Spurs

Spurs to sign Vieira – I was so right but is it so wrong?

/ Alan / 5 Comments

Tottenham Hotspur are making a concerted attempt to sign Patrick Vieira, the former Arsenal midfielder. Or to give him his full title, the much despised, reviled, whinging, play-acting, dirty, referee-intimidating, leader-of-the-scum Arsenal midfielder.

Sound contacts confirm this is very much more than the latest tabloid rumour. Regular readers will recall that ten days ago, when Michael Owen was available, I suggested Harry’s appreciation of the virtues of experience would undoubtedly mean the arrival of at least one veteran, battle-hardened in the ways of the Premier League. I can’t say Vieira’s name was exactly top of my list, however.

I’m probably older than most people reading this blog. Therefore, I’ve been hating the Arsenal for longer than you have. At an age when I should know better, the old rivalry continues unabated. I wish a pox and a plague upon their house, famine and drought throughout the land, although it’s only fair to stop short of smiting their firstborn.

So the pain is deep and the blood runs cold, but through gritted teeth I spit out the truth: Vieira was a great footballer. There, I’ve said it. May the earth swallow me whole. Wish I didn’t have to, but it’s true. He provided everything that our midfield has lacked for so many years: drive, accurate passing, positional sense, inspiration, tackling. He, more than Roy Keane even, is the one player that I have constantly referenced when describing our deficiencies and how they could be put right.

It’s easy to see why Redknapp wants him so badly. Sitting in front of the back four, curbing the inclination to get forward, he would enable the younger legs around him to do most of the work whilst he directed operations and the lack of stamina becomes less of a drawback. He’d seldom play for 90 minutes, either playing the first 75 to secure a win or the final 20 to hold onto a lead, the latter solving a big problem for us away from home. Also, he would be a beneficial influence on our youngish midfielders.

The economics are good too. As I remarked in the Owen article, we can afford his salary and the lack of a transfer fee protects our capital and our interest payments. Even better if Levy secures a ‘pay as you play’ deal, as has been rumoured.

But football is not about common sense. It’s driven by a tribal passion from the stands, about them and us, about belonging and solidarity. And Vieira does not belong here. He apparently took great delight in consistently trampling our team into the ground. Players don’t really care who they play for, as long as the money is right. Fair enough; that’s what the word ‘professional’ means. Just don’t expect us to turn right round and take him to our hearts. For the fans, football is not about the money.

Redknapp as ever is a canny operator. He knows there is a risk that this signing, if it happens, could alienate those of us who feel insulted at the very thought of not just any Arsenal player but their talismanic leader wearing our colours. However, he’s right to gamble that this is easily outweighed by our desperate desire for success. If he scores the winner at the Emirates, am I going to sit on my hands, comforted that my principles remain intact?

If anyone is vulnerable, it’s the player, not Redknapp or Levy. Should Vieira’s standards slip, the crowd will be straight on his back and at this stage in his career, I question whether that will motivate him to greater heights. More like drift away into well-paid retirement.

I will cheer any player in a Spurs shirt. Some I will cheer louder and longer than others.

B-B-Bye Bye Bye, Didier Zokora

/ Alan / 1 Comment

Seville have reached agreement with Tottenham Hotspur to secure the transfer of Didier Zokora. Our first big deal of the summer, it signals the start of the market processes that hopefully will bring a number of quality players to Spurs before the window closes.

The ivory Coast midfielder started 118 games for the club (source: http://www.soccerbase.com) but even a stat-phobe such as myself did not have to look up the number of goals scored. Members of the Spurs Odyssey messageboard (www.spursodyssey.com) ran a sweepstake on which match he would score in first, but I think we all regarded that very much as a donation rather than a bet.

