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It was 1985, I was 7 years old and weeks before I had been told by my new friends in Plymouth (having moved from Bristol) that Bristol Rovers were rubbish (kids are cruel) and not in the First Division. I had to choose another team! Out came a Panini sticker album and I was told to open it up randomly and the team I landed on would be the team I supported. At the time it seemed like a good idea.
Of course that team was Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, I embraced it and a few weeks later whilst flicking through the channels I came across The Big Match live, there they were, the bright white shirts and navy shorts of MY team. They were playing Manchester United, it didn’t matter I was 7 and transfixed by that white shirt.
At that time “the Spurs” were cemented in the “big five” of English football, had won the 4th most honours (in the professional era) and held the second highest attendance figures of all time in England behind Manchester United and only just!
Roll on 30 years and of course football has changed immeasurably, Sky and the Billionaire age have distorted the football scene all over Europe. What hasn’t changed is the magnificent support that Spurs still garner from the 4 corners of the globe, in England alone we are one of only 5 clubs to have over 1 Million supporters, our away support “everywhere we go” (couldn’t resist) is immense and seen by our peers as being the best in the country…..so what has happened to our Spurs.
For many years now I have championed Daniel Levy, as a business man he is uniquely brilliant and as a custodian of Tottenham Hotspur he has made sure we carry no debt and compete around the top 4/5/6 of the league for a while now, however my opinion has changed. If you look on twitter it would seem anyone that dare change their opinion of something is an alien, in truth it’s a normal rational & human thing today, take in facts, form an opinion and then if someone or something changes and if you are genuine, your opinion should follow suit.
When I look at Spurs I still see a massive club, I still see huge support across the globe, I still see us in the top 15 (*13th) biggest turnovers in Europe. All the clubs above us have bigger stadia and all have competed in the Champions League year on year compared to our meagre one season. Far from show how small we are this shows how big we actually could be. For me Tottenham Hotspur is the true definition of a sleeping giant and it is now clear to me we are being held back. In an amazing new age where we have supporters clubs springing up all over the world, notably in America, it saddens me that our new support (I include young British kids too) see Spurs as a club that should be grateful to finish in the top 6, that just getting to a Cup Final is progress and that winning however you do it is the be all and end all. It is not.
This is a unique football club, a bed rock of families all over the country, support amongst Spurs fans is literally handed down from generation to generation, along with that is the deep rooted belief we have to win with style. We have had little success recently yet our fan base has not diminished, it is loyal. The first British club to win a European trophy, the first club this century to win the “double”, the only non league club to ever win the FA Cup…unique. This leads me on nicely to our lack of trophies. It has now been 24 years since we last won the FA Cup, that year upon claiming the trophy, we won it for the then record 8th time. In the years that followed we have seen Alan Sugar shrink the size of White Hart Lane (diminishing our revenue streams) and fail to act upon planning permission to increase the capacity, his reign garnered one League Cup, I was there, men were reduced to tears it had been so long and meant so much. Sugar held us back, set us back, diminished our supporter’s belief and walked away.
Since Mr Sugar we have had the aforementioned Mr Levy, undoubtedly things have been better, we have at least competed at the top end of the table and made an appearance in the Champions League under his tenure. However the facts remain the same, we have won a single League Cup in his reign, the Stadium is still one of the smallest in the Premier League and our loyal fans are still turning up week on week paying some of the highest ticket prices in the country. It seems as if we are just doing enough for him to be happy. That doesn’t mean we should be!
This is a massive football club that deserves more from its custodians, that deserves to at least challenge for major honours and deserves for its hugely loyal and over paying fan base to be rewarded with at the very least ambition! For me the lack of ambition from our owner is being passed on to our fans like a disease, especially our new ones. I have lost count of the times I have tried to explain that Tottenham have to play a certain way that the last 20 years should not diminish the previous 113. This club is about playing football in the right way, with style and with flair and about competing for honours. Levy has held us back, set us back, diminished our supporter’s belief and is still here. This club is not perceived as big (even by some of our own support) because it is being strangled, not because all the ingredients are not there. They are.
Just because our owner has a lack of ambition and is happy with us ticking over doesn’t mean we are no longer a big club. Just because our owners have not pushed us to compete or injected the right amount of finance it doesn’t mean we are no longer a big club. Just because we do not have a billionaire that buys players for obscene amounts of money it does not mean we are no longer a big club. Tottenham Hotspur is bigger than all of us, but whilst we are here and we are supporting it we owe it something, we owe it to never be allowed to just turn into a run of the mill club, we owe it to never be allowed to lack the ambition to compete for honours and above all we owe it to ourselves, the people that pay those extortionate ticket prices to demand that our club is ran to our expectations and that if Daniel Levy cannot fulfil them then we should demand he finds someone that can. It is OUR club after all, a true sleeping giant.
