DML Editorial: Complaining about Comolli

Damien Comolli has fallen on his feet. The much maligned easy-to-blame target for the Spurs boo-boys, the media and for the right honourable Daniel Levy - who made sure that after Ramos was acquired as manager that everyone knew he was brought in on the say so and recommendation of Comolli (thus by default, responsibility for his failure was tagged). But, fallen on his feet has Damien. At Saint-Etienne. Again.

I was never a fan of his (you'd never have guessed that, right?) but more so was never a fan of the director of football structure. Chief scout working as a bitch to the manager, closing deals the manager has requested is how it should have worked rather than taking responsibility of transfers away from the coach. We all know it was an overly simplistic system when noted on paper but in reality it created confusion and chaos in-house and on the terraces with nobody ever knowing who was directly responsible for the internal politics that undermined the likes of Jol. Obviously Levy, but see, he sits on the side of 'I'm dumb with the football thing and entrust my DoF to make sure all things go as planned', so as this paragraph descends into literal suicide, it serves its purpose to prove that Comolli leaving and Levy finally admitting defeat is a great day for traditionalists.

Will it be great for Saint-Etienne? Possibly. Possibly not. Don't care. So what of Damien's reign as top cockerel at WHL? Was he really THAT bad? Was he simply an easy target, with us only selecting examples of transfers that didn't quite work out (no different to a manager with no technical director influence buying the wrong player - and how many times has that happened?) and not giving him credit when he did bring in someone decent?

"No seriously dude, I don't like you or your English cup of tea"

The fickleness is strong amongst us. He was celebrated for a period of time, believe it or not. When things were going well on the pitch. When we signed Zokora (and he was photographed with the player by a Spurs fan abroad) many of us saw this as a major coup. A real proper DM, proven African Nations class. And he also signed Berbatov (his first signing in fact). Or did Jol tell him to scout Berbatov and sign him? And was Berbatov really a good signing considering the mess its left us in? Harsh I know - because there's no way of knowing who or when a player will act in such a disloyal way. The point is, was Comolli actually 'ok' at his job?

Bent (initially slated by all), Corluka, Woodgate, Bale, Hutton, Modric, Bentley - all arguably very very decent players (Bale and Hutton still trying to reclaim some form after returning from injury and Bentley and Modric finding their level after a slow start). Most Prem teams outside the 'Top Four' would be happy to take these players off our hands (by most I mean Aston Villa). Modric is arguably good enough for a Top 4 club. And might well be playing for one in a season or two. Hmm. Anyways, all good good players. Maybe purchased for a little bit too much, but that's up the bank and not, I would expect the DoF.

Some managers spend millions on players of their own choosing, who flop and get sold on - so if Comolli was discussing targets at all times with the 'coach' and only going out to sign a player the coach wanted 100%, then was he doing anything wrong? Was he not just doing his job? Following orders? Players who we apparently missed out on due to chairman interference ('he is too old' - 'he wants too much in wages') is surely down to Levy and Levy alone. Up to the bank, right?

But isn't it Comolli who advises Levy who should be manager? Surely someone with that much responsibility and power wouldn't then become a lap dog for someone he appointed? Would he?

But what of Ghaly or Kevin Prince 'everyone thinks I was German Young Player of the Year when actually I wasn't' Boateng? Or Rocha? Or Taraabt? Or Gilberto? Or BAE? Kaboul? And Zokora obviously. Or Zokora. And Zokora. That Zokora. Oh Christ, Zokora.

We have spent millions on players that don't appear to be signings the coach might have wanted or singled out as targets. Millions of pounds playing reserve team football without a squad number. Yet where are the player we so desperately require? The cheap and cheerful engine-rooms and grafters? Not every player has to be box-office.

And when we need a replacement for Berbatov along with a defensive midfielder we got nothing. He never got on with Jol and along with his pal Kemsley got Ramos to walk out of Sevilla for us, which turned out to be an epic failure too far. So surely an inability to work with someone like Jol and Ramos out-weighs any successful signing? But if he's empowered by the chairman, the buck should stop with Levy. But it doesn't. And gone is Comolli.

