Evening.
Eighty three percent of sixteen women who took part in a recent survey said a hard man was good to find. No it was sixteen percent of eighty three year old women found it good when… no, hang on.
83% of you said that provided Mr Sulkypants lives next door that you would take Dimitar Berbatov back.
I am not here to judge. I am but a humble vessel. And I voted the same way too. So I’m worse than complicit. I started it. Well I didn’t really. You know what I mean.
My point is what does this tell you? It tells me that your above average Yid in the street doesn’t harbour a grudge for too long and necessity is still down on Invention’s birth cert as ‘mother’.
What it also raises is the fenced- in nature of our thinking when it comes to solving the whole striker mystery puzzle. Do you think Kenny Dalglish at the very moment when he knew Torres was off was looking for Blistering Bob Keane’s number? Did he wonder if he could get Michael Owen back for one more blast? Not for a nanosecond.
But we seem to constantly be linked with yesterday’s bananas. Scotty Parker’s picture is in a locket Arry wears about his neck. This is a guy that turned us down at least twice before, flopped at Chelsea when they were winning like a cheating Major on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and now is the jewel in the crown of a club that has been nestled in the drop zone all season. But he’s cheap to to feed!
There are exceptions of course. Van der Vaart and Modders to name but both of them. But otherwise we seen to collect these ‘not quite, but maybe’ characters like Pienaar.
It’s a little bit chicken and egg. No hot players, no silverware success and so no hot players. Our existing squad gets it in the ear every other week for not being good enough and nobody any good wants the aggravation of joining a side where they will be the one carrying the others. It’s a self fulfilling revolving door policy™
So what do we do? I see the stadium issue as a distraction quite frankly. The likelihood of the Olympic decision being overturned is ball park zero and the likelihood of the NYPD Blue option amounting to anything this side of 3012 is better than zero, only marginally.
Much talk of Arry having taken us as far as he can, but perhaps some blame needs sprinkling a little higher up the THFC ladder. Have Levy & Co achieved as much as they can given the restraints of their own fiscal strategies?
I’m talking about pounds shillings and pence here. Wages. Because all other revenue streams are surely maxed out. What we sell puts Tom Wait’s Step Right Up to shame.
We’ve characters like Woodgate and King floating around… are they on full pay? Graham Roberts stands more chance of playing this season than Woody. Neither of these guys are getting any younger. Neither of them are making any headway worth anything. The physio room at The Lodge must resemble something out of M*A*S*H. King’s knees are elbows. Look closely – I’m not making it up.
And then there’s the nowhere men. Jen as. [Blimey H, that was a cunningly concealed attack, you waited half the page] Jenas has to go. What is he on weekly? He could be replaced by a life size cardboard cutout of David Hasselhoff and cause less angst.
There are others. Dos *hicsh* Santos, Begbie and I’m tempted to hurl Defoe & Crouchino into the mixer based upon the fact I still think Pav can actually play football.
The club needs to meet the future half way. Trim some of these chancers, up the salary offer to attract one or two players of worth and let’s move on. The first step to a profit is stopping a loss. If Sunderland will pay £5M for Begbie then take it and reinvest.
And if existing players want more – sure – let ’em earn it.But the bumbling about has to stop.
A lot of dead wood here at Spurs now. The wage bill must be silly. Considering Levy is normally so good with money, he seems to be chucking a lot of it away. That money could help re-build WHL to a decent capacity.
e.g. Woodgate: 50,000/wk x 52weeks = 2.6mill
Jenas: 40,000/wk x 52weeks = 2mill
Hutton: 35,000/wk x 52weeks = 1.8mill
Pav 65,000/wk x 52weeks = 3.3mill
Gomes 35,000/wk x 52weeks = 1.8mill
This equals to around 11.5million saving per year, and that is just 5 players who wouldn’t really be missed, and don’t need replacing with others either. That money could easily pay to extend at least one, maybe two of our stands. We all want to stay at the Lane so why not do the old field of dreams ‘build it and they will come’. It’s all about infa-structure. Look at Shalke now, maybe 10 years ago since they moved into that new stadium, they were nothing before, now they can attract big names and are one of the best teams in Europe with the financial stability and infa-structure to stay there.
You’re absolutely right, we wouldn’t miss Gomes or Pav. We certainly wouldn’t need to replace them, or pay similar wages to any worthwhile replacement.
Also, are you these players’ accountant, or have you simply got these numbers from FM?
Repost of my contribution from a couple of days ago……
Lets face it chaps, CL is over for next season unless City & Liverpool both crash & burn between now & the end of the season.
Our aim must be to perform major surgery on the squad so that we qualify via the top 4 next season. ‘Arry is wrong with his often quoted a couple of additions.
