It’s not just the losing – Spurs fans are familiar with that concept although oddly I’ve never quite got used to it and after every defeat there’s an element of bafflement. How did that happen? So it still hurts but what gets me with losing to the old enemy is the constant innovation and inventiveness with which we self-destruct.

Many years ago I watched from the back of the Paxton as we were soundly beaten, 3-1 I think, by a Woolwich side coming to the peak of their powers. Didn’t like it but there you go. But the implosion impulse has characterised this fixture in recent times. Further back, 5-0 and not one but two Doubles. A  winner with Storey so offside I swear he was munching a burger at the Colonel’s stall behind the Paxton. Score four, they get 5. Davies sent off for no reason. Deflections. I haven’t checked but I strongly suspect tmy report in the corresponding fixture last season began with the same sentiments – 2 up, lose 5-2.

So this time, with both teams hesitant after relatively poor starts to the season, Spurs find some rhythm. Sandro makes the midfield his in an opening remeniscent of the old days when midfield hatchet men took no prisoners and more delicate souls wore steel shinpads. We take the game to our foe, two up front to pressure their wonky back four, Lennon beginning to make inroads on their left. The high defensive line is causing some anxiety but we’re OK so far, Gallas is in one of his wild-eyed ‘they shall not pass’ moods and anyway Lloris’ selection is part of the plan, to act as sweeper.

Some decent passing but it’s the early ball forward to get at them directly. Mertesacker, so ponderous he makes Huddlestone look like a cross between Usain Bolt and Lewis Smith, is drawn forward. Defoe, whose movement was excellent all afternoon, nips in behind him. His shot is saved but Abebayor is there for the rebound.

Bright and breezy, it was all too much to bear. Adebayor flew in for a tackle that meant nothing even if it had been anywhere near the ball, which it wasn’t, and legal, which it wasn’t either. Down to ten men after 20 minutes when a goal up is bad enough, but the science of implosion demands more, so much more. Our goalscorer, their ex-player, the one they love to hate, the one who has made such a difference to our attacking shape, and for a meaningless midfield challenge when our opponents had no idea how to get back in the game.

Our Andre said he wasn’t blaming Adebayor but I am. Foolish in the extreme. No one knows how things might have turned out – Walcott was itching to get a decent ball into the space behind our back four and Arteta and Cazorla had their sliderules out to plan the precise trajectory – but without him we stood no chance.

Now, a thunderous cloud of dark inevitability hung above the Deathstar, blocking out not just the light but all hope and shreds of mercy. Watching from my sofa, I had the luxury of taking a few notes. Each time, I wrote, ‘have to hang on – don’t let them score’, they scored. We conceded quickly after the dismissal, followed by another soon after then a third just before half time. Not feeling forensically inclined today, I won’t dissect the mayhem but suffice to say that Mertesacker’s header was sdown to lousy marking, Hud I think lost his man, while the ball for the second and third emerged from challenges where the man in red came out on top.

Discussing Spurs is like the current debate about the BBC. Everyone hauls out their own soapbox and shoehorns it in somehow. Poor editorial decisions and complacency about dealing with child abuse take a back seat to anything from left-wing bias to the break-up of the entire corporation. At Tottenham it’s not actually all about AVB versus old whathisname who used to be in charge as many seem to believe. Let’s postpone all the chatter and specualtion about formations and players because there’s little to add to that debate from this game.

However, what I would say is one problem has carried on from one reign to another – the wide men do not track back enough. I’m all for attacking wingers and both Bale and Lennon are playing very well this season. It’s just that in the Premier League you have to play another role and contribute to defensive solidity. Poor Naughton was run ragged by Walcott. I’m not convinced he can be a Spurs regular but yesterday he received little protection and in the fifteen minutes before the break it was too easy for the gunners.

