The blog I don’t want to write.

No one knew what had happened as we were watching the ball slide off for a throw but straightaway realised it was serious because both sets of physios dashed onto the field. The player lay face down and still. I wondered out loud if the urgent attention paid to his head meant he had swallowed his tongue but quickly he was on his back. The crowd softly moaned when the first chest compressions were applied.

The players, battle-hardened tough guys, were visibly shocked. Defoe pulled his shirt up over his mouth and crouched on his haunches, wanting to be there for support before tearing himself away. Rafa turned to the Shelf and prayed. A few, including Owen Coyle, came to be close, most were uncertain and kept a reverential distance, drifting back together by the benches for mutual comfort.

The stands were eerily silent. Then, some voices began to shout in encouragement, that particular mixture of anxiety and hope when your team is behind and you want to, have to, lift them. Those moments when they are struggling and you, only you the fans, can inspire them. The moments when the team needs the crowd. More spoke up, louder now, becoming an instinctive roar. ‘Come on, come on!’ For the player, perhaps for the man calmly and firmly pounding his chest. ‘Come on!’

From high in the corner of the Park Lane, the ragged bunch of loyal Bolton fans started to sing Muamba’s name and the whole of the Lane joined in. Then respectful, bewildered silence again, followed by successive bouts of cheering and chanting, standing to applaud every step as he was carried off, the pounding pounding continuing all the while.

My sincere and heartfelt good wishes to Fabrice Muamba and his family, extended to any Bolton supporters who may come across this. Full credit to Howard Webb whose authority was never in doubt. Much maligned and often deservedly so, football fans came together in a remarkable and touching way to respect a man who needed us and to respect the game we all love with a passion. Fabrice Muamba is one of us.

Football fans accept that defeat is part and parcel of the game, even if we never quite get used to it completely. We chunter over the recriminations, bellow at the heavens or kick the cat knowing that it’s an element of the unchanging natural order. If there are winners, it follows there must be losers too.

There are two types of defeat, however, that we simply cannot abide. One is where the players don’t try hard enough, and whatever you say about this current Spurs team, that doesn’t apply. The other is where the manager makes bewildering selection choices that fail to bring the best from the side because he chooses either the wrong individuals or the wrong tactics. Often it can be both.

Insiders tend to dismiss the fans’ knowledge of the game. Granted we are capable of spouting silage like geysers erupting in Yellowstone National Park but most have a sound feel for what suits their team. Yesterday, it felt like the manager got it wrong.

I’m a self-diagnosed sufferer from scepticemia, which means I seldom takes things at face value. I never believed Harry’s hype, the cuddly good ol’ uncle figure who just had to put his arm round a player’s shoulders to transform him into a star. I prefer evidence, and as I’ve said many times now in these pages he deserves enormous credit not only for taking Spurs from the bottom of the league to where we now are but also altering his tactics along the way, adapting to the strengths of the increasingly talented squad at his disposal and to the demands of top class football. All the more incomprehensible then why he should change things now.

Tottenham have demonstrated a few formations this season but they have the following in common. Parker and Modric form the core of the side, playing centrally. The movement of both is exemplary but Parker tends to stay deeper. Bale is an attacking left side man, latterly coming off his wing to surprise defenders in the middle. Walker overlaps down the right. This offers width even if Lennon is absent because that is essential to our style. Adebayor roams up front, saying in touch with the midfield. Someone works the space between the opponents’ midfield and back four, dropping back when we lose the ball and getting up into the box when we attack. Van der Vaart does this best, Defoe if he’s out. Thus we have width, pace and above all the ability to pass the ball at a high tempo.

I am therefore baffled as to the reasoning behind yesterday’s set up. Modric on the left is a total waste, just as it was last Sunday, just as it has always been since he came to the Lane. Whatever the injury situation, build the side around him. Shifting Bale to the right temporarily during a game might unsettle a defence but stationing him there for almost the entire 90 minutes nullifies his assets. He tried right footed crosses or the outside of his left foot but how much better they would have been if he had been able to hit it left-footed regularly. At a stroke we did Everton’s job for them and took two of our best players out of the equation.

Rather than stick to the flexible five in midfield, in the last three league matches Harry has decided to go for it with two up front. Yesterday Adebayor was detached from the rest, too far forward, and was rightly withdrawn but however well or poorly he performed, two strikers unbalances our midfield and left us outnumbered. Again this plays to Everton’s strengths, in particular their excellent organisation and effort in midfield. They lack creativity but once they were a goal up, they didn’t have to be. The onus was on us and we played right into their hands. Add to this Parker’s uncertainty as to his role – was he supposed to push forward, in which case he’s better starting from the back – Sandro’s lack of match fitness and Walker’s reluctance for the third game running to get forward consistently, you  have the shapeless mess that was Tottenham Hotspur for much of the match.

