SPURS DARING TO DO WITH ANTONIO

After years of being the poor relations, Conte has talked Levy into spending big at Tottenham

NO wonder the Tottenham fans are buzzing.

Antonio Conte is winning battles and ripping up the squad ahead of an audacious title challenge next season.

Don’t laugh. On the face of it, the consistency of serial thrillers Liverpool and Manchester City and their hugely impressive summer business so far does indeed suggest the pair will dominate yet again next season.

Conte, though, is the great disruptor. The man who wiped out a 24-point lead on his arrival to win his first title with Juventus in 2012.

The man who took over at Chelsea after they had finished 10th in 2016 with just 50 points and led them to the Premier League title the following campaign with 93 points.

Last season he inspired a fragile Spurs side to derail Liverpool’s title bid, smash up City at the Etihad and leapfrog bitter local rivals Arsenal into the Champions League. All with players he mostly didn’t even want.

Since then he has succeeded where every other Tottenham boss in more than two decades under chairman Daniel Levy has failed, persuading him to loosen the purse strings.

Majority shareholder ENIC has pumped in £150million, desperate not to lose the best thing that has ever happened to them.

Players are being signed ahead of pre-season in a huge departure from Tottenham’s end-of-season usual rummage around the bargain basement.

The club have already beaten big-spending Newcastle and Aston Villa to the £25m capture of Brighton midfielder Yves Bissouma (right). They have landed experienced wing-back Ivan Perisic, a title winner under Conte two seasons ago.

They have brought in reliable competition for Hugo Lloris in Fraser Forster.

And now director of football management Fabio Paratici is targeting £22m defender Gleison Bremer from Torino and fellow Brazilian Richarlison, the £50m Everton striker.

Tottenham are even considering Inter Milan marksman Lautaro Martinez, who would cost even more.

Ex-Spurs midfielder Jamie O’Hara summed up the electrifying impact Conte’s victories are having with the club’s fanbase.

“I do not want to jump the gun, but I think what

Antonio

Conte is doing at

Spurs is a little bit similar to what Jurgen

Klopp did at Liverpool when he first came in,” said O’Hara. “Jurgen rebuilt the team slowly but then over the next two or three seasons you saw the impact.

“Now this Spurs side could be unbelievable.

“On the face of it, it’s a two horse race next season. Spurs have been nowhere near Premier League challengers. “But with the business we are doing, suddenly this could be different. “Tottenham always used to just wait until the last minute. ‘‘Try and get a deal, try and get someone on the cheap and we end up panic buying, spending money and it doesn’t work out,” O’Hara told talkSPORT. “This season, before pre-season we have already signed three players.

“Three players that improve the team – not the squad – the first XI.”

Champions League football – a fantasy last autumn given the low morale, the underwhelming impact of ex-Wolves boss Nuno and Tottenham’s shocking form – has been a game-changer for the club.

While players are rejecting Manchester United – who in turn thumbed their noses at Conte to their cost last season – Spurs are confident of completing their summer business ahead of their preseason tour of South Korea.

Conte claimed not to be a magician after his side’s humiliating Europa Conference League defeat to NS Mura last November.

Since then he has shown himself to be a combination of Paul Daniels, Penn and Teller and David Blaine.

He could yet pull an even bigger rabbit out of the hat next season.