It’s been a long international break, but the Premier League returned last weekend with a bang, providing some great debuts, goals, and matches for all to watch. Here at #3 in the Premier League Goals of the Week series is Gylfi Sigurdsson’s first goal against Norwich City.

Until now, Spurs had yet to score a goal from open play in the Premier League. Yet, a fantastic transfer window and an attack full of new personnel aimed to change that, and that it did. Christian Eriksen got his first start since moving from Ajax at the end of the window, and it was Sigurdsson who was the benefit of his great play.

We head to Spurs’ first touch of the ball. Up to this point in the match we’ve seen some nice attacking play, with Roberto Soldado narrowly missing a crafty backheel to grab a lead. Here, Moussa Dembele earns the ball deep in midfield, as the first line out of the defense. We see options to his right, but they are pretty well covered. He could easily head into the space behind of his defender and attempt a take-on. As the last line, that’s not necessarily his job, though. As there isn’t an immediate option, Dembele opts to send a great ball out wide to his left back Danny Rose.

Rose has positioned himself well here, spreading out the Norwich defense by attacking. His position here also allows for the other left sided player in Spurs’ side – Sigurdsson, to head inside. The move has opened tons of space for Spurs to exploit, if they can get players to fill it. Note the amount of space in the diamond here. It’s this type of space that can force defenders to step up, and thus create a channel for a run in behind the defense. With Eriksen and Sigurdsson lurking just outside of the picture, it would take just a few smart passes for Spurs to get a good shout at goal. Here, though, the first pass is to the open man in Roberto Soldado. With great shooting prowess and being the sole striker, Soldado will command two defenders, and leave even more space.

Again, we have to note the spacing of Norwich’s defenders. As Soldado receives the ball, the right back is caught pretty deep out of position and both Sigurdsson and Eriksen have now appeared into the picture. Instead of dropping incredibly deep earlier in the attack to help Dembele, they have remained decently high up the pitch, and have pinched in because of the width Rose has provided. Soldado now is tasked with making a decision. As a goalscorer, he could trap the ball and try to turn and either gain a free kick or get a shot off. Or, he could drop the ball off for one of the two attackers approaching. With the amount of space on the left hand side of the picture, a few passes could easily create a better scoring opportunity, and Soldado’s pass starts such an attack.

We see Eriksen has dropped the ball off for Sigurdsson who now is left with no immediate defenders and a multitude of options for himself. As an individual, we know that Eriksen typically likes to lay the ball off, but also possess a strong shot. He could easily use his right foot here and aim to place it over John Ruddy in the corner. Also, he could pop the ball over the defender to the right and feed Paulinho, but it would likely result in a volley and a difficult shot. The option here is to lay the ball off to Sigurdsson into the open space that’s been created between the center backs and the right back that’s been glaring for the entire attack. We can see Norwich defender Michael Turner on the correct foot to possibly close down an attacking Sigurdsson, but Eriksen makes the pass to a full-steam-ahead Sig.

Sigurdsson receives the ball, and Turner instead went for the interception but missed. Thus, Sigurdsson is left with miles in front of him and only needs a nicely placed shot to give Tottenham an early lead. Beyond the great finish, we see the continued vision and positioning we’ve seen from Spurs all attack. Both Soldado and Paulinho aren’t caught ball watching waiting for a shot, but instead are ready to attack on a rebound if Sigurdsson’s shot were to be saved.

This goal was made because Spurs’ midfield did just exactly what it was supposed to. Defense fed the deep-lying player, and then the ball was spread wide, and fed back into the middle with speedy passing creating a channel and a sublime finish. This is different from an attack focused on one player that we have seen in the past. The fluidity and smart positioning between all of their attackers is something reminiscent of a Bayern Munich-esque attack, with each player getting where they need to be and having the talent to threaten any defense. If this keeps up, Spurs will be much more than a top four threat this year.