I’m struggling to work out why this is happening. Perhaps Redknapp feels sufficiently confident in his side to go with two up front and get at defences. He did the same at the Emirates, of course, and look what happened then. Bale has been criticised for coming off his wing but at least that’s produced some goals. He didn’t do much of that yesterday when we needed something different. Coleman and Neville handled Bale well last season at Spurs, which if I remember included kicking him repeatedly. Moving him right upset that plan and also blocked Baines’ attacking instincts. However, as I’ve said, we compensated by weakening his game and doing Everton’s job for them. Also, we should be confident in our abilities to break down a side rather than altering our tried and tested balance for the sake of their anticipated defensive set-up. We should be worrying about them: they should be worrying about us. Walker seems to have been instructed not to go forward as often as he was. He’s had injuries but this doesn’t appear what’s holding him back.

Defoe’s movement was generally good yesterday, operating as an out and out striker. Picking up balls into channels were our best opportunity of making and taking chances and he came the closest until Saha hit the post near the end. However, bright as he was, the old faults resurfaced, blasting away when passing was a reasonable option and that pesky offside law, just gets in the way of a striker trying to do his job, eh JD? Assuming VDV were fit, I would have started with him.

After a sedate opening period, we allowed Everton to come at us but dealt with their efforts until another piece of poor defending let us down. Kaboul has largely cut out his rash tendency to get sucked into a tackle but here he sold himself and Osman was away. The real problem is how suddenly and completely exposed our defence was. Yelavic took his chance well but we should not give him that time and space at the edge of our area. No midfield, Ledley came across to cover after Kaboul’s’ error, Benny was miles away. Once again, it’s defending that will shape our final position, once again we were found wanting.

This gave them a goal and the incentive to battle it out for the rest of the time, which they duly did. Credit to them for  restricting our opportunities with their two centre halves rock solid. However, we did little to move them around or draw them out. Everton seldom got the ball near our goal and when they did Kaboul did a fine job of sweeping up the danger. The second half was all Spurs in terms of possession but we achieved precious little. Conceding when not under pressure is proving to be a fault. It does wonders for the opponents’ confidence. It’s transformed A***nal’s season after all. We have to remember that we are the big side, there to be shot at, and opponents like nothing better than to mount a last-ditch defence of their lead.

By the finish we were treated to the undignified spectacle of our keeper going up for a late corner, such was our desperation. Friedel should know by now that all our set-piece routines are laughably weak. Even our current favourite corner, where Kaboul is the target, is designed to give their goalie as much time as possible to see the ball coming from about 14  or 15 yards out. Assuming it gets over the first defender that is. No team in the land, whatever league they are in, are as poorly prepared for set pieces as we are.

Baffled and bewildered, the fans can only look on, powerless. Despite this defeat, it’s still the case that the run-in of tough but winnable games after Chelsea will decide our final place. Being a sceptic, I’m not convinced that the England business is directly harming Redknapp’s decision-taking. If his mind were elsewhere, he’d allow them to carry on as before, which is basically what I’m advocating. Also, our best period came when he was under the intense pressure of preparing for a high profile court case. He handled that so should be able to postpone the less immediate and personal threat of the national team.

I suspect he’s trying too hard, feels a few changes are required because the league knows what to expect from Spurs. However, again this unsettles our pattern and the whole point of the pace and movement is that even if they know what’s coming, the opposition can’t deal with it for the entire match.

Or possibly he performs best under pressure, and when it falls away, he has too much time to think. Individuals create a strategy to handle intense stress. For many, this heightens their focus and levels of determination remain high. This can be sustained over short periods, during which time performance is enhanced rather than harmed by stress. However, once the external factors creating the pressure disappear, so does the motivation. The target of getting through a difficult situation has now gone, it’s been achieved. This is not a conscious process but it’s common. Maybe you have got through a bereavement or problem at work, you’ve coped and dealt with pressures others might succumb to and go under, but it only hits you once the funeral is over or work has been sorted. I wonder if that’s why Redknapp is trying too hard. Stick to what you and the players know, HR, and we’ll be fine. Like I said last week, hold your nerve. That goes for us too.

After a first half as ragged as the stream I was watching, Spurs muddled through against impressive Stevenage thanks to two superb goals by Jermaine Defoe and a generous referring decision. And that’s good enough for me. Playing lower league teams, that’s the way it so often is. Don’t really know why – something in the back of the team’s collective psychology that knocks them out of their rhythm plus the disruptive changes in personnel. Little things in themselves but history decrees this is how it shall be. We won with a second half that improved almost as much as my viewing pleasure. The only lasting significance of all this is that in future I’ll use my wife’s laptop.

