There is always a frisson of excitement about the North London Derby, and this years encounter was not going to disappoint. The Red Scum have had a terrible start to the season, not just in terms of results & injuries, but the loss of Fibreglass" & Nasri has destroyed the heart of the Arsenal machine and the replacements are either just not up to the job, or have yet to gel properly. Either way, it's been many a year since Tottenham went on to a derby with Arsenal as the favourites, and even with the favourite tag, you can never be too confident as a Spurs fan.
Tottenham got off to the now regular flying start, taking the game straight to the Arsenal with some good initial forays through what was looking like a fragile & un-coordinated defence. Six minutes in, a mistake from Song gifted the ball to Adebayor, whose neat through pass put Parker one-on-one with the keeper, only for Scotty to fire the ball directly at Szczesny and the ball to roll harmlessly wide.
Arsenal extra midfielder started to put their foot on the ball and wrestled the possession stats away from Spurs for large parts of the first half, but no matter how much possession they had, they failed to anything meaningful with it. On the other hand, when Spurs did get the ball, every attack looked dangerous, and it was only a handful of quality saves from Szczesny that kept the Scum in the game. Arsenals only real chance of the first half came from a pulled shot from Gervinho that really should have at least hit the target.
10 minutes later, Tottenham punished the meandering Arsenal with a great move through the heart of their weak defence. Adebayor brought the ball forward in to the Arsenal half while Defoe made a run to the right dragging the central defensive pairing with him, leaving Van der Vaart running through on the left. Adebayor found VdV with a delightfully floated cross ball, that the striker controlled on his chest, (with maybe slight help of his arm....), and bringing the ball down and stabbing it past the diving keeper. Goal.....!
VdV celebrated the goal with some passion, almost as if it were the winner in the World Cup final, but isn't that what we fans like to see when one of our hero's puts one past the Scum. It is always great to go into the half time break one goal to the good, high on elation and hope for the second half.
Unfortunately, it was only six minutes into the second half when Song cruised easily to the byline and crossed low & hard for Ramsey, who had done bugger all up until that point in the game, made a late run into the box to poke the ball home. There has been a lot of finger-point towards VdV for not tracking back to stop the cross, but it is unrealistic to think that the support striker would have been able to do anything about it. I question who was tracking Ramsey's run in to the box...?
The goal seemed to spark Spurs back in to action, and we very nearly got a goal back almost immediately when Bale eased down the left and released Adebayor inside the area, whose shot was saved with another excellent save from Szczesny, who was single handily keeping the 'Arse' in the game.
Harry decided to stiffen up the midfield with the introduction of Sandro for the now tiring Van der Vaart, who left the pitch to a rapturous applause from the Spurs faithful. When Sandro came on, and in combination with Scotty Parker who was having a great game, he set about disrupting the Arsenal midfield and breaking up play. Sandro was instrumental in the second goal when he was given far to much time to cross towards Modric, whose shot cannoned of a defender into the path of Walker, who took one touch and unleashed a rocket of a shot from all of 35 yards. The ball stayed low and fast and swerved wickedly just as it reached Szczesny, leaving the keeper on his arse as the ball whipped past him.
At two-one, we looked well in command and I was confident now that we would either hold this lead or even go on to grab another goal or two, as by now the Scum were broken. Bale came very close to scoring when the cart-horse combination of Mertesacker & Song let the ball bounce over them, allowing Bale to sneak in and only just slide the ball past the post.
Five minutes of extra time could not end quickly enough, and even with Szczesny joining the attack in the final minute, the game was ours.
It was a fine win, that helps push our claim to be top 4 material, after all we have not lost to the Scum for 3 years in the Premier League. In the hot, nervous, high energy atmosphere of White Hart Lane, we played well enough to deserve the game on balance and it showed that we can take a lead and hold on to it. We created by far the best chances in the game and if it had not been for a string of fine saves from Szczesny, we could have had a hatful of goals on the day, and given the Arse a real spanking.
Only one thing left to say.... North London is ours...., North London is ours...., F**k off back to Woolwich, North London is ours....
My player ratings: -
- Friedel - 8.0 - Granddad has added some certainty to our defence. Solid game
- Bale - 7.5 - Doing what Bale does best, scaring defenders & excellent crossing
- Kaboul - 7.5 - Very solid game. Developing an impressive partnership with King
- King - 8.0 - Immense at the back, nothing less than we expect
Walker - Assou-Ekotto - 7.5 - Bennie doing what he does week in, week out
- Parker - 8.5 - Another immense performance. How did we ever do without him...?
- Corluka - 7.0 - Calm head in defence
- Van der Vaart - 7.5 - Did well for the 1000th Tottenham goal, tired later in the game
- Sandro - 7.5 - The Brazilian always makes an impact. Did not disappoint
- Modric - 6.5 - Workman like performance. Not his finest work by far
- Adebayor - 7.5 - Always dangerous, nice link up play for the first goal
Livermore - Defoe - 7.5 - Good all-round performance, unlucky not to score
Quality result! I, like Fi, enjoy the player ratings/comments as well, although think there should be more players with pudding references to accompany the much-maligned Pavlova. Flan der Taart maybe a bit abusive towards arguably the most influential player in the team, but Assou-ECakeo works.
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