One of the pitfalls of writing regularly on the web (although this blog is new I have written for several years for the excellent fanzine My Eyes Have Seen the Glory www.mehstg.com) is that your predictions and opinions are out there and stay out there. This is in sharp contrast to the TV pundits, who are never held to account for their inconsistencies, or for that matter the many keyboard warriors on the messageboards, whose bluster is trampled under the inexorable march of the next 13 ITK threads. Both use the same method – speak or write firmly with absolute conviction and no one will notice that two weeks previously they had the totally opposite view.

Maybe I should try that in future. Not one for rash predictions, I was nevertheless confident that Zokora was just the man to provide some desperately needed stability in centre midfield. He caught my eye in the last World Cup, an industrious, confident figure in the Ivory Coast midfield, protecting the defence and then picking up the ball to start the attack. He led by example and possessed both the physical strength and stamina that was perfect for the demands of the Premiership. So much so that at the start of the season before last, I predicted he would become our player of the season….

So I waited. And waited. Saw something at the end of Jol’s last full season. Then waited. And waited. Then lost patience. In defence he left too great gap between the midfield and back four, who were then easily exposed by attackers grateful for the unexpected freedom. Coming forward, he never found the strikers consistently and his ball retention was inadequate. Although the old joke about the second touch being a tackle was not created with him in mind, it may as well have been.

Zokora is a decent player who is not up the standards that we need if Spurs are to prosper. His career at the club faded away, named consistently in the squad but seldom a starter once Palacios arrived and shunted ignominiously into defence. He willingly plugged a gap but his shortcomings were exposed away to Villa. Selected ahead of Corluka, Ashley Young slaughtered him, to the point where he was substituted before half time. Corluka then totally contained Young, and at that moment Redknapp surely placed him on the transfer list, at least in his mind.

Yet it feels somewhat churlish to be over-critical of a man who was well-motivated and committed to the team. His celebrations after the CC Final win were genuine and unconfined. The loss of his brother, an equally promising young player at the time, to a dreadful drowning accident, was the source of his dedication, in sharp and welcome contrast to many modern players, lazy and boated on giant bank balances.

I wish him well, as I suspect will most Spurs fans. It is time for him to move on as we need better, but the thought remains: if he could play so magnificently in the last CC Final against United, who couldn’t he have done that more often?

Spurs’ Redknapp Looks to Owen Example

/ Alan / Leave a comment

Transfer business in the Premier League has become all too predictable but Michael Owen’s transfer to Manchester United has surprised everyone, not least the player himself. The deal is an example that Harry Redknapp is highly likely to follow on behalf of Spurs.

I had a sneaking feeling that Owen would come to Tottenham. When it comes to transfer business, Redknapp starts twitching when he spies a bargain, like those antique dealers who claim to know instinctively when they are in the presence of a genuine work of art. He likes a veteran, does our ‘arry. At Portsmouth he made good use of Kanu in particular and others like Campbell, Primus and Hreidarsson played important roles when it appeared they were on the slide. The very best example of Redknapp’s talent, however, is right here at the Lane. Ramos wrote off Ledley King, whereas Redknapp resurrected his career and restored him to his rightful status as one of the finest centre halves in the club’s history.

It makes good sense. Redknapp gave them a crystal clear idea of where they fitted into the team and asked them to play to their strengths. The defenders, well, defended. Protected by an industrious midfield, they were instructed to stay back, not venture forward, and do the business in and around the box.

Kanu’s example is especially relevant to Spurs because we lack an effective target man whose ability to bring others into the game is at least as significant as their goals per game ratio. It’s certain we will sign this type of player this summer. With Keane, Defoe and Modric scuttling around him and Lennon providing the crosses, the team will surely prosper. Bent has been given the chance to prove himself in this respect and has been found sadly wanting. Experience counts in this position, body strength and an awareness of what is going on around you more valuable than the stamina to hurl yourself around the pitch for 90 minutes. Even Heskey can do it, for goodness sake.

