Madders, Tottenham can't play without you: what Spurs' results say about Maddison

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James Maddison went 375 days without playing a competitive game for Tottenham Hotspur. A knee injury ended his 2024-25 season after the Europa League semi-final first leg against Bodo/Glimt on 1 May 2025, so anyone looking to bet on Spurs had to factor in the loss of their chief creator for the run to the final. Then, in a pre-season friendly against Newcastle United in Seoul that August, he ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in the same knee.

He finally came back as a late substitute in a 1-1 draw with Leeds United on 11 May 2026. His first start arrived 536 days after his last, against Coventry City on 19 October, and he marked it by curling in the opening goal of a 3-1 win after 14 minutes. Spurs' results since he joined show how much they have missed him.

Spurs win more than twice as often when he starts

At the time of writing, Tottenham have played 123 Premier League games since Maddison signed from Leicester City in the summer of 2023. Split them by whether he was in the starting XI and you get two very different teams.

	      	
 Games With Maddison -   49 
 Won	                    26  
 Drawn	                 6
 Lost	                    17
 Win rate	           53.1%
 Goals per game          1.96

Games Without Maddison - 74
 Won                         18
 Drawn                       19
 Lost                        37
 Win rate                  24.3%
 Goals per game             1.35

That is 1.71 points per game with him and 0.96 without. Stretched across a 38-game season, it comes to roughly 65 points against 37. In 2025-26, West Ham were relegated with 39.

The gap shows at both ends

The goals are the obvious difference. Spurs have scored 96 in his 49 starts and 100 in the 74 games he did not start.

The defence suffers too. Tottenham concede 1.45 goals per game when he starts and 1.65 when he does not. Their goal difference is +25 with him in the team and -22 without him.

A season almost entirely without him

Maddison missed all but the final three games of 2025-26, and Spurs barely survived it. They went 15 Premier League matches without a win, one of the longest winless league runs in the club's history, until they beat Wolverhampton Wanderers on 25 April.

That Wolves win started a late recovery. Spurs won three of their last six league games and lost only one, a 2-1 defeat at Chelsea in which Maddison came off the bench. A 1-0 home win over Everton on the final day confirmed 17th place on 41 points, two clear of West Ham.

Bench minutes were not enough

Spurs opened 2026-27 with six league games without a win, three draws and three defeats, and sat bottom of the table. Maddison came on as a substitute in four of them and missed the other two with a setback.

That fits the longer pattern. Since 2023-24, Spurs have won only three of the 19 Premier League games in which Maddison came off the bench. Short cameos have not given Roberto De Zerbi's side what a full game from him does.

Two starts, two wins

The Coventry win was Spurs' first in the league this season, and it lifted them off the bottom. Five days later, Maddison started again in a 2-0 win at Chelsea on 24 October, although he was forced off early in the second half with a groin problem.

Those two victories took Spurs up to 12th at the time. In the six league games before his first start this season, they had not won once.

Momentum without him, for now

Spurs kept the run going without Maddison on 31 October. He was fit only for the bench and was an unused substitute in a 2-0 home win over 10-man Crystal Palace. It was their third league win in a row and lifted them to 8th.

One win against 10 men does not undo three seasons of numbers, though. Spurs only got going once he was back in the side, and the sooner he is starting again, the better their chances of staying there.

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