Agreed. Well, I think Maddison should definitely be starting but I'm not that big on Mount myself. Especially as a CM. Still, it'd be interesting to see how he does. Personally, as a CM, I think Ox is really good, but I don't know if that horrible injuries going to have any lasting effects on him and his game.
I think there's a place for Winks, too, but the one problem I have with him is that he's too conservative in possession. He's very good at resisting the oppositions press, which is extremely handy, but - a bit like Cleverley - always takes the easiest option. If he could become more expressive with his passing, which, to me, seems like a confidence issue, he could become a really good DLP.
When Winks first broke out with Spurs, he was always looking for the forward pass and played very well this way in some high stakes matches against good or great opponents. He was widely viewed by Spurs fans as a new creative CM for a while.
His slow regression to conservative sideways/backwards passing is a bit of a mystery. If the conundrum can be solved, however, I could see him doing a job for us in one of the creative roles we desperately need.
I wonder if you might be right about the confidence thing. It certainly didn't come from management: no coach is going to hammer the creativity out of a midfielder intentionally.
But he also had no rational reason to lose confidence. Even when he was constantly looking forward, he had very respectable pass completion stats. I can only visualise it being something psychological he needs to overcome. Perhaps he's a bit of a pathological perfectionist or too afraid of making mistakes. Alternatively or additionally, he seems somewhat injury prone, which, unless you've got the attitude of a Kane, can definitely make you play more timidly (but shouldn't really affect your range of passing or decision-making).
Get Winks sorted and I reckon he'll be a consistent option, barring injury, for a long time to come. Though the "England DNA" crop steadily coming through the pipeline will hopefully give him a robust challenge since they'll all have been inculcated in the ways of a more creative style of play from the beginning.
Alli won't be first choice this season. Lo Celso, Eriksen, Son and Lucas are all better.
Lucas is, at this moment in time, a meme player, primarily because of his CL SF hat trick. By which I mean that he's severely overrated by stats analysts and casual observers: people who don't watch Spurs on a very regular basis.
He's yet to put together a really convincing extended run of performances for them. He's already had a couple of bad games this season -- which, to be fair, is a bit like the entire team. Unlike the rest of the team, however, he doesn't have an outstanding credit history to point to.