It makes good sense in the boardroom too. There’s no such thing as a free transfer these days, what with signing-on fees and the ludicrous salary Owen no doubt ‘earns’. However, the hall of mirrors that is modern transfer business distorts the real world so completely that it becomes entirely plausible to claim that this is a fine piece of business. United’s success can generate the income to pay high salaries and the absence of a transfer fee ensures that their capital remains intact. It’s the interest on the vast loans that financed the Glasers’ takeover that is potentially damaging to the club in the long term, so this deal does not add to the borrowing requirement.

At Spurs our finances have a more solid foundation but the principle remains the same. It’s excellent business and we will no doubt indulge at some point in the window. However, we’re better than Portsmouth and need better quality players, so the majority of signings have to be of a high calibre. Redknapp won’t have to work his magic on too many old stagers. It’s a luxury he’s not had before as a manager.

Come On You Spurs (and Andy)

/ Alan / Leave a comment

As the media work themselves into a lather over grunting at Wimbledon, there’s an on-court sound that bothers me infinitely more. The individual voices crying, ‘Come on Andy’, or Roger, or Andy (again) are profoundly irritating. It’s not quite so bad this year, because we are spared the grating awfulness of ‘Come on Tiiiiiiimm’, as he has retired to bore us rigid from the safety of the commentary box, but I’ve already had enough. By last Tuesday, actually.

I confess I can’t quite put my finger on why this is so annoying. The last time I heard support like this was at primary school when we were marched out to support the  netball team in the local derby against St Gregory’s. Whipped into an hysterical frenzy because we were excused maths to watch the game, the high pitched screaming seemed to terrify our visitors and the goal shooter’s aim was as sharp as a drunk at a fairground shooting gallery. But we were ten years old and somehow that’s not going to put the fear and trembling onto the mind of a battle hardened veteran of the tennis circuit.

One irksome variant is the guy (and it is almost always a guy) who wants to be the last voice to be heard before the serve. As it surely undermines the mental composure of the preparing server, in most cases it has the exact opposite of the intended effect. Once achieved, one can only assume that our supporter basks in the glory of his achievement, imagining admiring glances from those around him. His fellow spectators nudge one another on the way home, see him, he was the bloke who shouted out ‘come on’, third game, second set. And it was a deuce point!!! I picture a website somewhere where these folk gather to share stories, or maybe a hierarchy of shout-outs. A Wimbledon final match point is surely the top of such lists. The king of the shout-outs.

Support for British players at Wimbledon is also characterised by the frantic waving of 5 inch square Union Jacks. A more ineffectual gesture I cannot possibly imagine. Quite how the waving of a miniscule flag by a Surrey matron will lift the flagging spirits of a downhearted Brit I really do not know. Yesterday during Murray’s game, a woman held up a Scottish flag hand-drawn on an A4 piece of plain paper. Rather than buy or make a flag, presumably she felt moved to smuggle in said paper and felt tip and furtively draw behind the Pimms and strawberry stall, before slipping into her seat to reveal the factor that would tip the balance in favour of the surly scot.

My son reminded me that years ago I had mentioned the way the aussies got behind Pat Rafter in the Men’s final. They generated great chunks of big noise, not chanting but just loud, strident and concentrated. He was too polite to add that this is obviously one of dad’s soapbox comments, trotted out every year in the last week of June and the first of July. Thanks for being gentle, son, I get the message. But it was real support, from the heart, and Rafter knew it.

The contrast between genteel Wimbledon and the raucous masses in football grounds could hardly be greater. In the end, my irrational irritation comes from the joy of supporting a football team and being part of the crowd. Obnoxious and abusive that support may sometimes be, but it is where I feel most comfortable, participating in a genuine expression of lasting commitment, one where victory means something and where fan and team are united as one against a common foe.

Of course the Wimbledon crowds enjoy their day and are absorbed with their heroine or hero, but they do not, cannot, feel it as we football fans do. After the match is over, how much does it matter to them who won?  For us, it means so much. It’s true passion. From the heart.