And yet…. going to 3-4-2 after the break was a brave decision. Our young manager could have settled for damage limitation and scuttled away into the night, spraying cliches behind him like ‘one of those days’ and ‘look forward to Thursday’ to shake off his media pursuers. It nearly paid off. The gunners don’t like it up ’em and approached their superiority with surprising trepidation. They weren’t happy as we ran at them. For a time we didn’t notice the loss of a man and played our best football, holding the ball and passing it well. Then ‘don’t concede’ and we did. However, Bale’s goal and their fans, who know their team best, were shaken into silence. Who knows what would have happened if Bale’s cross-shot had been more cross than shot, with JD waiting, or if Defoe had gone for placement not power at the far post from a corner.

The fifth seemed unfair somehow. 5-2 sounds worse than 4-2 by a factor of more than one goal. What was important for Spurs in the longer run is that we did not lie down and take it. When Villas-Boas got hold of them in the dressing room, they listened. They settled easily into an unfamiliar set-up, unlike last season when we couldn’t grasp the 3-5-2 at Stevenage at all, and responded willingly, playing their best football. Pressing high and defending from the front was effective. Walcott and Chamberlain were itching to get moving and Daws and WG couldn’t have caught them but if you prevent the gunners’ midfield from getting the ball or the space to pass it, it’s as good as an extra man. Almost.

This is one positive we can take from the game. It will stand us in good stead as we come to a sequence of games under growing pressure for points.

Maribor were swept away by a fine attacking performance from Spurs, capped by a three-touch hat-trick from Jermain Defoe. Feed the wingers. Bale rampaging down the left in a magnificent display of power and pace. Defoe with the cut-throat razor finish, ruthless beauty not once but three times, each one his first and only touch in the move. The only problem is deciding which one was the best.

Formations and tactics are permanently on the agenda, especially at Spurs where we don’t have a squad that obviously fits one particular set-up. Anyway, it’s not just about the right formation, it’s about the right formation for each match. Last night’s 4-4-2 throwback to the good old days with two flying wingers and an endless stream of crosses for two, ah the luxurious joy of writing it, two strikers, was perfect to take the game to our willing but limited opponents. Young Tom Carroll shone in centre midfield, ably backed up by Huddlestone who got hold of the ball then laid it off, unobtrusively and economically. Play that open set-up against City and they will demolish us.

Villas-Boas has been criticised for having preconceived tactical ideas – not so. He’s a loyal man sure of his own judgment but not to the point of inflexibility. He has stuck with Gallas at the back in the league, kept faith with Walker despite his loss of form and likes one man up front, but when change was required, he brought in Adebayor. He’s learned his lessons well from his spell at Chel**a. This new dynamic suits me – the obvious is for JD to play off Manu but the big man is mobile too and remained a focal point for attacks even when he dropped off the front.

I’d go further. It’s time for AVB to make this his team. Time to move from transition to the future. Last night the 1882 fans gave the ground a much-needed lift as well as the team. Lots of writing this week about the damp atmosphere at the Lane, the best being from the peerless Lustdoctor ‘Against Modern Tottenham’  . Partly it’s down to unrealistically high expectations – of how good we are, of how quickly a new manager can form a squad deprived of two key players and a decent striker short into true contenders.

Partly it’s down to how Spurs fans have always been. When my lifetime at the Lane began in the late sixties, one of the first things I learned from other fans and the media was that we were fickle, we turned on our own when times got rough. In those days it was the funeral slow handicap that wounded.

As a kid, as now, I questioned that. If we were so fickle, how come we kept on turning up? You can’t fool Spurs fans. We know our football and know what we want. Play the game the right way. If we see something different, that’s the origin of the grumbling. For certain there have been times when it’s been over the top. I’ve never booed a Spurs player and never will. But the grumbles come because we know the game, know who we are and what we stand for. Because we turn up year after year, decade after decade. Because we care.

We know we need another striker and midfielder. The frustration comes because for a few years we have been so close. It’s been the same since I began writing this blog four years ago. We’re close and every time we build, we lose as well as prosper. Dembele and Vertonghen will do for me, but the loss of Rafa and Luka hurts like crazy. You don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone (and remember how many Spurs fans repeatedly said both were over-rated).

