The Good…

So, I’ll begin with the ‘Good’ – a selection of memories and musings from the last 25 seasons that’ll warm the hearts of even the most sceptical of Spurs fans…

Klinsmann’s Heroics ‘94-95

Before 1994, football had never really registered with me. But after being glued to the World Cup that Summer, I became Spurs obsessed as the Premier League got underway – guided by my Old Man’s passion for Tottenham. And what an exciting time it was – with Jurgen Klinsmann tearing it up and scoring some belters against Sheffield Wednesday and Everton in his first two games (followed by his trade mark ‘dive’ afterwards that my cousin Danny and I would spend all season perfecting). Big goals followed – 21 in all in that first spell – including the winner vs Liverpool in the Quarter Final of the FA Cup. At Christmas, it was only natural that I’d have the stunning purple Umbro kit as a present, although I was crestfallen when ‘Holsten’ was missing from the front of it as some killjoy had deemed that alcohol advertising wasn’t appropriate on an 8 year old’s replica kit! The season went by, FA Cup Semi heartache awaited in the form of Everton and Daniel Amokachi (more of that in the ‘Bad’ Blog) – and one of the last memories of the season for me was an irate Alan Sugar throwing Klinsmann’s shirt at a Football Focus interviewer saying he “wouldn’t wash my car with it.” It had ended sourly, but there’d be a second coming for Klinsmann. He arrived back a few years later in 1997/8, his 9 goals helping to steer us to safety – a 4 goal haul in a 6-2 drubbing against Wimbledon being the glorious highlight of it all.

League Cup Glory

After the ‘feast’ of my old man’s younger days following Spurs, it’s been the ‘famine’ for me and thousands of younger fans. But – and it’s a pertinent but – there have been some magic moments of silverware along the way. Only 5 years old for the FA Cup victory in ‘91, I cannot recall it, leaving the League Cup victories of ‘99 and ‘08 to put the glory into ‘Glory Glory Tottenham Hotspur’. ‘99’s victory over Leicester was sensational! Okay, as an actual game of football it was dire, but when Alan Nielsen flew through the air to nod home the winner in extra time, I was finally about to see my beloved Spurs lift a trophy. The win over Chelsea 9 years later was even sweeter. I was a student in Swansea at the time, watching it in the Bryn-Y-Mor pub in Brynmill as a Dimitar Berbatov penalty got us back on level terms after a Drogba free kick had given Chelski the lead. The fingernails were pretty much gone by the time Cech’s save rebounded off Woodgate’s face to seal the win against the more fancied neighbours in extra time and if you’d told me in ‘08 that it would be the last time we’d win silverware for 12 years (not forgetting the Audi Cup, of course) I wouldn’t have believed you. The wait continues…

Champions League Promised Land

For years the Champions League was for other teams and the notion that Spurs could play in it was fanciful. We came close in 2006, until a dodgy Lasagne put paid to that. No, we were Thursday night Europa League fodder at best. Tuesday and Wednesday night European football was not for Tottenham Hotspur. All that changed in 2010 when a late game in the season against Man City effectively played out as a Champions League Qualifier Playoff. Us and them. Winner plays on. Loser plays on Thursdays. It was a tense affair to say the least. But late on, up stepped Peter Crouch to head home the winner, stunning the Eithiad into further silence and booking our ticket to Europe’s Promised Land. Such an important goal – it’s one that crops up on my Twitter feed time and time again. The following season, it was a wild ride in the Champion’s League and as a Welshman it’d be remiss of me not to mention Gareth Bale’s hatrick against Inter at the San Siro. Yes, the history books will say that we lost 4-3 – but Gareth, oh Gareth. Just thinking of it makes the mind giddy. 5 minutes watching his highlight reel from the second half of that game is not wasted time. Beaten but unbowed, glory weeknights would await in the future after the first taste of Champions League football for the Lilywhites. As far as Champions League hat tricks go? It would take some beating, but a certain Lucas Moura would give it a go nine years later…

