Spurs boss George Graham is already without striker Steffen Iversen, midfielder Steffen Freund, wing-back Stephen Carr and striker Les Ferdinand.

Graham refuses the easy option of moaning about injury problems.

He said: "I've studied this and there are only two or three teams in the Premiership who have actually got away this season without having a number of top players injured at the same time.

"So it is no good me whingeing on about an injury crisis because practically every club has them. The problem for us, though, is that we don't have a big enough squad to cover it.

"That has to change, but until it does it is going to be difficult for us to progress against clubs who have the big squads. I looked at Orient's first-team squad list last week, and even they have a bigger one than we do."

Graham has already underlined the need for new signings to Spurs' imminent new owners ENIC but admits he has not attempted any meaningful dialogue with managing director Daniel Levy who masterminded the deal to pay £22million for outgoing chairman Sir Alan Sugar's controlling interest,

Graham explained: "Mr Levy has said he's going to take a back-seat once ENIC have appointed a new Tottenham chairman who will have close contact with (director of football) David Pleat and me, but that won't happen until the end of this month."