In the modern world, twelve days without a football match can only mean one thing - it must be summer, the close season. Nothing to play for, no poor records to worry about or good records to uphold, no injury concerns, just sun, clear skies and...
Wait, what's that? It's the middle of the season? You've got to be joking?
No I'm not joking. It is day eight of Spurs' 12-day break between games and, with only our loss at Blackpool to concentrate on, my mind is going into meltdown. We lost to Blackpool, for heaven's sake, that must mean we're terrible, doesn't it? We've lost it, we have no hope of fourth place and we're going to lose all our best players and our manager.
If I could step back and take a breath, I would see that it will all turn back and forth a few more times before the season is out but, having had so long to week to stew over our last result, my ability to process rational thought has ceased.
Basically, it's a form of cabin fever, and I'm sure other Spurs fans must be feeling it - forced to look elsewhere for kicks, on Sunday evening, folk stood foolishly outside their glass houses, throwing stones in the direction of our neighbours, Arsenal.
Jokes and insult filled forums and fanzines as Spurs fans fell about laughing at the Gunners' misfortune to have lost a cup, the final of which they stumbled into and, come the end of the season, they aren't going to care about.
Then yesterday, I'm sitting comfortably in my front room watching the Oscars highlights, when I flick channel to see Chelsea launch a brick into our patio doors, cracking our window of opportunity looking out over fourth spot and handing the bragging rights straight back to the now-realistic title challengers, Arsenal.
When I was younger, I'd come up with all manner of weird and wonderful reasons and explanations that proved Tottenham were better than their league position suggested.
It worked like this... In 1998, Spurs beat Newcastle 2-0 which meant that by default, because Newcastle had beaten Barcelona earlier that season, we were better than Barcelona. Add to that, the fact that Barcelona beat Real Madrid 3-0 in March 1998, and Real went on to win the European Cup, then Spurs must be better than the European Champions.
Experience tells us this logic is flawed. But that doesn't stop us applying similar rules week in week out . Only a few weeks ago even the papers screamed, "If Spurs can beat AC Milan in the San Siro, they can beat anyone."
Today, this simple logic, improper as it may be, is working heavily against me. It is telling me that if Wolves can beat Blackpool, and Manchester United moreover, then they can make short work of us.
If our last game had been the 1-0 victory over AC Milan, then I'm sure that by now we'd all be convinced we were on the cusp of an extended spell of European domination, but it had to be Blackpool didn't it.
There are still four days before our match at Wolves on Sunday, by which time we'll most likely be convinced of impending relegation, possible administration and all in training to attend tryouts for FC Hotspur of Tottenham?
Sorry, but this is the football season, and twelve days is too long.
No comments:
Post a Comment