Steve Bruce has defended his decision to rest Sean Longstaff during the 3-1 defeat at Norwich last weekend.
Longstaff, who has opened contract talks with the club over an extension, was only named as sub but came on in the closing stages to set up a goal for Jonjo Shelvey at Carrow Road.
The midfielder suffered a knee injury back in March at West Ham and only made his return to the first team picture last month.
Bruce started with Ki at Norwich but is now facing a welcome selection headache for the encounter with Spurs.
But when asked about Longstaff's chances, he said: "My job is to make sure he is 100% right.
"He is only a young lad making his way and of course he's had a massive rise very quickly.
"Him and his brother have impressed me immensley.
"But it is my job to protect him.
"That's all I did last week.
"He's had his first injury to deal with and it's a nasty one.
"To be out for five months and his first competitive game was West Ham in pre-season.
"We had not done a lot with him in terms of physicality, but it's the work load on his knee.
"His knee is fine, however, there's times where he is not so good with it so we have to protect it."
Bruce has used a 5-3-2 formation in the last two matches but it remains to be seen whether he parks the bus at Spurs.
He said: "It's still very early.
"There may be one or two tweaks.
"It's too early to change formations."