Daniel and Damien thought it rude to stare at the blind floating head ghost

Apart from the nitty gritty of transfers, arguably, you could say his other main directive is to avoid mass upheaval and sign players the next manager can work with - all of course within the DoF structure. So basically, Comolli is responsible for the vision and progression of the club, and no matter who we sign, the 'next' coach can ease in and continue the training of the first team.

But now, this ethos, no longer exists, so players like Modric and Bentley - bought by Comolli for Ramos and were not used properly are now finding their way under Redknapp who HAS used them properly. But then any manager probably would have done so. In fact, if the players are good enough, it doesn't really matter who the coach is as long as he can man-manage.

What pro-Comolli supporters will tell you, as I've hinted earlier, is that he hasn't done that bad compared to other managers (DoF free) with signings. But again (repeat mode) him being there as a buffer between chairman and coach, protecting the chairman serves no purpose to the fans or the club in the long term.

Let's take a look at his signings:

Berbatov £10.9M - For the money spent and low-key status of the Bulgarian (not everyone had heard of him) this was a great signing. The first made by DC, and ironically the one that would prove (partly) pivotal in his downfall, thanks to Levy's dithering.

Assou-Ekotto £3.5M - Why, why, why? He has one move. You know the one. It's the one where he moves to go one way and goes the other instead.

Zokora £6M - After the first season, everyone hoped to see the real Zokora - the one that played a handful of games in the African Nations - in his second year at the Lane. What we got in year two was first season Zokora, slightly degraded, but with additional dance moves. An engine he has, but its not enough. Footballing brain is a standard requirement. Doesn't score goals, likes to play act and is pretty much the definition of not what to spend £6M + on.

Dervitte undisclosed - Not seen much of him, but I'll put this type of signing down to the quintessential 'we've signed a captain of his country (be it at youth U-21 level)' Spurs signing that we never see break into the first team because they never turn out to be good.

Malbranque £3.5M - Great player to have in the squad and team, and our most consistent performer last season. Would flourish under Redknapp. Why was he sold to Sunderland? Did we need the extra few million, perhaps for investment in the hopefully re-designing of Chirpy's head?

Chimbonda £4M - Infuriating player. Mercenary who had a few decent games, because he can play, but has shown himself up (Cup Final anyone?) and since joining Sunderland has continued to prove this point.

Mido £4.5M - Really helped us when he first signed up, influential up front, giving us somethign different. The weight/injury problems means he will probably never consistently perform for any one club.

Rocha £3.5M - Why?

Alnwich undisclosed - Is he still on loan? Another 'highly rated youth player' who we've seen nothing from. Apart from his dick in a mobile phone sex video.

Bale £5M - Great talent, but is possessed by evil spirits. Why was this not uncovered during scouting missions? Has never won a Prem game for Spurs, and never will till he is exorcised

"What do you think? Can he play left-wing?"
"Damien, that's a tree"

Berchiche undisclosed - Another one for the future, but he has a few years before we can chalk this off as a faded dream.

Taarabt undisclosed - Zidane on LSD. Has had some tasty games for the reserves, that are made up of 10-30 second bursts of genius, followed by playground football. A kid with immense ball skills, but suffering from Zokorapsy. If he doesn't learn to do the simple things, he'll never make it.

Bent £16.5M - Masses of money spent on him. The ones who didn't want to take the abuse that Bent was a waste of money will tell you he was bought for that much at the time because we needed someone to take the helm from Berbatov. Except, Berba was still with us for a season - along with Keane and Defoe, so Bent's form and confidence suffered as he sat it out on the bench. Still, over-inflated price (thanks to West Ham for matching Charlton's estimation). We were still the mugs that paid it. £9M would have been fine based on modern day wastefulness. Still, at least he is now starting to repay us. But why he was bought originally when we did not require a forward, especially when the money could have been spent elsewhere is.....Comolli's guess.

Kaboul £8.2M - Stupid. Another 'captain', another average player. Struggled thanks largely to the poor start to the season we had, but showed glimpses of something. That something then turned to nothing, confirming he was shit. Now at Pompey (bought by Redknapp, which is something that I'll worry about depending on how Harry does in the Jan window). Complete and utter waste of money. You do not spend £8.2M on a 'potentially great player'. Potential is another word for 'maybe'.

