How deep is your squad?

This post is guest written by Jamie Dunn, someone you'll be hearing more on this site from time to time.

The League Cup is a curious one; the ‘Big Four’ have enormous, continental fish to fry so when they enter the competition in the third round, playing the kids is alright for them. Meanwhile, the smaller teams can’t afford to risk the players charged with keeping them in the Premier League and so they usually fall victim to ‘upsets’ at the hands of Championship and other lower league clubs champing at the bit for a piece of cup glory.

We’ve never quite fallen into either category, which is evident in the fact that we’ve won the competition twice in the last ten years, reaching the final a further two times on top of that.

Last night we advanced to the next stage of our noble quest to win the trophy back from the hands of Manchester United, with a comprehensive 5-1 victory over Doncaster Rovers, fielding a largely unused set of players.

Several players were rested – out went Jermain Defoe, Robbie Keane, Wilson Palacios, Luka Modric, Aaron Lennon, Ledley King and Benoit Assou-Ekotto – and that was the most encouraging aspect of the performance last night. That the players on the fringes of the first team delivered as convincing a scoreline as Harry’s preferred XI might have was both encouraging and refreshing.

Four of the five who found the net last night are yet to start a competitive game this season. David Bentley showed that, while he has fallen so far behind Lennon in the pecking order the little man can hardly see him over his shoulder, he still has a decent strike on him. Giovani dos Santos played a big part in the goal, showing great skill before his cross arrived at Bentley's feet. Jamie O’Hara, who impressed in pre-season but faces a challenge to dislodge any of our current favoured midfield, also scored with a well-taken effort.

For Peter Crouch it was a chance to score his first goal for Tottenham, a chance he grabbed with both hands as he (obviously) rose above the defending pack to head home. Roman Pavlyuchenko may have scored his last for the club, however, with the close of the transfer window looming large. Please, don’t go, Pav.

Granted, it was only Doncaster and anybody who watched the game or the BBC’s frankly Setanta-esque highlights show will know they were unlucky to hit the woodwork as many times as they did, while Carlo Cudicini was forced into action several times as well. They are yet to win a game this season and as a result even Kevin-Prince Boateng was allowed to remind us he’s still kicking about, giving away a penalty with his first touch before setting up Pavlyuchenko for the final goal.

So, Mark and I will continue to tell each other to rein it in, quietly enjoying being top of the table while it lasts and pretending not to be dreaming of taking home the lot come May.

But, we can all take our tongues out of our cheeks long enough to say that, while we're still probably not going to win the league, we may finally have some of that much-needed ‘strength in depth’ everyone’s been talking about.