Once Upon a Time in Amsterdam

Part of the frustrations of being a Spurs fan is the process of falling short of the glory time and time again. Usually it takes the form of agonising semi final loses, but last year the rule book for ‘Spursy’ agony was reversed somewhat. Patchy league form and a spate of injuries (including a layoff for that man Kane) seemed to galvanise the side on the European stage – as Dortmund were dispatched easily enough, followed by an almost unbearably tense aggregate victory over Man City. In the semi final – that stage of cup competitions that has continuously proved to be the insurmountable metaphorical hurdle for great Spurs sides over the past decade – stood an in-form youthful Ajax side. Not that any Spurs fan needs reminding of what happened, but what a delightful process it is to recall fond memories of it. First leg, same old story. 0-1, leaving an uphill task and serious work to do in Amsterdam. And it didn’t start well. At half time, 2-0 down on the night, 3-0 on aggregate – the game was gone. Fairytales do happen in sport – but when they do, they seldom involve Spurs as a rule. Watching it with my father, I remember being sprawled on the sofa, annoyed that we’d not even given it a real go but, in all honesty, I wasn’t particularly disappointed because we’d shown nothing in either of the legs to even suggest that we were ever going to win the tie. Liverpool had stunned Barcelona the previous night and here we were limping tamely out of the competition. And then the second half began. I watched but was indifferent, distracting myself on my phone by reading how terrible we were on Twitter. Then, Lucas Moura gets one back on 55 minutes but, so what? You don’t score 3 away goals at the Amsterdam Arena. This was just more evidence of the football Gods cruelly mocking Spurs fans. Four minutes later, he bags another, the blood starts pumping and you start to wonder if we can do this. The last half an hour plays out, Spurs on top, strong, dominant but not able to pick that final lock. Gallant effort, ballsy, full of heart – but not quite enough. 5 minutes of added time play out. “It’s just a shame isn’t it?” I say forlornly to the old man, proud of the boys but gutted that another semi final sadness is about to be written. But then there’s one last chance. The ball launches to Llorente, he lays it off to Dele, who plays through Moura. It’s as if time slows down: he rolls it into the left hand bottom corner and – stop the clocks, logic is chopped – the comeback is complete and Spurs have booked their place in the Champions League Final. I’m 32 years old – I’m crying, hugging my Dad like a giddy and excitable toddler and then we both sit there, stunned into golden silence, wondering how on Earth our Spurs have done this wonderful, beautiful thing. Of course, we played out a damp squib final against Liverpool and history will show that we didn’t win it. Yet, you’ll always remember the way your heroes made you feel, and that night in Amsterdam was the proudest I’ve ever felt as a Spurs fan. The memory of it will last a lifetime.

Fixing the North London Gap

An event of major significance – culminating over seasons rather than a one off moment – has been our success at first closing the – and then extending our own – gap over North London rivals Arsenal. The first NLD I can remember was watching the 1-0 victory in 1994/5 season, watching Gica Popesco slot home the winner while a mulleted Jerry Francis beamed from the dugout. However, after that, it was slim pickings. Over the next decade, Arsenal had their glory years, steamrolling us seemingly at will. But then, every so often we’d get a huge result against them. Stand outs? 2008 – The 5-1 second leg League Cup semi win and the 4-4 comeback in the league (who could forget Dai Bentley’s screamer?!) Then into the noughties, Spurs’ wins came with increasing frequency as we asserted our own dominance. Particularly sweet was the famous 2-3 comeback win in 2010 that kicked off the decade and many memorable and well deserved results followed. Although we still don’t get it all our own way, the current derby dynamic in North London is a world away from the dark days of the late 90s and early 00s. As final league standings over the past few years attest, the claim that “London is white” can longer be laughed off or dismissed. Long may Spurs’ success in this respect continue…

What are your thoughts? Of course I’ll have missed things – what should be included in the highlights of the last 25 years?

Andy, South Wales, March 2020