Rose undisclosed - Decent young Lennoneque player, without the bling baggage. One to watch and maybe a gem. As long as he stays away from Buckhurst Hill.

Boateng £5.2M - Much hyped because he has 'Prince' in his name and has tattoos. Looked well over his head when he did play for us, but he just might come good. Has 'grown up' since he got relegated to the reserves (basically, he realised he was being a dick and has got back to proving his worth as an up and coming prospect by concentrating on his football, because Christ, he ain't no superstar). Harry has brought him back into 1st team affairs, so a second chance is on the cards. Did we sign him because Sevilla were looking at him when Ramos was still there? Doubtful you think, as Ramos never went anywhere near him selection wise.

Gunter £2M - Decent player. Another gem, we hope.

Woodgate £7.5M - Doesn't take a DoF to look towards bringing Woody to Spurs, does it? Any manager at Spurs (considering our CB issues) would have looked to bring him in. Am I side-stepping a compliment for Comolli? Yes. Yes, I am.

Hutton £8M - Probably a bit too much for a Scottish player. Looked superb getting forward before injury. Bit of a crock performance wise since coming back. Comolli bought him on the strength of one of his scouts (Alex Ferguson).

Gilberto £1.9M - Brazilian? If he's Brazilian, so are my nuts.

Modric £15.8M - Brilliant little player. Gem for sure. Diamond in fact. But what does it say about the working relationship of Ramos and Comolli when Modric is stuck in awkward formation positions and struggles to impress? Harry comes in and does what everyone would do - let him play as a classic free-roaming number 10. Spurs did well to sign him. He's a typical flair Spurs type of signing and one we needed after losing the vision of Berbatov. I'll give Comolli props for getting the signature, but what did Ramos actually ask for? A left-winger?

dos Santos £4.7M - Either he is an extreme talent (if so, why did Barcelona let him go?) or he's a one-trick pony. IMO, was thrown into the deep end in a shit team. When he returns from injury, hope to see him settle and play. Might not be good enough for Bojans Barca, but he'll do fine in the Premiership. But Spurs should not have pushed this as a major coup with additonal 'he'll be a fully fledged first team player' soundbites. We needed something a little more complete. dos Santos is for the future. He's got a while to go before we can claim to have the best young Mexican player.

Gomes £9M - He plays brilliantly against us (for PSV) in one game and that's enough to value him at a hefty £9M and also pencil him in as a steady, reliable replacement for Paul 'I once had a HUGE long term contract at Spurs' Robinson. Instead we got a very good shot-stopper who is prone to amazing lapses in concentration and experiences yo-yo confidence. In other words, we spent almost ten million to bring back Paul Robinson.

Bostock £700k - Gem, gem, gem. Whether we have the development lined up for him is something I can only pray for. This kid can plaaaay. So credit here.

Bentley £15M - A typical superfluous luxury Tottenham type of player. Not really needed, when you consider what was needed pre-season. We lose Robbie Keane, so quick-sharp, we get a new poster boy. Not that Robbie was ever a poster boy. However, confidence makes people forget the past and look to the future, and Bentley is showing some quality now that he and the team are playing with swagger. Still not worth £15M, and might yet still go missing in games, depending on whether the gel keeps his hair in place.

Sanchez undisclosed - Backup keeper. Fairly impossible to be critical of this signing. Until he plays and concedes three.

Pavlyuchenko £14M - He might have the fashion sense of a blind chav let loose in Primark, but he seems honest, but not in a soppy way Rebrov was. Might have no pace but once he settles in England, he might be very decent for us. A snip at £14M. I'm trying not to be critical of the player, so I wont. I'll be critical of Comolli however who saw fit to spend this staggering amount of money on a player who had just done 5 months of Russian football. Arshavin would cost us £20M tops. We don't ever spot a bargain do we?

Corluka £8.5M - Can cover three or so positions. Has looked good and has looked average, but with Mordic at Spurs, bringing him in was inspired. I don't want to sound like a broken record and criticise the fee, and when you compare the amount spent and see it matches up with the money spent on Kaboul, this transfer still manages to make me feel a lot better, even though it shouldn't. But I wonder what kind of defender we could have got for £16M.

Campbell loan - Manchester United laughing at us.