Enough of the comparisons with Redknapp. Bring in the new players and the new shape and let’s get on with it. Move forward. I love Friedel and Gallas. Adore them. More than just what they’ve done for Spurs, which is plenty, they embody the true spirit of football. The media bang on about how players and fans don’t care. Muamba knows we care. Those of us who were there that Saturday night or last night to welcome him home, that’s football and football as it really is. Same for Brad and Willy. Could have given up. No. Could have taken the money and stayed in the reserves. Not enough. Pride means they want to be the very best even though their bones ache and muscles complain. Total dedication.

But time for them to step back. Lloris made a horrible ricket yesterday. If anything, what worried me more was that he repeated the same reckless manoeuvre in the second half only this time the Maribor forward didn’t make the tackle. But he’s the future, so play him. Let him get used to us and us to him. For better or worse (in the long run, for better in my view), play him.

Play superjan at centre half. That’s our long term future. He’s a fine left-back but he’s our centre half. Sandro and Dembele in centre midfield. What a power combo that will be. Give Carroll more game time, after yesterday he’s earned it. Last season I noted how he looks for the ball, is unafraid to take responsiblity. That firsttime ball to Defoe – top class. But more signficantly, when the passes didn’t come off, no matter, he came back for more. Livermore has the same attitude for that matter. let them play and they will make mistakes, but let them.

Villas-Boas was right to not make wholesale changes but I have a sense that he’s like a kid playing with an older child’s toys. Make this team yours, Andre old son, and we will get behind you. Make them play the Spurs way, with a bit of defensive stuff thrown in, I grant you. Time to move forward with our man.

Dear Seth,

I’m terribly sorry about yesterday. You were so looking forward to your first game at White Hart Lane. It’s not always like that, honestly.

Did you have a good seat? It’s great up in the old East Stand. That’s where I sat for my first match too. My dad took me. He wasn’t interested in football like your dad is but he knew I wanted to go so much, he left my mum to look after the little sweetshop that we had, just down the road from your house funnily enough, and he gave up a Saturday just to take me to the Spurs.

The stand is still pretty much the same as it was then. It’s not modern like the other ones. We climbed up all those stairs. I dashed ahead of my dad, he was puffing and panting but I wanted to see the pitch as soon as I could. I remember standing at the top, looking down. It was so green. Like a magical place to me, seeing my team, my heroes. Something I had dreamed of. Now I was here. I was ten or eleven, a couple of years older than you.

Shall I tell you a secret? When I walk up the short flight of steps to the entrance, I still get a little excited. Look round, take it all in. When I walk from the car and am about to turn the corner where I can see the ground for the first time, I always speed up, just a fraction. It’s what being a football fan does to you. Silly, isn’t it? Don’t tell anyone.

Of course when I first went, you could get half price tickets for children. You didn’t have to pay £45 for each seat. Shirts didn’t cost £57. On top of that, your Uncle Mike had come all way the from Yorkshire. And look what happened.

Over the last few years, Spurs have played fantastic football. Not always, and we’ve never been able to defend properly for all the 45 years since I ran to the top of the East Stand for the first time, but we have been part of some thrilling games. Yesterday was the opposite. We couldn’t do anything right, not for one single moment. I waited and waited for us to start playing well, passing the ball around, Lennon and Bale making runs down the wings, like I told you they would before the game. It felt like I was in a time machine that had taken me back fifteen or twenty years, when people like Gerry Francis, Christian Gross and George Graham managed the club, the players weren’t very good and we played like this all the time. I’m really sorry, Seth.

Some clubs have a tradition. That means that whoever is the manager, they try to do things the same way. At Spurs we pass the ball around. We have skillful players. We attack. It’s entertaining and it sometimes means we don’t win as many matches as we should, but that’s what we want at Spurs. That’s what they teach you in the Tottenham Under 9s, isn’t it? You are a midfielder, good at passing. That’s what they were encouraging you to do yesterday morning at the new training ground. Wish I could see it, sounds fabulous.

