Theo Walcott has pledged to ruin Harry Redknapp's honeymoon at Tottenham in tomorrow night's north London derby.

The Arsenal striker played under Redknapp at Southampton and is aware of the lift his arrival has given to Spurs' struggling players.

Tottenham recorded their opening League win of the season against Bolton on Sunday.

New manager Redknapp, who will officially take charge of the team for the first time tomorrow, has said they will “give it a real go” at Emirates Stadium.

But Walcott was in the Gunners team beaten 5-1 in the Carling Cup in their last meeting with Spurs and is determined to make amends by stemming his rivals' recovery.

The 19-year-old winger said: “Tottenham is the biggest game of the whole season for the fans, so if we can do well at home in front of our supporters it will be brilliant.

“We will not worry about bringing back memories of the cup semi-final. We will just be concentrating on how to exploit their negatives. We just have to get right at them.

“I have worked with Harry Redknapp and he is a brilliant person to be around. I am sure he will get everyone's confidence up — but hopefully we will put that back down tomorrow.”

The Gunners are four points behind Premier League leaders Liverpool after Sunday's 2-0 victory at West Ham and Walcott added: “The title will go down to the wire and there are going to be a few teams in the race. No game is easy because every team in the Premier League is difficult now, it is so competitive.”

For Tottenham, captain Ledley King has refused to rule himself out of tomorrow's match, which would be his third appearance in a week despite concerns over his knee injury.

Redknapp's predecessor, Juande Ramos, had insisted that the 28-year-old defender could only manage one full game every two or three weeks.

King also hinted that Redknapp's arrival would add intensity to the competition for starting places within the squad.

He said: “The players have to start again and everyone has to perform and that's when you get the best out of players.”

Fellow centre-back Jonathan Woodgate hopes to recover from the groin injury he sustained in the UEFA Cup defeat by Udinese last week — and that kept him out of the home win over Bolton.

Redknapp is also seeking to strengthen his backroom staff having already recruited Kevin Bond as a coach and confirmed Clive Allen as reserve team boss.

He wants to bring in former Spurs and England midfielder Tim Sherwood, who said today he is undecided about whether to quit his job as a TV pundit with Setanta.

Sherwood said: “It's very flattering. If I ever wanted to get back into football the club I would choose would be Tottenham and the manager I would work with would be Harry Redknapp.

“It is the biggest club I ever played for but I owe it to Harry to want to give it one million per cent of my time.”