So, the list more or less has as many hits and misses as you'd expect from most clubs who go with a more traditional manager-with-no-director-of-football-system. The lack of transparency means we simply can't be certain how much influence Jol and Ramos had during their time there and how involved Levy truly was. So, be it Comolli the glorified scout/contract man or be it Comolli the would be architect of glory - the only thing certain is he was one cook too many around the broth.

Comolli, having inherited a team built by Frank Arnesen's and Martin Jol - who finished 5th - he got Jol sacked and left us wanting a DM and a LW even after spunking £150M. He simply never bought the right players for the right (or left) positions when most required.

This system doesn't, didn't work.

The comedy Comolli complaints have now ceased. Forever.

Gust of wind

Playing catch-up with some of last weeks headlines.

With the media-shy Levy getting in as many soundbites and quotes as humanly possible, and Ramos quietly accepting the £1.7M pay-off we were treated to a slice of Poyet-pie. Remember him? Meant to be one of the promising young coaches in the country. Nonsense Gus looked the part up until he had to do every post-match interview with a glum look on his face telling us Bent and Pav can't play together, along with how unacceptable one defeat after another (and another) was.

He's come out all guns blazing, pointing his finger in the direction of Mr Chairman. Subject material? Berbatov of course.

With Levy telling us his side of the story the week before, Poyet manages to echo what most people truly believe. That Levy completely mis-managed the whole sorry saga from start to finish.

£6M 'more' made on the transfer for waiting until the final rather than sell him the end of May. And his comment about 'How much is six points worth?' is something most of us have pointed out (in the sense that starting the season lacking strength up front meant that over the course of the season we could lose £6M or more by finishing in a low position).

Poyet also slates the players for being flash, citing one 20 year old Spurs 'star' for spending a bit of money on a Ferrari and then drops the bombshell that although it was a 'great job' at Spurs, he wasn't involved as much as he wanted to be.

Ok. Firstly, Berba. Regardless of the shambles our summer transfer melee was, why is it that Harry Redknapp took all of 3 seconds to get the team working as a unit? Bent is scoring goals. Modric has found his way around the Premiership and we are winning games, home and away.

Same players Gus. No different to what you and Ramos had. Why was Bentley and Modric marginalised into playing unconventional roles in the team, out of their positions? And if you were not involved as much as you wanted to be, then what exactly was your involvement? Glorified interpreter? Ramos really was lost over here, wasn't he?

And shock horror, all footballers are twats. Buying a Ferrari, paying for hookers, getting a hair transplant then shaving it off, losing thousands on cards.....they are boys who can afford bigger toys than the average boy. Don't be jealous.

Sorry it didn't work out. And tbh, no hard feelings. Good luck, and if you are still wondering about the Newcastle job my advice would be - don't be a mug.

Make 'em smile!

Ramos: 2 points in 8 games = average 0.25 points per game
Redknapp: 10 points in 4 games = average 2.5 points per game

Tottenham Hotspur, now ten times better than we were. Happy days.

Metrochenko

Nothing too dramatic here, but thought I'd share for fits and giggles. My brother-in-law was wandering through the aisles at the Waltham Abbey Tescos, and who does he see? None other than our Russian no-paced smiling destroyer of Liverpool, Roman Pavlyuchenko. A regular fixture there apparently as he's still house hunting and thus currently residing at the Marriott.

Maybe someone can shed some light on how 'Roman' is actually phonetically pronounced in English, as my brother-in-law called out his name twice to no avail, until Pav finally turned round realising someone was obviously attempting to attract his attention.

Doubt he understood a word, but hands were shaken and a 'good luck, happy to have you at Spurs' exchange took place with the Russkie smiling and nodding. One of the counter-girls told my brother-in-law this was the first time she had seen him shopping there without his interpretor. Looks like he's venturing out all on his own now. Bless.

And what was our (probably) £40,000 a week striker shopping for? A £20 Tesco's DVD player. That's almost forgiveable considering his current living arrangements.

The Louis Vuitton man-bag, however, is not.

