My Heart: White
My Heart: White
My Heart: White
My
ad, why couldn’t you have up against Manchester United and then losing by
supported Arsenal?” two. At home. I remember Gary Neville saying in his
It’s only when you bequeath a post-match interview that it could only have happened
loyalty to Spurs to your son that against Tottenham. He smirked as he said it.
you realise the full enormity of what Neville was speaking the truth. At that point my son
being a Spurs supporter means. It took my son, now must have wondered how he ended up shackled to
in his twenties, quite a few of his boyhood years to this shambling wreck, this Don Quixote, this shabby
realise that, unlike his Chelsea, Arsenal or Manchester deluded aristocrat of a football club. But then I had to
white
United supporting friends, his inherited allegiance to remind him that when you live where we do in north
Tottenham was likely to lead not to a trophy but to a London you either attach yourself to the overcrowded
h
pwort
lifetime of occasionally heroic, sometimes comic and coat tails of that bunch of arrivistes from Woolwich or
id H e
Dav o generally hurtful underachievement. you make the grand romantic gesture of nailing your
fe sh ackled t It’s a funny thing. In all other respects we do our best colours to Tottenham’s mast, knowing that they were
on a li m Hotspur; to make our children happier. It’s only in handing on lighting the way for adventurous attacking football and
a
Tottenh ling wreck, our loyalties to a club like Tottenham that we knowingly winning the Double in the days when Arsenal had little
b
‘a sham y deluded
condemn the fruit of our loins to bearing a painful need of a trophy cabinet. Bit like now in fact.
burden for the rest of their lives. It’s like asking your son
b
a shab rat of a
aristoc lub’
to turn round while you attach a note saying “kick me”
to his back before sending him forth into the world. I could tell my son of the quicksilver talents of Jimmy
Greaves, the inscrutable Alan Gilzean, or stolid
ll c
footba
He blurted the above heartfelt plea some time late Bobby Smith; I could sing the praises of push-and-run
heart
in the last century, during our most recent Dark Ages or the staggering width of Pat Jennings’ hands and
when we had somehow contrived to be managed remind him we were the first winners of the UEFA Cup
by Christian Gross, who arrived at his first press in 1972. It would be little use. For anyone who’s grown
conference brandishing a tube ticket and never fully up in the Premier League era, only the Premier League
recovered his poise, and then George Graham, a man matters and in that time, despite getting fifth under
bearing the double shame of having been banned Martin Jol who was then inexplicably fired and replaced
for taking bribes and also having managed Arsenal. by Juande Ramos, who was just plain inexplicable,
Not long after that, in one of those doomed flourishes we’ve been, let’s be honest, left behind.
to which clubs like Tottenham are attached, we had
appointed favourite son Glenn Hoddle as manager
images DAVID CANNON / GETTY IMAGES
and suffered the peculiar agony of going three goals
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Glenn Hoddle on the ball
during the 1981 FA Cup final
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the SPURS primer
Spurs boss Harry
Redknapp with Luka
Modric
Goals and glory door of international stars in the past 20 years, season. Gross infamously waved a tube (London
Way back in October 1958, with new manager with the likes of Jurgen Klinsmann, David Ginola, underground transport) ticket in the air at his first
Bill ‘Mr Tottenham’ Nicholson enjoying his first Sergei Rebrov, Dimitar Berbatov and Luka Modric press conference, to which he arrived late, saying:
game at the helm, Tottenham won a phenomenal being just a few to have graced the club with their “I want this to become my ticket to dreams. I came
contest over Everton, 10-4. Just 14 months later, presence. Yet the status of the club’s favourite by Underground because I wanted to know the way
in February 1961, they beat Crewe Alexandria son falls to an Englishman, Glenn Hoddle, who the fans feel coming to Spurs. I want to show that I
13-2, and went on to claim the League-FA Cup was voted the best Tottenham player of all time am one of them.” The club avoided relegation but
double the same season. by fans on the official Spurs website. Hoddle when Spurs lost two of their opening three matches
pulled the strings in Spurs’ midfield during their the following season, Gross was shown the door.
golden period in the 1980s, playing almost 500
times for the club and returning as manager Six decades of silverware
from 2001-2003. Tottenham beat Chelsea 2-1 in the final of the
League Cup in 2008, which ended nine years of
Game of two halves pain for fans who had been desperately waiting
Tottenham’s ability to simultaneously entertain for some silverware. Jonathan Woodgate’s extra-
and frustrate their fans was at its puzzling best time header gave them victory over the defending
in the 2001-02 season, when they went into half- champions and it also meant Spurs had secured
time leading Manchester United 3-0 at White Hart a trophy in each of the last six decades – an
Lane. The final score? United 5, Spurs 3. “We achievement matched only by Manchester United
attacked brilliantly and nullified United’s attacks among English clubs.
in the first half,” said the manager Glenn Hoddle,
“but the second half was just the opposite.” Bale brilliance
On May 5, 2010, Spurs reached the qualifying
rounds of the Champions League for the first time
in their history. The highlight so far? It has to be
a pair of stunning performances on the left flank
from Gareth Bale (below) against Inter Milan.