That’s the Tottenham way, and Seth, it’s the right way to play this beautiful game. Pass and move. Pass and move. Your dad said it was obvious from one glance at the Under 18s and Under 21s yesterday that all the teams at Spurs play that way. Shame the first team forgot about it.

Sigurdsson is an international. Did you see how he controlled the ball and then turned into the Wigan man next to him? Not one or two touches but four or five, not every time but but most of the time. Did you see how often he was tackled? Tom Huddlestone, did you know he’s played for England? He’s a great passer of the ball. Long passes mostly. Yesterday some of the passes worked but most of them didn’t. They stay in the air for ages so the defenders can get there first. I like Tom but he has to learn to pass the ball quickly  a short pass will do so long as he moves off into more space so he can get it back. He didn’t move around much, did he? I think you could have shown him what to do.

Do you know what managers do? They organise the players, tell them where on the pitch they should play, how they should move around, things like that. I expect your coaches do that too. Hope they don’t shout at you, though. I go and see games on Sunday in our local park and all the coaches and dads shout at young boys your age. I hate that. At your age you should try your best and enjoy it. If you do that, you will have had a good game.

Our manager is Andre Villas Boas. He’s young, he’s new and I want him to do well. He’s the Spurs manager, after all. So far he’s not done too badly – we were fourth in the League. Yesterday he did some things that were not so good. Wigan are not as good as we are but he started with two defensive midfielders, Sandro and Huddlestone. They play in midfield like you and hang back a bit to protect the back four. It’s a very important position because it helps the defence and starts attacks when we get the ball. Sandro was excellent before he was injured – did you see how he made tackles and passed it simply so we could attack once we had the ball?

You are good at maths. If you have two defensive midfielders, you have one less attacker. We made it too easy for Wigan because of that. Here’s some more maths. Wigan lined their players up like this: 3 at the back, 4 in the middle and 3 forward. It’s unusual but it worked. We had no space as we tried to attack. We just couldn’t get it forward and when we did, we only had one man, Defoe, up front. It also meant that Lennon and Bale, our wide players, were marked a long way up the field. They couldn’t get going. They are dangerous, so it meant we couldn’t play well.

I think we could have done something about that but they didn’t. I think we could have at least tried to get them going. I think the Wigan manager Martinez was smarter than our manager.

The Wigan players aren’t as good as ours. We wouldn’t buy any of them but there is a lesson for you here – they played better as a team. Did you notice how they passed the ball to each other over short distances, then moved into space? They passed the ball the way they were facing, and passed it quickly. That means it is less easy for them to be tackled. It worked. Perhaps you can try that when you next play for Spurs.

Our manager could have changed his tactics but he wasn’t keen. I don’t understand why he took Defoe off. He wasn’t playing well but he needs other men to give him the ball. He’s our best scorer and we were behind. I don’t get it. Do you?

We really need need a big striker to play up front. Your dad has seen a few decent centre-forwards in his time, ask him what they do. We have Adebayor. He’s good but sometimes the manager does not want to play him, then Adebayor sulks because he’s not in the side. He has to wait, to try harder. Seth, you would play football all day and all night if you mum and dad would let you. That’s the right attitude to have. I bet all professionals were like that when they were your age. It’s a shame some of them have forgotten.

As you know, Seth, I go to almost every home game. That was one of the worst I’ve seen in the last twenty years, maybe the worst. Still, it doesn’t always happen but the best team won. I hope you enjoyed it, though. I hope too that you play well for Spurs. Part of being a fan is you watch them play badly, then after a while you start thinking about the next game, about coming back. That’s a real fan. Who knows, maybe in ten years time I’ll wave to you from the Shelf, except you will be on the pitch. I’ll still be there.

Say hi to your dad and Uncle Mike for me,

Regards,

Alan