Challenge Spurs™ - Another day, another win

Challenge Spurs™ Series

Game 04 v (A) Manchester City
2-1 win, 3 points
Total points: 12
Position: 16th
'Out of the bottom three'

It was meant to be tricky. Bolton, Arsenal, Liverpool and City. Four daunting games for a sorry Spurs team with no confidence, direction or sense of balance. Yet Harry Redknapp's honeymoon period seems to be going longer than a groom on a triple dose of Viagra. Four games, 10 points. Just two points dropped.

Modric given the freedom to express himself, tucked behind the front man but roaming all over the shop. Bent re-discovering his goal-scoring form. He suddenly looks a bit good. Humble pie all round?

So Spurs, a proper team now, keeping possession and playing with confidence. Coming back from one down to win - away. Its dizzying stuff. Manchester City, consistently inconsistent. Hughes blaming the ref and the wet ground, otherwise they would have won comfortably. Keep on believing Sparky, just keep on believing.

Sure, today we were a little casual at times, and with City down to 9 men (thanks to red cards and that wonderful referee) we should have been a little more comfortable going into the final ten minutes. Assou-Ekotto also saw red for us, but arguably not having him on the pitch was an advantage. Maybe we can make it a double and ask Zokora to lunge in with two feet next time. Or perhaps, and I know this is revolutionary in thought, we could look at not starting either of them.

So, great start to the game, tidy football and Modric coming close. Only then to go 1-0 down. Ekotto forgetting his positional responsibilities and Robinho netting after Gomes could only parry the ball. Bit messy.

Fernandes then gets sent off for a second bookable offence, and not long after Bent runs onto the ball after Dunne drunkly allowed the ball to whizz past him. Bent made no mistake, 1-1. The second was created by the returning Jenas, chesting the ball and laying it off for Bent (all from an inital Huddlestone pass). Bent brace. Glory! Dunn then sent off for taking Bent down (who was clean through) then Ekotto picked up a red card for a clumsy foul on Zabaleta.

For animated picture footage, just watch MoTD2 for the obligatory 2 minute Spurs footage and analyisis.

I'm not going to put on my '6th spot isn't that far away' hat on just yet. Any club sitting between 20th and 5th spot can get into Europe or be relegated. Exciting stuff. Lose next week, and we could be bottom again. Win, and it wil be our best run of league form since quite a while. So onwards to the next four games of the Dirty Dozen run of fixtures:

(A) Fulham - Hoping for 3
(H) Blackburn - Hoping for 3
(H) Everton - Possible draw, thus 1
(A) West Ham United - Hoping for 3

Followed by Man Utd (then Newcastle, Fulham again, then WBA). There's room for a lickle defeat somewhere in amongst those games. Just the one mind. It's looking like a festive happy-go lucky Christmas for the Spurs.

Oh, and no Gareth Bale today either. No Bale = Prem win.

The magic of tomato ketchup

Harry re-introduces it to the canteen and we go from scoring 12 goals in 12 games to notching up 12 in just 4. And if that doesn't prove the genius that is Redknapp, then asking Roman Pavlyuchenko, via his translator, to just 'Fucking runabout' (which resulted eventually in a last gasp goal against Liverpool) must surely deserve a sing-a-along.

All we need now is the re-introduction of a little mayo, and we'll be climbing that table in no time.

WE'RE GONNA WIN THE LEAGUE!

Challenge Spurs™ - Citeh Away

Game 04 v (A) Man City
Total points: 9
Position: 20th
2 points from safety

Like a 45 year old porn star making her 8th comeback, the Premier League is wide open. Even if Redknapp suffers his first defeat as Spurs manager, the doom and gloom of 3 weeks ago wont be able to muster the strength to rear its ugly head in our direction. We are just 6 points from 7th spot. Now steady on, I'm not waving my Barcelona shirt above my head and whistling the theme from the Champions League. I'm not even going to talk about the possibilities of igniting UEFA Cup qualification from a league position. I'm simply illustrating the fact that as shit as we've been this season, up to the Ramos sacking, we are not superglued to the bottom three. And even the club in 7th place will be looking over her shoulder if results go wrong. Entertainment made in England.

I doubt we can go the full Dirty Dozen fixtures unbeaten, but I'm willing to bet my soul we will be nowhere near the bottom come January. Mid-table will do. Home games will be where we pick up the majority if not all the three-points, so draws away will also do fine. Confidence off and on the pitch best served with a Spanish omelette of despair, just for reminders.