Despite rightly fielding a very strong team, Spurs were uncertain for most of the first half. Stevenage prevented us from establishing any tempo or pattern but nevertheless we should have been bolder and more determined to impose our will on proceedings. We weren’t helped by conceding the early penalty. Nelsen has been bought to add experience but showed the naivety of a schoolboy so early in the match, stretching for a tackle that he was never going to make. Nelsen the New Zealand Naybet? Nay.

We may be seeing more of him. Dawson’s injury is a sickening personal blow for a fine, wholehearted leader: I feel desperately sorry for him. For the team, it could a turning point, the difference between success and failure this season. We could score more goals but chances are, between now and May we’ll probably score enough. Defence is the key. If Led is out, we knew Daws was there, a strong reliable international defender to step in. Now, it’s Led’s knee, Nelsen’s portly figure struggling to remember what it was like to play every week and Gallas’s dodgy ankle. For now on in, every single match is high pressure. Their experience will be invaluable, providing they are fit. There’s no guarantee and it will hang over us until season end.

Defoe brought us level with what is fast becoming his signature goal, long

range, low and looping slightly into the bottom corner. John Barnes, bless ‘im, proved how little football he watches these days by confidently asserting that JD hits the target 8 times out of ten. If only… Less the fox in the box, more like plenty from twenty. His second and the clincher was a terrific effort, freeze-frame the image from behind the goal as he pulled the trigger, all athletic power fizzing into the bottom corner past a despairing dive.

In the first game, Harry changed the tactics to match Stevenage’s long ball and big blokes up front.  After last night, I wonder if he’d scouted the wrong side. It could be the influence of their new manager but Borough move the ball extremely well and we were fortunate they weren’t as sharp as Defoe in front of goal. Highly impressive and good luck to them in the future. They were unlucky with our penalty. Cliches include ‘I can see why the ref gave it’, ‘he had no alternative’ and, while we’re about it, a ‘good time to score’ but to me Bale kicked the player accidently in the act of trying to cross. Manu, I’m pleased that you scored but really, you didn’t have to make quite so much of a fuss.

Stevenage did not close us down as the game went on, understandable as they pushed men forward. Bale and Defoe took full advantage of the extra space, Bale’s crossing and choice-making were high quality, plus that incredible shot that was so powerful it came back off the bar nearly as far as the edge of the box.

Otherwise, no one else had much of an impact but equally most did their bit. Once again Cudicini looked alert and sound. Defoe was clearly man of the match but we learned nothing new. Give him an extra half a yard and he looks a world beater. He should start ahead of Saha and behind a fully fit Rafa, but I said that in Sunday’s comments. Last night had nothing to do with it.

Muddling through is the way of things in the Cup. In ‘91 we were poor away to Pompey and then Notts County in the 6th round at home before Gazza saved us on both occasions. It’s fine by me. Here we are, now take Bolton on and Wembley beckons. It’s a fabulous opportunity. Don’t waste it.

For an hour this was arguably Spurs’ best performance of the season.  United fought to come to terms with the unusual experience of being pushed back deep into their own half, of struggling to get hold of the ball, of being unable to break free. All this effort and hard won superiority was thrown away in three mad moments of shoddy defending. Ultimately the match became a sober reminder of both how far we’ve come and what remains to be done.

History will always recall the breathtaking pace, flowing movement and stunning goals that shattered Villa, Newcastle and Norwich amongst others but this was the supreme test, the champions as they peak once again for the run-in to the league title. After a sticky start when we appeared as rusty as our opponents were classy, we gradually imposed our will on the game. To see this unfold before your eyes is a rare and inspiring delight, to see the team come to terms with a few problems, work them out and then proceed to dominate for long spells against the very best. This isn’t just about good individuals. Rather, it’s the team as a living organism, one where it’s possible to peek inside and see how it adapts to new conditions.

Welbeck’s pace and Rooney’s dash looked ominously good early on. The determination of our makeshift central midfield paring of Sandro and Livermore took them forward but as they pressed, United exploited the gaps they left behind in front of the back four. However, Spurs made sure this did not last for long. Pause for thought plus some sharp finger jabbing from King and they adjusted their starting positions. Remaining a fraction deeper provided the required cover and enabled them to time their forward movement better. Modric,  playing wide left from necessity, looked for the ball and found in Assou Ekotto a willing helper. As the half went on, Benny drove us onward, teamwork and early passes of the highest order.

