Glory Glory Tottenham Hotspur?

There have been times when Tottenham Hotspur’s trajectory has been similar to that of the BBC’s bloated malcontent Alan Partridge; stumbling around reminding people of past glories, attempting to convince of a brighter future, almost reaching it but then sinking back again into mediocrity. But times may be changing down the Seven Sisters Road and while nobody believed Alan would ever again reach his previous dizzying heights, the media have begun to latch onto the idea that Tottenham may well be on the brink of something great. We’ve seen the typical headlines over the past couple of weeks heralding their title credentials, reaching a peak after the victory over Everton and then slightly deflating after this weekend’s draw with Wolves. So, is it realistic to even talk about Tottenham in relation to the title?

Firstly, purely mathematically, Tottenham are in the title race. They travel to Manchester City on Sunday and host Manchester United at the beginning of March.  Positive results in just these two games would dramatically change the lay of the land. The question is not can they mount a sustained challenge. It is will they? 

Looking at the squad and particularly the first eleven Tottenham haven’t looked this strong in over 25 years. The balance of a midfield comprising Bale, Modric, Parker and Lennon is the envy of many a manger and player alike. Parker has added a puritanical work ethic, harrying opposition in position, making lunging tackles and committing niggling fouls that disrupt oncoming attacks. Sandro, with his telescopic legs and intuitive positioning can add future solidity to the unit should it be needed. Modric has continued his deft midfield displays, nimbly ducking between bodies like a pick pocket working the Christmas crowds - a WD-40 footballer who can get the gears moving, coxing and inviting his team mates into positions where they can cause real damage. Lennon has benefited from having Adebayor to link with and Bale is getting better at positioning himself where he can both cause damage and elude the tight marking of a well drilled right back / right winger partnership.

The greatest improvement Tottenham have made this season has been with the introduction of Adebayor. While many will claim that he lacks the clinical finishing to be a prolific striker he has netted nine times in the Premier League and created seven more and it is in the role of the aforementioned link man that he has been a crucial element in Tottenham’s rise. Anyone who can remember the often abject performances of Crouch and Pavlyuchenko last season will testify that the way Adebayor works the channels, pushed the ball into space and brings the midfield into the attack is a huge improvement on what was happening last season – Pavlyuchenko often displaying the first touch of a man with a sever degenerative nerve disease and Crouch’s complete inability to pass to on rushing team mates. 

With Adebayor filling the role of the lone striker, Van der Vaart has been allowed to flourish in the free role between midfield and attack, pulling the strings and attempting reverse passes and through balls to get his quicker team mates behind the defensive line. It is also to be noted that Defoe, recognising his poor form spent the summer doing conditioning training with a former Arsenal trainer in the south of France in an attempt to model himself into someone who can hold up the ball despite his small stature. In this he has been successful and the goals have come though his chances have been limited. 

All Tottenham’s attacking prowess would be for nought if it wasn’t for the solid foundations that Redknapp as laid. Brad Friedel has filled the defence with a confidence that the more talented but erratic Gomes never could. King has played for 921 minutes in the league this season, more than twice the match time he managed in the 2010/11 season. Kaboul is growing into the player his physical attributes have always suggested he could be and with Walker returning from successful loan spells at QPR and Aston Villa there is pace on the right to compliment Assou-Ekotto’s verve on the left. With Dawson and Gallas pushing for inclusion there is a depth at the back that has helped Tottenham grind out results, such as the 1-0 victory over West Brom, which was previously a point of weakness. 

Injury is always the cloak of doom that can fall on a player or team at any moment, enveloping them in a season ending dread. Significant injuries to Adebayor or Bale would severely impact on the team aesthetic and an extensive injury list would hamper any squads’ performance in the league. As such there is little use in supposing the worst for Tottenham, currently they have the means.

Still, title contenders are more than the sum of their respective parts. This is the reason that Chelsea have struggled to maintain a consistency in the league that has been Manchester United’s calling card for the last two decades. For all the money, for all the talent you possess, winning is a hard won habit. This mental strength will be the real barometer of success. Should either Manchester City or Tottenham triumph this season then they will have to display the cool, clinical focus that Sir Alex Ferguson seems to imbue his teams with. City will bare the greater weight of expectancy; there is a sense that this is their year, the year when the endless draws that cost Mark Hughes his job are forgotten, the year the reserved football gave way to exuberance and goals in abundance. But if it is their year, then it is theirs to loose too. This is now the time for the real contenders to show their metal. Nobody can know how Tottenham will react in the coming months, when the papers talk and mind games fill silences with whispers. It will be necessary for Harry Redknapp to use his much fabled man management skills if the doubt creeps in, or complacency takes root.

