It’s that time of year where we start to analyse how horrid the winter spell will be for our clubs.

From a Spurs perspective, to paraphrase the great Bing Crosby, I’m dreaming of a successful Christmas.

If ever there was a period to test our top four credentials, it was these upcoming months.

Our absence from the Capital One Cup may be a blessing in disguise after all, and for rivals Arsenal also.

Since the summer, I have strongly advocated that top four is not within our reach in 2015/16. But should these games be kind to us, we are certainly in with a shout.

Our next four Premier League fixtures are Aston Villa, Arsenal, West Ham and Chelsea.

I have no concerns surrounding the Villa game, which as a Spurs fan I never thought I’d say. Last season every game, no matter the opponent, was tricky purely because we always make it difficult for ourselves.

This campaign, however, we are cool, calm and collected. Pochettino has instilled a rigidity to our side that takes pride of place amongst our defence, who have picked up four clean sheets so far.

After that, a trio of London derbies is a pretty daunting task. In typical ‘Spursy’ fashion, Chelsea will probably have turned it around by then, with Arsenal’s injuries worries unlikely to affect them significantly.

The West Ham game would not normally be as big as it is, but with the Hammers still above us, knocking them off their perch is essential.

December paints a very different picture. Less so on the difficult side, but more within the ‘must win’ category. With the likes of West Brom, Newcastle, Norwich and Watford among our opponents, 12 points would look pretty good in our Christmas stockings.

Mauricio Pochettino has concentrated on cracking the basics first this season, with a view to winning games at the back of his mind, for now.

It might sound strange, all teams of course want to win, but it seems that amongst a flurry of draws this campaign that the Tottenham boss has concentrated on the following: be hard to beat and solidify our pretty shocking home form.

Admittedly, I would have preferred wins against the sides we have drawn against. After all, there is always a case for ‘too many draws’ and not enough victories.

But the Spurs I saw at the Vitality Stadium were a different side. They were a Spurs that despite a minor setback, made the most of their chances and finished with a scoreline that accurately matched our efforts against Eddie Howe’s side.

It feels like we are slowly but surely getting there. I could not be more behind Pochettino and the project he has begun at White Hart Lane. I no longer go into games thinking “we’re going to get smashed today.”

Pochettino is changing the mindset of everyone associated, both internally and externally outside the football club.

There will always be that ‘Spursy’ aspect to our club, but with a little Christmas magic, hopefully our manager will change the meaning of this unfortunate word to something of greatness.