So what’s been happening over the summer at Spurs..? The average side – Part 2

Looking back over our pre-season games to date, the best spin I can come up with is that we have neither been very good or very poor. Our pre-season tour of South Africa was its usual ‘artificial’ affair, with more focus on establishing the Tottenham Hotspurs ‘Brand’ in Africa and reaffirming connection with Supersport United, than with quality preparation in the Footballing department.

We played 2 games as part of the ‘VodaCom Challenge’, which were no better than training games, with Harry trying to find his best squad by swapping in & out at least 8 players per match. Even then we managed to lose 1-0 to the Kaiser Chiefs, and scrape 1-1 draw with the Orlando Pirates, which somehow was enough to see us through to the Final of the ‘competition’. We ran out comfortable 3-0 winners over the Orlando Pirates on the night, in a final in which was no better than an average training game with 6 changes made to the starting line-up. I just hope that all that phaffing around was enough for Harry to come up with good idea of the best formation.

On our return to jolly old England, we ran out 5-3 winners against the MK Dons of League One. Even though it was effectively a Spurs XI line-up, we were lucky to come away with the result, according to my ex-wife, (an MK Dons Fan, who knew..?). Not sure if Harry learnt anything from that encounter, even though Kranjcar & Pav made a good cases for more 1^st team action. This match was followed by another Spurs XI (read: 2^nd string) playing against Orient, that turned in a convincing 4-1 win, with a couple of cracking goals from Crouchy. 

The following day the 1^st team went down to the South coast to help the Seagulls celebrate the opening of their new stadium, the crassly named ‘American Express Community Stadium’. Let’s hope that WHL never gets a crap name like that… The game against Brighton & Hove Albion was probably the most useful pre-season game so far, with an almost proper 1^st team line-up, (Friedel (Gomes, 46), Charlie, Daws, Kaboul, BAE; Azza, Jenas, Livermore, Bale; VdV (Defoe, 32), & Pav), coming back from an early goal to win 3-2. Still a little concerning that we managed to let in 2 goals, but it was good to see the boys seal the deal against the Championship Team, and Bale playing so well.

So we have a final pre-season game at the Lane later this week, taking on Athletic Club Bilbao, which looks like it might present us with a real challenge. As a Spurs fan I hope we put out our strongest team and come away with a decent & convincing win to set us up for Everton next weekend. Regardless of the result, I am still left with a sense of ‘Meh..!” about our run up to the new season, but I guess it’s not really any worse than other years….

COYS..!!