 

Redknapp’s court case and a tax evasion charge creates an unusual dimension to this question, like two moons confusing the tides making it difficult to confidently predict where Tottenham will be or who even will be at the helm come the end of the season. There is an injunction against reporting about the case so it is anybody’s guess as to the real likelihood of Redknapp facing time behind bars. What can be discussed is the effect the time of the case will have on the team. There are plenty that think this distraction could derail Tottenham’s season, siphoning focus from the league into the labyrinths of tax law Redknapp will be attempting to escape. However there is another school of thought that reasons that the court case could prove to be a boon for the team, however unconventional. Should Tottenham beat City at the Etihad Redknapp will be in court the very next morning. What better way to defuse the hyperbolic headlines than an even better story to distract journalists? If the worst happens and Redknapp goes down it will be intriguing to see how the team react. It certainly adds spice to an already exciting season.

Should Tottenham perform with the same efficiency in the second half of the season that they displayed in the first, they will be right up there at the time of reckoning. We will certainly know more once the dust settles on Sunday’s action. With Manchester City hosting Tottenham and Arsenal entertaining Manchester United this could be a defining day in the title race. Manchester City will be looking to assert their dominance in the same fashion they did in Augusts 5-1 demolition. This time, however, it is City who’s numbers are depleted, the absence of Kompany and Yaya Toure significantly weakening the spine of the team while Tottenham’s playing staff are carried on a surge of good results.

The league will not be won this weekend, but for Tottenham the battle is as much in their hearts and minds now. Neither they nor City have gone the full course. Recent years have seen Liverpool and Arsenal mount challenges only to taper away at the close. One thing is for sure though, for Tottenham these are new and exciting times, echoes to former glories no longer ring quite as hollow and the league can be viewed with excitement and hope.  

~Ed

Devils & Dust

So, Manchester United then. It's been a funny old season so far for the reigning champions, flitting as they have between dazzling attacking prowess and unfocused, unsightly fumbling. Some things remain sacred, of course – their unrelinquishing position in the Premier League top two, renewed spats with Liverpool and Manchester City, the continued poise and finesse of Paul Sch... Ah yes, Scholes, the apparent answer – in the short-term at least – to Sir Alex Ferguson’s burgeoning midfield crisis (I made a bet with myself that I could make it to the third paragraph without using the 'c' word. I owe me a tenner).

Last weekend’s FA Cup derby saw Scholes become subject of the most unlikely Sunday reanimation since that very first Easter, the rambunctious midfielder brushing seven months worth of dust from his Puma King’s (probably) to reintroduce himself to the professional game. Scholes’ class won’t have vanished since May; the worry is more about what sort of United team he is stepping back into. For the first time since Roy Keane was jettisoned from the Theatre of Dreams amidst rumours of x-rated TV outbursts (and against a context of rival upward mobility) the manager is facing some hefty questions regarding the ultimate direction of his team.

For approaching twenty years now United have been to the English game what an Adele single is to daytime radio – omnipresent, overpowering and, to those supporters donning rival colours, decidedly disliked. Since the mid-90s, Scholes has been at the heart of United’s domination, his place in the pantheon of United greats so assured that he has his very own selection box of stock phrases and clichés from which fitting description can be picked. Just as George Best before him ('supremely talented', 'an eye for the ladies’, ‘drank it all away') could be immortalised in a handful of oft-repeated epithets, so Scholes' talent, nee his career, will forever be communicated to the uninitiated via similar sound bites. For you see, Scholes, despite 'being wasted on the left for England' and 'never learning to tackle’, was arguably 'the most talented British player of his generation', even if away from the field he was 'a bit shy and, er, retiring'. What else? Well he had a knack for getting himself in the box and will be forever remembered for a couple of complete screamers against Middlesbrough and Bradford, but he also kept possession with great intelligence, and it is largely for this reason that Sir Alex will be glad to welcome him back into the fold.

Much like his side this term, Scholes was/is a player of contradictions. He barely troubled an interviewer throughout his entire career, appearing modest to the point of introversion, yet he could snap into a tackle with unbelievable venom. For a player of such guile and ingenuity, he didn't half make some stupid challenges. All fair enough, of course – as with most of the greats, the rough must be taken with the smooth, like Diego Maradonna's penchant for Columbian exports or Zinedine Zidane's dislike of sister jokes.

There are other reasons why Ferguson will be thrilled to have him back in the squad. He may feel that Scholes can re-establish a bond between the current squad and a time when everyone knew what United were about. This season we’re not so sure, and so the question must be asked: who are the real United? Are they the one that knocked three goals past their arch (title) rivals on Sunday, or the one that staggered about St James' Park ten days ago like a drunk waiting for the last tube? Are they the insatiable animal that knocked 14 goals past Tottenham, Chelsea and Arsenal in the space of 270 pulsating, late summer minutes, or are they the meek, wounded mutt that limped out of the Champions League with barely a whimper? Well, perhaps they are neither. Or possibly both. Reader, I'm confused.