So, with City away on Sunday, anything must just happen. I'm sure it will be a goal-fest. They will no doubt attack attack attack and regardless of their poor form generally over the past few games, they might accept a Gomes flap or two. And as for us, we'll be up for it. This is still the potential banana skin, IMO.

Prediction: 2-2

that was the week that almost is

Not much blogging this week due to a family bereavement. Will be back daily next week. Steady on the open bus parade.

As for Spurs, been another eventful week (although we still got the weekend bit to go and mess it up for us).

4-0 at home in Europe. Yes, the opposition was arguably a bit pony - but the swagger was back. Some very decent tidy football, great in possession and movement and Darren Bent all smiles with a sweet hat trick thanks to the involvement of the slow-brooding beast that is Tommy Huddlestone (who also got on the score sheet with a tasty volley). Modric did well against his old team mates and apart from Hutton (who looks out of sorts) everyone seemed to enjoy the evening. Even Gomes, who decided this would be the night to keep a clean sheet.

Bostock made his debut and no doubt we'll be seeing more of him through out the season. Looks assured and has quite a shot on him. Let's try and not fuck up his career, right?

In other news, ENIC (that's Levy to you and me) bought another 2.8 million worth of shares in THFC lifting their stake in the club to 71%. Apparently works out to around 85.5% ownership of the fully diluted share capital. I suppose news that we only paid Ramos £1.7M (£2.5M including Poyet and co's severance pay) has allowed a bit of a pre-Xmas spending spree for Daniel. Don't go spending it all! Apparently there's a little Russian who play for Zenit who wants to come to Spurs.

Another twist in this summers epic saga. Arshavin apparently is a bit angry. He is gutted the transfer to Spurs never happened and has to endure digs from team mates (and Dick Advocatt, believe it or not) after every Spurs match. Although arguably what they possibly could have been saying when Ramos was manager is anyone's guess.

"Hey Andrie, you Champions League mug. You are here instead of being bottom of the Premiership! Ha ha in your face"

Riiiiiight. Regardless, he has told the media that after his deal fell through, everyone took an interest and look out for our results. However, you want to be a little anal retentive about it, he doesn't actually say he wants to come here now. Just that his team mates are taking the piss out of the fact that he never joined us (these Russians have got piss taking all wrong).

Let's remember a month ago, he was too good to join us. And now, he wish he had. Footballer, hey?

Moving from on the pitch to off it. Joe Jordan has left Pompey, so expect him at WHL soonish. Along with Sir Les of Ferdinand who will join the coaching the staff to help out the strikers. Don't mind Les at all. Proper Spurs fan who loves the club, so having him out on the training field is a good move. Still don't know or understand why Sherwood is there. As for Jordan, I don't mind him. If he does sign on, then that's ok with me.

LOL @ the Premiership

Spurs. Worst start to a season in our history (at least Since the Titanic Sank©) and still bottom yet the Premiership finds itself with 14 clubs separated by a mere 6 points - 6 points from 7th place having just won 2 games all season.

Fans/the media alike have been citing us and Newcastle amongst one or two others as being in a dogfight, but if you take a quick gander, anyone who lacks form over the next 6 games will plummet. And it may well be the case that come Christmas, there maybe several clubs swapping places at the bottom faster than you can say 'three points' with no apparent certainty who might go down.

It's a bit zany, innit?

Challenge Spurs™ - Last gasp robbery

Challenge Spurs™ Series

Game 03 v (H) Liverpool
2-1 win, 3 points
Total points: 9
Position: 18th
2 points from safety

For a good 60 minutes I was miserable. Cold, wet and frustrated. I doubt nobody will argue the fact that Liverpool are pretty great in possession. Whereas all we could manage was Gomes passing the ball to BAE and BAE passing it back to him. It was just turning out to be one of those games. We were not particularly bad, we just never got going and Liverpool did their very best to make sure we never came anywhere close to it. They dominated the match and could have had a bundle of goals.

It started well for them 3 minutes in with Kuyt smashing the ball in from a Robbie Keane lay-off after some lame defending on our part and they continued in the same vein, almost scoring 4 or 5 times.

