Premier League preview No17: Tottenham Hotspur

Guardian writers' prediction 6th (This is not David Hytner's prediction, but the average of our writers' tips)

Last season's position 5th

Odds against winning the title 50-1

When the Champions League aria played and Tottenham Hotspur carried the fight to the Milan giants and Real Madrid, it was tempting to wonder whether things could get any better for the north London club. The heady European adventure of last season, which represented the first time since 1961-62 that Spurs had graced the continent's elite competition, was reward for 2009-10, when Harry Redknapp, finally and memorably, sated the board's demand for a top‑four finish.

The Champions League ties, though, helped to buy credit and deflect attention from a Premier League campaign that never quite ignited. The blight on it, and the big difference to the previous season, was the number of points that were tossed away at home. Supporters wonder what might have been if draws against Sunderland, West Ham United, West Bromwich Albion and Blackpool, for example, had been turned into wins, never mind the defeat against Wigan Athletic. Tottenham finished in fifth place, six points behind Arsenal.

This time out, as Redknapp himself might admit, the Europa League is a curious consolation and the manager's challenge is to prove that if the club can never better the Champions League quarter-final finish of last April, they can at least return to such exalted levels. The danger, however, which is preying on the manager's mind, is that they could slip further away.

Redknapp is notorious for playing down his team's chances, for attempting to create an atmosphere where there is as little expectation on them as possible, but he truly believes that Liverpool's spending has given them the initiative. And that is before he considers the top four from last season, into which Manchester City have propelled themselves on the back of Abu Dhabi's petrodollars. Once again, Arsenal feel like Tottenham's most realistic target.

It has been a summer of impasse, with the market so far defeating Redknapp. He has signed only one senior player – the 40-year-old goalkeeper Brad Friedel on a free transfer from Aston Villa who, incidentally, has not traded regular starting football for a place on the Tottenham bench.

Redknapp is desperate to add proven quality, with the priority remaining a world-class centre-forward who might permit him the option of playing 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3. The problem, though, is that such players come with huge wages and Tottenham are simply not in the position to pay them. The ceiling is around £75,000-a-week and the chairman Daniel Levy refuses to play fast and loose with the club's financial future, particularly as White Hart Lane holds only 36,000.

It has not stopped Redknapp from getting frustrated. The Manchester clubs, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool can each offer six-figure weekly wage packets for the right player. "You're looking to be a top-four team and it's difficult; we can't pay the wages that those clubs pay, basically," Redknapp said. "We were interested in Sergio Agüero but he wanted £250,000-a-week. We were only £220,000 short."

Redknapp released Jonathan Woodgate, who has joined Stoke City, and loaned out Kyle Naughton and Bongani Khumalo but he must trim his bloated squad further in order to comply with the Premier League's 25-man limit. Virtually every Tottenham player has his price, albeit a very large one – Levy refuses to accept a loss. He is demanding a huge loan fee, for example, for David Bentley, who still has three years to run on his contract.

The irony behind Redknapp's wage-related grumbles is that the club's many unwanted squad players are on deals that make them too expensive for potential buyers in the Premier League or the Championship. He must sell before he buys, and he is struggling to sell. Moreover, he is struggling to find players who represent an improvement on what he already has and who also fit into the wage structure.

Luka Modric's future has been the major issue of the summer and it seems pivotal to Tottenham's prospects. The midfielder, whose performances over the duration of last season eclipsed those of even Gareth Bale, has been chased by Chelsea, who are able to offer him an eye-watering wage increase and Champions League football. At the start of the summer, Modric made it clear that he wanted the move.

Levy, though, has maintained that he is going nowhere and that his case will be different to those of Michael Carrick and Dimitar Berbatov who, after much wrangling, were sold to Manchester United. Levy would argue that the circumstances in those instances were different. Carrick had two years to run on his Tottenham contract in 2006 and had made it plain that he would not sign another one.

With Berbatov, if he had been made to stay in the summer of 2008 there was the fear that he would invoke the Webster ruling the following summer and buy out the remainder of his contract to force the transfer that he wanted, at a cut-price. There was also the worry that he would effectively down tools during the season.

Modric is under contract until 2016 and he is routinely commended for his professionalism. At the time of writing, the situation feels so delicate that a gentle breeze could tip it.

Redknapp intends to play his younger players in the Europa League – watch out for Kyle Walker at right-back and Danny Rose at left-back, although the former could push Vedran Corluka for the regular berth. And with Europe not expected to be too great a distraction, the manager will hope that a clear and energetic focus on the Premier League will pay dividends.

No club in England are linked to a greater number of players than Tottenham – the N17 rumour mill is a force of nature – and, if it were up to Redknapp, you suspect he would sign them all. But the existing squad contains genuine quality – think William Gallas, Michael Dawson, Bale and Rafael van der Vaart, however frustrating he can be, at times – and, with a statement signing up front, Tottenham should at least finish with more points than last season.

It would be nice for Redknapp if he could field the same central defensive partnership from one week to the next. Keeping Modric would be nicer.