As I'm sure you are too, for this season United have been a perplexing amalgam of beauty and befuddlement. Against a vibrant Newcastle they looked a side shorn of invention, lacking in drive, poise and, perhaps crucially, leadership, and yet, and yet. Four days later, they headed to the Etihad away dressing room after 45 minutes clutching a three goal lead and scenting blood. And then came… what? The hiccups? Nerves? The classic 'the-game’s-already-won syndrome'? Whichever it was, the truth is that no such heebie-jeebies would have been tolerated by Ferguson in days of yore. He simply wouldn't have permitted such carelessness; those terms just wouldn’t have existed within the club’s collective vocabulary. In truth, the game was essentially United’s season so far in a nutshell. For all the hand-wringing over Vincent Kompany's possible-deserved, possibly-not dismissal, United had taken the lead with the kind of blink-and-you'll-miss-it counter which they patented years ago. And despite City being unable to keep bad Kompany, you must wonder exactly how many teams would have pressed home their man advantage quite so ruthlessly. The only team to exploit numerical inequalities this season with such deadly focus has been City. Against United.

In their defence, you could read United's second half wobble as merely 'one of those things', or to conclude that City's impressive almost-comeback was a product of that very particular murmuring at the heart of so many glorious FA Cup ties; an intangible cocktail of history, guts and tossed-out rulebooks. For United, it could have all been so much more comfortable had the continually-impressive Danny Welbeck steered in Antonio Valencia’s low cross minutes before the interval. The difference, psychologically, could have been telling for both teams – to come back from three down is rare but do-able; from four is a collectors item indeed. The claim made against AC Milan, when 3-0 to the good against Liverpool at the break in Istanbul in 2005, was that they thought the game was already won. Liverpool had nothing to lose; Milan, conversely, had it all to throw away and eventually did just that. Such is the inherent, precarious peril of the three-nil lead; such is the illogical psychosis ingrained in the very nerve and sinew of football.

It’s rare for United fall foul to such quirks, but fall foul they very nearly did. At various points this season, not least in Europe, United’s ball-retention has been sloppy, the engine room lacking fire and the necessary man power to stoke the coals. Scholes’ cameo, despite erring for City’s second goal, came with a 97% pass completion rate. Much of this problem may be down to alterations not just in personnel, but also in style. Last season United were often sensible and unadventurous where in the past they went for broke, often in defiance of sense itself. The United of 2010/11 was often compact and functional, regaining the title in a less than vintage year for the top sides and reaching the Champions League final without conceding a goal on the road. The additions this season of Welbeck, Tom Cleverley and Ashley Young signalled a move towards a more virile and expansive approach, which paid dividends early on but has stalled worryingly of late.

There remain, inescapably, doubts about Ferguson himself. It has been noted recently by those in the know that the infamous hairdryer has been more or less switched off, stowed away in some memory box in the bowels of Old Trafford along with the boot he aimed at Beckham and the battering ram he took to Lee Sharpe's front door. Folk claim he’s gone soft, but his desire for a challenge seems to me to remain undiluted. Just last season he met Wayne Rooney's public letter of resignation with his most full and frank press conference ever, responding to questions of loyalty, ambition and power-shifts head-on, engaging the want-away Shrek-a-like in a remarkably ballsy game of chicken. It ultimately proved successful – Rooney signed on again and United took a record 19th league crown. If Ferguson's signature move is the mind game, then this proved his faculties to be as sharp as ever. In short, he still appears to be up for a scrap.

Perhaps the thing most questioned amongst the United faithful is their manager’s judgement when it comes to team selection. We've seen on numerous occasions the zippy Valencia stationed at right-back with Michael Carrick alongside due to defensive injuries. Time was Ferguson would have wasted little time in throwing a young buck into the domestic fray, something Scholes knows better than most. One is therefore left wondering what this policy means for talents such as the much-touted but little-used Paul Pogba. Cleverley has been heralded as potentially the first great home-grown future hero since the Class of '92, but this alone speaks of another issue. Whilst Chelsea have John Terry and Liverpool likewise Steven Gerrard, and although the severely under-rated Darren Fletcher has gone on to become a pivotal figure in both Ferguson's and a succession of Scotland manager's plans, the club hasn't produced a true local icon of it's own since the mid-nineties. 

I could of course get into the multitudinous issues surrounding the infrastructure at United, but I was hoping to set aside five minutes of this lifetime to get married and have kids. The key thing to remember is that perspective is often everything, not least when it comes to football. United have had dire luck with injuries, and the side Ferguson is in the midst of constructing sits three points off the top of the league having just defeated the title favourites on their own patch. The real shadow which lurks over United’s season is that Champion's League exit. Again, a little panoramic viewing might be in order. In 2005 United finished bottom of a group comprised of Villareal, Benfica and Lille. Two seasons later they were European champions.

Scholes' decision to come out of retirement echoes his boss’ own determination to continually push against the ever-ticking arms of time, a battle which cannot last forever. Ferguson's best sides undoubtedly come and go in cycles and he is now building what will surely be the final team of his reign. Whether old man time will allow him the chance to see it through to a successful end is, in a game defined equally by questions and egos, the biggest poser of them all.

~ Matt