Sherwood hoping for fiery derby
Tim Sherwood wants this weekend's north London derby to be a "blood and thunder" encounter as he believes that will give Tottenham the edge.
Spurs head into the match in need of a morale-boosting victory after heavy back-to-back defeats this past week at Chelsea and then at home to Benfica in the Europa League.
The results likely mean another season without a trophy at White Hart Lane and leaves their top-four ambitions hanging by a thread ahead of Sunday's pivotal encounter with Arsenal.
This, though, is the kind of fixture which can give Spurs a timely shot in the arm and Sherwood wants the game to be a throwback to the derby matches he used to play in.
"It is a fantastic occasion - always was to play in these games," the former midfielder told Spurs TV.
"It is my first time as a manager at the Lane to be standing opposite Arsene Wenger and hopefully I will get one over on them.
"I don't think there is much blood and thunder these days - I want it to be more of that.
"I think that gives us the edge. We are possibly more functional than they are, but if they get into their stride we know they can be very dangerous, so we need to knock them off their stride."
Sherwood's first match in the dugout for a north London derby came in January, when the Gunners ran out 2-0 victors in their FA Cup third-round tie at the Emirates Stadium.
That was the first defeat of his tenure and the pressure has since mounted on the man that succeeded Andre Villas-Boas in December, with talk of a summer departure intensifying as poor results begin to stack up.
Sherwood is only concerned with the here and now, however, and is confident his players - whose desire he criticised after the defeat to Chelsea - will do him proud on Sunday.
"We've got the best game we could have, a north London derby," he said.
"We won't need any more motivation for that, will we? I am sure they will be up for it. It is probably the best game we could have.
"I always thought it was a good time to be playing Arsenal, but it's ups and downs. We have to soldier on, you can't always win games and we know that.
"We're in a difficult period at the moment, coming off the back of two defeats, we have to go out there and be counted and I am sure we will and the crowd will accept nothing less."
Emmanuel Adebayor, Kyle Walker and Mousa Dembele are all struggling to be fit for Sunday's match, while captain Michael Dawson will be absent due to a hamstring injury.
Etienne Capoue, Erik Lamela and Vlad Chiriches have also been sidelined, although Gylfi Sigurdsson could be involved after training on Friday.
