John Barnes believes that Tottenham will not be fighting it out for the Premier League title come the end of the season.
Jose Mourinho's Spurs have made a strong start to the 2020-21 campaign and sit in second place above champions Liverpool and five points ahead of title contenders Manchester City.
The Portuguese manager is a serial winner - he won the English top flight three times with Chelsea - and after almost a year at the helm is building some momentum at the north London club.
Despite Spurs' promising start, former Liverpool winger Barnes has insisted that the Premier League title race is still between Pep Guardiola's Manchester City and the injury-hit reigning champions.
'Tottenham are doing well, but Manchester City and Liverpool are still the favourites for the title,' Barnes told BonusCodeBets.
'They (Tottenham) grinded out a victory against West Brom, a game they could have easily lost, but Tottenham aren't a team who can continue to do that.
'They don't play with enough consistency, score enough goals, so they are over and above their own expectations now sitting in second position, they are title challengers in the sense they will be in the top four, but they won't finish in the top two.'
Tottenham have won only three trophies in 29 years with Mourinho looking to end that drought, but Barnes believes that Spurs do not have the 'mentality' needed to achieve success.
'Spurs are always a game away from a disaster or a fan meltdown, and the fans and players will turn on Jose Mourinho as soon as things aren't going so well,' he added.
'They lack the harmony and togetherness that other teams have, the players still don't look happy to be there, so if Tottenham drop a few points that can easily snowball into something much bigger.
'It is a mentality thing as much as anything else. They will challenge for the third and fourth position at best, but they currently have good momentum that they need to take forward.'
Liverpool and City played out a 1-1 draw at the Etihad last weekend and Jurgen Klopp's side's title defence has been severely affected by multiple injuries to first-team stars.
Defender Joe Gomez joined Virgil van Dijk, Fabinho and Trent Alexander-Arnold on the sidelines this week, leaving them very short at the back.