Slipperduke
The Camden Cad
The Forth Bridge in Scotland is a magnificent sight. A mile and a half long, it’s an immense, yet beautiful assembly of blood red steel bars and rivets carrying hundreds of trains a day over the wonderfully named Firth of Forth. It is said, usually by locals eager to fool a gullible traveller, that a team of maintenance workers spend their lives re-painting that bridge. It takes them seven, long years to work their way across the structure and when they reach the end they have to get a bus back to the other side and start again. It’s not strictly true, of course, but it does give you an insight into what it must be like to support Tottenham Hotspur.
Some teams are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness repeatedly snatched away from them. Whenever Spurs look like they’re getting somewhere, something goes wrong and they have to start all over again. They’re the only team to have been stuck in a transitional season since 1992, mainly because a succession of chairman have had trigger fingers so itchy that some kind of soothing balm may be called for in the Director‘s Box.
It doesn’t help that, at some point in the club’s history, a vicious curse was invoked causing every bright, young prospect to be struck down by injuries. Paul Gascoigne left Newcastle for Tottenham and turned his knee inside out in the FA Cup Final. Perky winger Darren Anderton came in shortly afterwards and picked up more injuries on his own than most clubs accumulate over the course of a season. Anderton was the ornament in the shop that your parents won’t let you touch in case you break it. Stefan Iverson was highly rated, but presumably made of fibre-glass and now poor Gareth Bale is up on bricks. It still startles me whenever an up-and-coming starlet signs for Spurs. Are they not aware of the inherent risks involved in playing for this club?
Sometimes it’s the Tottenham fans who are to blame for the under-achievement. George Graham was the last man to win silverware at White Hart Lane, but he was never accepted by the supporters because of his Arsenal connections. Graham rebuilt the defence on the ruins of the Christian Gross era and turned the club from relegation contenders into a sturdy mid-table outfit. Not good enough, barked the crowd. He was replaced by Glenn Hoddle whose arrival was deemed to be the Second Coming, but just two seasons later the fans were demanding a Second Going.
Tottenham’s modus operandi is to perfect one area of the squad, while remaining blissfully unaware that another department is deteriorating. In the 2005-06 season, the rearguard of Paul Robinson, Michael Dawson and Ledley King was as good as any in the land. Unfortunately, neither Mido or Jermaine Defoe could seem to forge a first class partnership with Robbie Keane. Fast forward to the beginning of this season and Dimitar Berbatov and Keane were almost telepathically linked, but Robinson was rapidly turning into Marlon Brando, King was being rebuilt in the garage and Dawson was gibbering at the sight of an oncoming striker. Tottenham are like a plate spinner on his first day at the circus.
This weekend’s Cup Final marks a high point in the brief, but impressive reign of Juande Ramos, but it does it also mark the point of no return? For any other club in the country, a cup win is usually a good indicator of future success, but at Spurs it’s the harbinger of doom. This football team, like the Forth Bridge painters, are sentenced to a lifetime of repeating and repeating, never being allowed to settle, never being told that they’ve finished. I happen to think that they’ll win the League Cup on Sunday night. They’re in scintillating form and they have enough about them to give Chelsea some serious problems. But you just watch how the next six months unfold. Watch as they unravel at the seams and thank the Football Gods that you’re not doomed to support them.
Some teams are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness repeatedly snatched away from them. Whenever Spurs look like they’re getting somewhere, something goes wrong and they have to start all over again. They’re the only team to have been stuck in a transitional season since 1992, mainly because a succession of chairman have had trigger fingers so itchy that some kind of soothing balm may be called for in the Director‘s Box.
It doesn’t help that, at some point in the club’s history, a vicious curse was invoked causing every bright, young prospect to be struck down by injuries. Paul Gascoigne left Newcastle for Tottenham and turned his knee inside out in the FA Cup Final. Perky winger Darren Anderton came in shortly afterwards and picked up more injuries on his own than most clubs accumulate over the course of a season. Anderton was the ornament in the shop that your parents won’t let you touch in case you break it. Stefan Iverson was highly rated, but presumably made of fibre-glass and now poor Gareth Bale is up on bricks. It still startles me whenever an up-and-coming starlet signs for Spurs. Are they not aware of the inherent risks involved in playing for this club?
Sometimes it’s the Tottenham fans who are to blame for the under-achievement. George Graham was the last man to win silverware at White Hart Lane, but he was never accepted by the supporters because of his Arsenal connections. Graham rebuilt the defence on the ruins of the Christian Gross era and turned the club from relegation contenders into a sturdy mid-table outfit. Not good enough, barked the crowd. He was replaced by Glenn Hoddle whose arrival was deemed to be the Second Coming, but just two seasons later the fans were demanding a Second Going.
Tottenham’s modus operandi is to perfect one area of the squad, while remaining blissfully unaware that another department is deteriorating. In the 2005-06 season, the rearguard of Paul Robinson, Michael Dawson and Ledley King was as good as any in the land. Unfortunately, neither Mido or Jermaine Defoe could seem to forge a first class partnership with Robbie Keane. Fast forward to the beginning of this season and Dimitar Berbatov and Keane were almost telepathically linked, but Robinson was rapidly turning into Marlon Brando, King was being rebuilt in the garage and Dawson was gibbering at the sight of an oncoming striker. Tottenham are like a plate spinner on his first day at the circus.
This weekend’s Cup Final marks a high point in the brief, but impressive reign of Juande Ramos, but it does it also mark the point of no return? For any other club in the country, a cup win is usually a good indicator of future success, but at Spurs it’s the harbinger of doom. This football team, like the Forth Bridge painters, are sentenced to a lifetime of repeating and repeating, never being allowed to settle, never being told that they’ve finished. I happen to think that they’ll win the League Cup on Sunday night. They’re in scintillating form and they have enough about them to give Chelsea some serious problems. But you just watch how the next six months unfold. Watch as they unravel at the seams and thank the Football Gods that you’re not doomed to support them.
