Can Pochettino steer Spurs into the top four?

Mauricio Pochettino can still get Spurs into the top four

Tottenham Hotspur last played in the Champions League in 2010/11 and are desperate to rejoin the European elite again next season but can they do it?

Just under four years ago the Londoners made it all the way to the quarter-finals before being dismantled by Real Madrid, but this season they have genuine hopes of a top-four finish.

Head coach Mauricio Pochettino has the advantage of facing a fight for a Champions League spot which is up for grabs due to a number of clubs failing to live up to their potential - notably Merseyside duo Liverpool and Everton.

And Spurs currently stand four points off the all-important fourth place, which is occupied by capital rivals West Ham, with Pochettino's former club Southampton and deadly adversaries Arsenal also in the mix.

So what do Spurs and Pochettino need to do in the next few months to make their dream come true?

They have one of the Premier League's top goalkeepers in Hugo Lloris to shore up their backline, but their defence needs to improve, with more goals conceded than scored in the opening 17 games of the season.

The return of England full-back Kyle Walker after injury should help, but a top-class partner for Jan Vertonghen in central defence has to be a priority when the transfer window opens, with Younes Kaboul and Federico Fazio both far from convincing.

The options in midfield look far rosier under Pochettino than they did a matter of months ago, with both Nacer Chadli and Erik Lamela having come on leaps and bounds.

Chadli has scored six time in 14 league outings this term to emerge as a key player in the Spurs set-up, while record signing Lamela has gone from total misfit to a hit - especially following a stunning winner against Burnley at the weekend.

However, a physical enforcer to support that duo and the ever-impressive Christian Eriksen is another January priority, with the summer departure of Sandro to QPR looking a strange decision, as he appeared to be the perfect foil for his more creative colleagues.

So, through the spine of the team, a couple of quality recruits could make all the difference to the prospects of Champions League football, but it is in attack where the most question marks appear to lie.

Emmanuel Adebayor, currently away from the club for personal reasons, continues to be one of the most frustrating players in the Premier League, while Roberto Soldado remains unable to find the form which made him such a star back in his native Spain.

And the struggles of Adebayor and Soldado would leave a massive hole in the Spurs frontline, had it not been for the emergence of Harry Kane as the potential talisman to bring Champions League football back to White Hart Lane.

The 21-year-old local boy started the season as a reserve, but a string of goalscoring displays in the Europa League led to him forcing his way into the league line-up, where he has scored four times in his last eight games.

Crucially, all four of those goals have come in 2-1 victories, showing that Kane has the attitude to make the difference when it is needed.

However, he will need to maintain that sort of form over the second half of the season if Spurs are to secure a dream return to the European elite, with precious other options available to Pochettino in attack, unless another major January swoop is made.

That leaves Kane in the pressurised position of being the go-to man for Spurs and whether he can cope with that at such a young age will decide whether it's Champions League football, or a fifth consecutive Europa League campaign, for Tottenham in 2015/16.