Bale scored a hat-trick in their 4-3 defeat to the
reigning European champions, and backed it up
with two assists as he inspired Spurs to a 3-1
home win against the Italian giants.
Selling a Sol (YouTube: Gareth Bale vs Inter)
club can boast as many players That’s the dark secret every Spurs fan carries in The club’s bitter rivalry with Arsenal is perhaps
capable of scoring a goal. their heart: the lust for glory is outweighed by the fear best summed up by the story of former Spurs
No other club have so many of failure. The people talking them up at the moment captain Sol Campbell (above). The ex-England
who can’t be relied on to are not the fans. They’re the pundits, who are suddenly international left Tottenham on a free transfer to
score a goal. surprised to find another entertaining team outside the the Gunners, making him public enemy number
Young players tend usual suspects. Tottenham fans frankly wish they’d one among Spurs fans, who quickly dubbed Conquering Europe
to get briefly better at stop going on about it and leave us to gloriously fall him ‘Judas’. Campbell later came in at No.1 on Martin Chivers (above) was the hero of Spurs’
Tottenham and then short somewhere far away from the spotlight. a list of ‘football’s biggest traitors’ in an English UEFA Cup success in 1972. In what was the
crocked himself slip back. It’s as if None of this is to suggest for a moment I don’t love newspaper, while in 2009, four Tottenham fans inaugural UEFA Cup tournament, Tottenham
playing for England there’s something in Tottenham. That’s the important thing about football were banned from grounds in England for three faced Wolverhampton Wanderers in the final,
and Ledley King, the the water at White Hart love. Like love of your children, it’s unconditional. years after directing offensive chants at the winning the first leg at home, 2-1, courtesy of
club captain and, since the Lane. David Bentley, Aaron They may waste your money, let you down in public defender while he was playing with Portsmouth. a Chivers double, the second of which was a
acrimonious departure of Sol Lennon, Tom Huddlestone, and make the same mistakes again and again. 20-metre screamer. They held on in the away leg
Campbell, the embodiment Jermaine Jenas; they’re all This changes nothing. The thing you love is the Wheeler dealers for a 1-1 draw to become the first British side to
of the club, can only play one in talented, all English but none of accumulated experience of joy and pain that you have Current strikers Jermaine Defoe and Robbie win two different major European trophies.
three and doesn’t train. We have them have grown and improved stored inside over the years. As the Americans say, Keane are both in their second stint at Spurs,
full backs – Assou-Ekotto, Hutton like a Gerrard or a Rooney. There’s you are invested in them. with the club having paid a total of A$66m for the The People’s Club
and Bale – who are likely to have senior moments that a sense in which they don’t look as if they believe Talking of Americans, yesterday I listened to Bruce pair. Defoe was sold to Portsmouth for $9.7m and Spurs became the first football club to float shares
lead to the opposition getting a tap-in at the far post. they’re expected to win. Our record against the Springsteen talk about one of his old records which he bought back at an expensive $25.6m. Keane was on the London Stock Exchange, doing so in 1983.
In midfield we have so many players they can’t give traditionally stronger teams bears this out. We’re quite had worried away at for over a year. He said: “You don’t the better business – sold to Liverpool for $33m
a start to Nico Kranjcar and Wilson Palacios, both first likely to turn them over in spectacular fashion from choose the story. The story chooses you.” Maybe it’s like and bought back for $19.5m. Gross error in judgment
picks for their national sides. Upfront we have four time to time but mostly, when it comes that with Tottenham. They choose you. You wouldn’t The British tabloids were rubbing their hands in
strikers – Crouch, Pavlyuchenko, Defoe and Keane – to the tense arm-wrestles that decide the destination change them if you could. They’re part of who you In Hod We trust delight shortly after the arrival of Swiss manager
none of whom you would put your house on. No other of titles, we’ll give in. are. That’s why we don’t support Arsenal, son. White Hart Lane has been a virtual revolving Christian Gross to the club, during the 1997-98
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