No Bale so Lennon had to provide the pace to up the tempo and make something of our increasing possession. He did well, pressurising defenders and switching wings to set up Saha for a glorious opportunity. For the second time in three weeks, a Spurs player contrived to get in the way and Abebayor was penalised for handball. Earlier, Manu missed the best chance of the half, clean through but De Gea saved low to his left. It felt as if Many could have put his foot through the ball rather than open himself up, which often means less force cam be applied to the shot.

The crowd were agitated by some of the possession football but it’s so hard to break United down. Livermore and Sandro showed great poise and purpose, keeping the ball on the move, never resting and unafraid to get stuck in when necessary. Although he gave the ball away in a couple of dangerous situations, Livermore once more showed his promise. He does something off, but doesn’t blink. Just gets on with it, his game is apparently unaffected by the ups and downs. He clashed with the master Scholes, didn’t bat an eyelid. No respecter of reputations, he’s in the process of making a bit of a reputation himself. As a result, Scholes and Carrick were pushed back, Rooney forced into midfield to help out. As far as teamwork goes, this was as good a period as I’ve seen this year, up there with the closing minutes of the City game where our opponents turned this way and that in frustration but could not find a way through.

Then a free kick is awarded against Sandro. I’ve not seen a replay but it looked soft at best, non-existent more accurately. Either way, I still can’t believe he was booked. Trouble is, the next time the ball left that area of the pitch was when we kicked off after going a goal down. The teams left the field at half-time to a tumult of derision directed toward the referee yet it’s not his fault that we can’t defend a simple corner. Giving Rooney a free header is naive in the extreme. Was it Walker who lost him? In the second half, Rooney protested as his new marker, Sandro, roughed him up before a corner but the damage had already been done. Walker on Rooney doesn’t seem the best match-up to me: one for the coaches to think about.

To their credit, Spurs picked up after half time where they left off. The tempo and ball-retention was good, Lennon looked promising and United seldom got near our goal. Then, one of those how-did-he-get-there-why-isn’t-anyone-near-him-surely-the-ref-has-stopped-play moments. Benny threw up his arms in incredulity even as he turned to cover Nani’s run. A moment’s doze at a throw-in but a second later the game was lost. Luka should have done more to prevent the run in the first place, Walker at least got a tricky ball away from the goal but not far enough and Young scored. Soon after, as we obligingly backed off Young had a training-ground run-up to prepare his favourite long range curler.

Only then did United fully assert themselves and passed the ball around until the final whistle.When Defoe scored I didn’t even stand up but it was well-taken. United were never going to repay our defensive generosity. So many dispiriting afternoons against United in recent years, you would have thought that I would have got used to them by now but this was utterly dispiriting because we had played so, so well. The defending was appalling: it’s pointless playing so well if we come up with that sort of cack. Nothing to do with United being able to bounce back: we should not have given them the chance. However, United are a benchmark and if we are to aspire to their status, we have to take our chances when they come and concentrate for 90 minutes, not 89 minutes and 50 seconds. That’s all it was, in total. Switching off for 10 seconds and the game we dominated for large swathes of time has gone.

Plenty of good things to hold on to as the gap narrows, starting with 4 points, the way we played, our refusal to be intimidated and the return of Bale, Rafa and Parker. Rafa’s presence yesterday could have been the difference as Saha was largely ineffective. I sometimes wonder about the callers to 606 – yesterday in the midst of understandably exasperated Spurs fans blaming the ref, Saha, the ref again, one guy said Redknapp had taken us as far as he could and should be sacked. The evidence – the last three results. Now there are ups and downs in my relationship with Harry but I’d hang on a bit. If being the third best team in the country is the level we’re currently on, we’ve been there since about November. This guy had obviously had enough of waiting, it was three months after all, but personally I’m going to offer HR a little more of my patience.

‘One Love’ proclaimed the banner. That doesn’t seem quite right for Redknapp. The team maybe, the shirt for a lifetime, but not the manager however well he’s done. I’ve criticised him for his tactics over the last two games but he returned to a familiar 4-4-2 and we looked better for it. I would have chosen Defoe ahead of Saha but Harry had to play with his new toy. I’m not a huge Defoe fan but he’s done well this year and would have done more when we didn’t have the ball. Interesting that Walker hardly got forward – instructions clearly, perhaps to stop Evra and Young teaming up. Oh, and one more thing – dodgy keeper so we should have put him under more pressure on crosses and set pieces.

Finally, no complaints at all about motivation. That answered any queries about how the NLD defeat would hit us. We need to hold our nerve, remember what we do well and keep doing it. In the same way we effectively rote off the early season defeats against the Manchester clubs, CL qualification will be secured by how well we do in the run of tough but winnable games that follow the Chelsea match through to the end of the season.