder over the last few seasons. Lucas Bergvall gives Spurs something different in possession, but he is still only a teenager and was withdrawn after only a few minutes of Saturday’s game against Chelsea with a head knock.

This is where Xavi Simons was signed to make a difference. The Netherlands international is a natural number 10 and joined Tottenham from RB Leipzig for €60m when Chelsea also wanted the highly-rated youngster. So far, though, Simons has struggled to find his best form and has been overwhelmed by the physicality of the English game at times.

James Maddison remains out with a long-term injury while Dejan Kulusevki is still sidelined and has yet to play a single match this season. Once those two players are back, Tottenham’s creativity crisis might end. Until then, though, it’s something that Frank must find a way to handle otherwise Spurs’ entire campaign could be compromised.

Frank took over Tottenham Hotspur in a difficult position. While the North London club ended its long wait for a trophy by winning the Europa League last season, Ange Postecoglou’s team also finished 17th in the Premier League table. One place lower and they would have been relegated.

Postecoglou started out promising a bolder, more modern style of play and delivered on that for a period of time. By the end of the Australian’s tenure, though, Tottenham were playing a brand of soccer designed to stay compact defensively and hit out on the counter-attack whenever possible. This is how Spurs beat Manchester United in the Europa League final.

At Brentford, Frank favoured a style of play that was closer to what Postecoglou ended up using towards the end of his time in charge, leading some to suggest the handover between the two managers would be a smooth one. A few months into the Frank era, though, and Tottenham clearly need more in an attacking sense.

There is talent within the Spurs squad. They have good players, but something isn’t quite clicking for the North London side right now. Frank must show fresh ideas to get Tottenham out of a hole that is seemingly getting deeper with every match they play at the moment. He can’t allow the boos to get any louder.