One of Antonio Conte's favourite words is "exploit" and that's exactly what he needs to do with Tottenham Hotspur's current break in the season.
The Italian is always looking to "exploit" any unexpected situation, positive or negative, and while this six-week break for Spurs has come after a frantic fixture schedule of 13 matches in 43 days, there are positives to be extracted from the time ahead of the club's next Premier League at Brentford on Boxing Day.
Here are five things we reckon will be on Conte's to-do list in the weeks ahead as he looks to put Tottenham in the best possible position for the second half of the season.
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Recharge his batteries
Conte decided to give his non-World Cup players and staff just over two weeks off as a mid-season break and they will return to the training pitches of Hotspur Way on Monday, November 28.
That time off is equally important for the Spurs head coach, who flew back home to Italy after the win at Leeds to be with his wife Elisabetta and daughter Vittoria. Conte needed to make up for lost family time after missing Vittoria's 15th birthday celebrations in person last week due to Tottenham's hectic schedule.
This period will have been draining on Conte and that he took the opportunity to let his assistant coach Cristian Stellini take three of his press conferences in recent weeks showed he was trying to ease the load.
A recharged Conte will only benefit Tottenham and having this mid-season break might just have come at the perfect time for the boss to take a step back, analyse his team away from the manic fixture schedule, make various decisions and come back fresh for the second half of the campaign.
Work with Djed Spence and make a right wing-back decision
One opportunity Conte will have during this time is to work with all three of his right wing-backs at Hotspur Way when they return at the end of this month.
Of the trio, Djed Spence could benefit the most from this mini pre-season as it gives him the chance to work with Conte and the coaches on exactly what they want from him, with the added bonus of four months of experience behind him. Spurs are expected to play a series of behind-closed-doors friendly matches which will give the England U21 international the chance to show he is taking on board what he's being coached.
This period with all three players will give the Spurs boss all the time he needs to decide what happens next with the right wing-back position. Conte constantly says that Spence is one for the future and he must decide now whether that future begins in the second half of the season or the player needs a loan move first for the remainder of the campaign.
If the latter were to happen then Conte is left with the original two right wing-backs he was not expected to start the season with in the first place. In that case, the Italian could push for another right wing-back to be signed in the January window.
Have that meeting with Paratici and Levy
Conte likes a crunch meeting with Spurs' powers-that-be. He speaks with the club's managing director of football Fabio Paratici every day during the season and chairman Daniel Levy most days but sometimes you just need a good old fashioned sit down to set out your stall.
Similar was meant to happen at the end of last season only for Conte's future to resolve itself with the Champions League qualification and in the end the head coach only needing to meet with Paratici in Italy to discuss transfer targets.
This time all three men are likely to be involved in some capacity in the meeting when Conte returns to Hotspur Way.
"Honestly until now we didn't speak but for sure after the first part of the season it's right to have a meeting with the club and then to discuss about the positives things, the negatives things and how we can improve. Then we'll see what we can do. It depends always on the possibilities of the club and also the ambition, but for sure we'll speak," Conte said last week.
"We'll speak also to have a good evaluation about this first part of the season where I've seen a lot of positive things, but you know injuries and to play every three days, I think we struggled a lot. In future we have to try to improve, to be better to face this type of situation. This would be a good way in my opinion. Then we know very well we have to discuss with the club to make the right decision."
The Spurs boss added to football.london: "For sure, every time we speak together they're always good conversations, because there is only one target: to try to improve, to improve the club in every aspect. On and outside the pitch. Then to find the best solution in every moment.
"I think until now we worked only with this target: to improve. To improve and to find a good way to bring this club to be competitive, you understand, but I'm understanding very well this year that it's not easy. It's not easy because you can improve but at the same time you have other teams continuing to improve and go forward. Like us or much more than us, because maybe they have more situations or more possibility [to improve], sometimes.
"For this reason it will be very important to speak, it will be very important to have a good conversation and understand if we're satisfied with the work we're doing after one year in this first period of this season. And then to understand very well what is the realistic possibility for us, which are the realistic ambitions for the club, because I think the truth is very important. It's very important and we need, the club and me, to know the truth, because if you know the truth, you can work to find the best solution for the future."
Conte will set out his needs for the January transfer window if Spurs want to improve in the second half of the season and he'll be told in return what is realistic. Paratici's right-hand men when it comes to recruitment, chief scout Leonardo Gabbanini and Paratici's long-time colleague and former Juventus first team scouting manager Lorenzo Giani, who is based in Italy, will also have input on the potential players available to improve Tottenham in various areas across the team, which is likely to include central defence and an attacking midfielder as well as reacting to any offers that come in for current players.
Conte's contract could also be discussed, with Spurs holding that option to extend it by a year but with the prospect of a fresh new deal potentially on the cards to ensure some stability going forward at the club if the Italian is willing to commit now rather than at the end of the season.
Work with Yves Bissouma
There's another summer signing who needs Conte's helping hand and that's Yves Bissouma. The Mali international has been one of the Premier League's best central midfielders of recent seasons but has only shown brief glimpses of that player during his early months at Tottenham.
Conte publicly explained early in the season that Bissouma was taking longer to adapt to his tactical demands and that he needed to improve his defending.
The 26-year-old's displays against Leicester and Liverpool have shown what he can do but he's still nowhere near the player yet that he was at Brighton. He's been playing in a deep role under Conte, even pushing the more natural anchorman Oliver Skipp into an attacking role when the England U21 midfielder plays, and it has not always looked a natural fit.
This break will allow Conte more time to work with Bissouma to unlock the Premier League star within.
Reintegrate the World Cup players and use the last week to prepare for Brentford
The one plus side to Tottenham's dismal Carabao Cup defeat at Nottingham Forest is that Conte now has a full week ahead of the Premier League return at Brentford to work with his players on preparations for the game.
That is a world away from the madness of the recent schedule which left little time for the Italian to actually coach his players.
"In this last period we never showed stability. I can think that the last period was really tough for everybody, for all the clubs, to play 13 games in 43 days was really tough, because it was impossible to work on the [training] pitch on the tactical aspect," Conte told football.london after the win against Leeds. "One day for recovery and then the next day to recover the game. For sure when you don't work on that tactical aspect you are going to lose something, especially defensively we lost, we lost a lot I think."
The World Cup players will return at different points after the competition up until the final on December 18 if any Spurs players are involved. Conte will then have to decide whether some of the returning players need a few days off to prevent fatigue but on the whole he will have plenty of time on the training pitches to prepare for the festive encounter.
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