Come on you Spurs.
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At last someone who has banged the nail on the head on so many points! The writer i am sure is somewhat younger than me? as i date back to my first game at whl in the late 60s and have only missed three homes in the last thirty five years.. but for me it should not be up for debate about the size of our club, it is only due to how the clubs custodians from scholar, through to Sugar and enic have let the fans down, so much so as you point out that younger fans and those maybe into their 30s perceive our club as a medium sized player, who should be grateful for what we have.
ReplyDeleteI grew up following a big club, with a large capacity stadium, who always played in front of large crowds, playing a unique brand of football.
I am sure many fans know very little about our history? Do many realise we have the 4th largest average home attendances in history and infact have only just been taken over by the goons that after over ten years with a 60k capacity stadium.
This club of ours is the only real sleeping giant in the country.. i dont listen to fans who say we will never fill a 60k stadium, because with a small amount of success we will fill it, our history says so.. we just need owners with that vision to take us to the promised land.
Time for many to have a history lesson in our club.. THFC should be massive, just let down by owners who see £s and probably dont know or want to know what has gone before?
what a great read, written with passion & belief. I have & will be spurs all my life, for 6 decades I have followed the one true love of my life. I've seen the ups & downs, great win's, total capitulations & never doubted that we are the greatest team with the best support in the world. we are a sleeping giant but what or who will wake us from this long slumber? Harry Kane, NDP or new owners? probably a combination of all three. It is said that our lord levy is a great business man, a tough negotiator but he got the bale money very wrong, it would seem he can look after the pennies but the pounds are over his head, alas we all have our limits, someone will always want to buy spurs, whether for better or worse I don't know but to stay the same, to stay asleep is not the answer. to settle for 5th to 7th and say it's ok, it's our place our limit, is neither the answer nor the Tottenham way. selling our best players just for profits sake will not make the giant jump out of bed & come out fighting, you just don't get out of bed when you have sold your dreams, hopes and sole. change creates opportunity, opportunity for successes and a chance to wake the giant.
ReplyDeletep.s. it was last century that we did the double.
Three very big cheers for a blogger for once not buying into the 'we're not really a big club, so what are you moaning about?' rubbish peddled by so many of the Levy apologists. Until very recently we were the best supported London club, and well within my lifetime we had higher gates than Man U, but many so-called fans are determined to judge ENIC/Levy only against the bad days of the Sugar era, rather than the great days of the previous forty years. The present is pretty gloomy, and the future under a dud like Pochettino doesn't look much better, but please don't rewrite our glorious past - it seems to be all we've got!
ReplyDeletewe are the last true sleeping giant. my worry is that whilst the giant sleeps the kids, our future life blood go looking for reflected glory. I'm lucky in my work as it takes me all over the world so I get to see the youth of the world unfortunately they all seem to be donned in red or blue the only white you see is Madrid, ok team but not the mighty spurs. for the last 25 years I have made a point of buying and giving away as many spurs kits as I can afford, to those who can't, whilst I know they appreciate the clothing they always ask for other teams shirts and my usual half hour speech on who we are, our great history & why they should support spurs does now tend to fall on deaf ears. this won't stop me, I'll just shorten the speech. when I get back to England I see the same, red or blue but very little white. at away games you, like I must see kids in abundance, go to palace & they are all 12 years old, northern teams could fill WHL with their youth. we need to wake the giant now or who will fill the "new heart lane". in the next 15/20 years when the likes of myself are long gone, dead & buried who will take my place? converts from red & blue or true lilywhites through & through. We are in real danger of loosing whole generations of fans.
ReplyDeleteThe truth is out . (but half of it). Beautifully written, passionate and true. Am 62 and I became a fan in the first double when I saw the photo in a Greek newspaper, This is the team I said . Al my friends now call me a 'loser' because I believe in 'lost causes'. I blame noone not the Sugars and the Levy's but what they represent , a system that puts profits above people, ideas, ideals, visions and humble aspirations. Bale and Berba did not leave Spurs because they wanted trophies , they needed extra money , Berba to feed Bulgarian kids who starve, and Bale to buy a Bentley to show his working class friends. I love them and will love them forever for the moments of magic. SPURS WILL RESURECT LIKE THE PROPHETS OF THE CENTURIES!!!!!!!! Who NEVER DIED!!!!!!
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