I'm sure I wasn't the only one in the ground getting a bit of an itchy feeling that the longer the game went on the better the chance we had of getting something out of it - just because of that ominous feeling that the Reds were a little wasteful.

Harry took off the only two left-footers in the side (BAE and O'Hara) and brought on Hutton and Pavlyuchenko. Although taking off BAE wasn't something I'd argue about considering how dire he was.

As we entered the last half an hour, Spurs began to push a little more forward. More so than the opening 60 minutes. And Liverpool, having removed Keane, began to falter a little. Superb, slick passing - but little in the way of testing Gomes. And when Gomes was tested, he did well (as opposed to his usual theatrics like his pass to nobody that found Keane who played it to Gerrard who hit the top of the bar).

We then got our bit of luck in the form of Jamie Carragher. 3rd goal for Spurs this. Twenty minutes left, and everyone was pretty chuffed. With Stoke beating Arsenal (ha!) and Wigan picking up all points at Pompey, taking all three points suddenly became a possibility, more so out of desperation not to be too far adrift from the safety of 17th place. If Liverpool weren't gonna score a second, then why not us?

And Pav should have made it 2 but somehow managed to blaze it over. But not to worry. Cue the 91st minute and a strike by Bentley that was saved by Reina but not held, allowing Bent to cut the ball back to Pav, who this time slotted it in.

Cue pandemonium in the stands. DVD already in the Spurs shop.

Lucky? Yeah, sure. Reina, was almost as average as Gomes was in parts today. Its usually Liverpool doing this to other teams. I'm more than fucking happy to see us be bossed about for the majority of the game but still win.....and against one of the Cartels. Make that 5 points out of a possible 9 against Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool. That's a pretty tasty stat. For a change.

And as for the Challenge Spurs™ 'Dirty Dozen'. Spurs are making a mockery of my original predictions. 7 points from 9 games - 2 points dropped out of 3 games. Off the bottom, 2 points from safety.

We are obviously still not on the top of our game, but anyone expecting so or criticising our 'luck' is forgetting the misery of the games prior to Harry's arrival. The players have pulled themselves out of a hole. Still more work to be done, but suddenly all talk of going down is secondary to our revival and White Hart Lane has finally rediscovered a bit of personality again.

The fans were in great voice (after we made it 1-1, we woke up). Thankfully the applause for Keane was louder than the boos. The celebrations for Pav's goal were a combination of relief and a bit of 'FUCKING COME ON' which has been a long time coming.

Special mentions to Corluka (at left-back in the second half), Modric who suddenly isn't easy to knock off the ball and has an uncanny ability to receive it and play it off in the tightest of spaces....and as for Pav - he may not be Berbatov, but at least he smiles and celebrates properly. Something Berba didn't quite manager for us against a Top 4 club in the Prem.

And also, well done 'arry. Good half time team talk. Great substitutions. We struggled for a while to pass the ball with decent possession and push forward with it.

Our players persevered. And how refreshing to see Spurs going for it in the final 10 rather than sitting back like Christ knows how many times in the past.

Top (unbeaten since March in the Prem and unbeaten all season) versus bottom (rejuvenated and riding their luck). Three points. Perfect day.

Roll on Citeh.

P.S. Bale doesn't play: We win. EXORCISE HIM.

Paul Merson

How wonderfully bitter and twisted some people can people, claiming that Lampard's cross-come-goal was superior to Bentleys, which, according to Merson, was a hit and hope effort and wasn't all that great.

Keep on mouthing off you horrid little man. Had Fabregas scored that we'd never hear the end of it, about how brilliant the technique was and how he spotted the keeper off his line and aimed for the back of the net.

Which is exactly what Bentley did, you shit-eyed twat.

The names Bond. Kevin Bond

New assistant, haven't said welcome yet. So, welcome Kevin Bond.

But the announcement that Sherwood is on his way (part-time) in a capacity that he doesn't even know yet, is some what worrying. I've given my reasons on this already in a previous blog. The bloke has spent his time (since leaving Spurs as a player) slagging us off and churning out anti-Spurs bullshit on that bullshit radio station. Yet another prime example of how fickle and two-faced people in the game are.

He's a shit pundit so hopefully Harry is just after someone to wash the players boots.