We need 2 top class keepers. Gomes splits opinion, I love him but….and yes the defence probably doesn’t fill him with confidence. Cudicini & Pletikosa aren’t capable back up. Get in Shay Given & a back up like Jaaskelainen (OK he may be late 30?s but would probably be happy to sit on the bench).
We need to pension off Ledley & Woody, as hard as it might be, but they have been passengers for 2 seasons. Bassong can leave too, as well as Hutton. That leaves us with Daws, Gallas, Kaboul, Khumalo & Caulker at CB. Get one more in with CL experience. Walker back from Villa to challenge Charlie at RB & cover needed for BAE at LB. Not sure about Naughton.
Jenas, Bentley, Krankie, Sarge, Rose to go. Keep O’Hara, Townsend, Livermore & get in someone
like Van Bommel, again for CL experience also 1 other who can play wide left or right. Obviously keep the 5 across the middle Lennon, Modders, Thudd, Sandro & Bale.
Up top is where the most work is needed. Sell Keane, Pav, Crouch, GDS & VDV (yes VDV as he upsets the balance of the team too much). Keep Defoe, he has just had a poor season. Get in 2 world class strikers, one with loads of CL experience, Anelka, Drogba or Klose and one like Llorente.
Thats 14 out of the door with about £70m coming in in fees plus the savings on wages, which will enable us to pay top dollar to the best of those coming in. We can then bolster the squad with younger players like Mason, Parrett etc.
And play 4 – 2 – 3 – 1
Anyone fancy this?
Given
Walker Dawson, Gallas, BAE
Thudd Sandro
Lennon Modders Bale
Drogba
Subs
Jaaskelainen, Charlie, Kaboul, Van Bommell, O’Hara, Llorente & Defoe
Sounds a bit like someone just saved his carear in on football manager and wants to share it with the wolrd. I doubt very much Jussi would sit on the bench in the twilight of his career for a start. Drog-horse I still think will be a Chelski player despite the roumours… and Llorente would not move to Spurs to be cover… neither would Klose or Sulka. Why get rid of both Kranjc and VDV? I think the team would actualy think VDV moving on would be a step backwards.
I do agree that a clear-out needs to happen, and some things I agree with. Marmite, Keane, GDS, Hutton, Woody, old Sarge, Pav, O’Hasha… maybe Kranjc if we can’t make space… but I think that would be all. Drastic changes will harm our team.
Drastic changes are what’s requited mate. It’s fannying about that has us where we are.
good article
i believe we treat Harry like GG and will never accept him and because of age cannot be given time like fergie (fergies replacement will not be given four years to win a throphy)
Woodgate is fit but addicted to operations (fact)
King and Jenas cannot be sold due to drink -king and other personel issues with jenas
Ramos tried to sort out problems at spurs but certain players overan him
Clear out must be done and a strict manager to take charge as fergie did at old trafford
we can not have people like lennon playing when he wants
I have friends at spurs who say we can never compete until we change this struture of player power
“The club needs to meet the future half way. Trim some of these chancers, up the salary offer to attract one or two players of worth and let’s move on. The first step to a profit is stopping a loss. If Sunderland will pay £5M for Begbie then take it and reinvest.And if existing players want more – sure – let ‘em earn it.But the bumbling about has to stop.”
Agree with this. I am sure we have an excel spreadsheet formula that when you input Hutton outputs 8.25m and this book price guides our decisions. Same for buying too so if a good player is worth more than his sale price we go for him whether the team needs him or not(Pienaar for example) because the book price is right.
That transfer strategy has assembled a good squad of players but it only works when you are weak. When you are strong it holds you back. Because the final pieces of the jigsaw may not be a bargain and you might have to take 5m for Hutton and 3m for Gio and 3m for Keane etc and overpay by a few million for the striker that gets the goals that takes you over the top. Unless we accept that selling deadwood promptly for the price we can get is better than stagnation we can’t move forward and look at targets to improve us.
Completely agree. Most of us have been saying for the last 2 seasons that we need to cut the dead wood. We all know the usual suspects and we must get out the axe during the summer even if we have to take a hefty loss. It is the only way to move onward and upward. This summer will be a true indication of if we actually do have the ambition for greater heights or if we have indeed already peaked and the Your Ropey League amd domestic cup runs are our glass ceiling. It would be a terrible shame if we could not just clear out the something like 8 players and get say 4 top class players in to augment the quality we already have so that we can have a really good crack at the Prem …. we are so very close I just hope that DL and the board can take the required leap to the next level. COYS…. I cannot possibly stand another 50 years until our next appearance in the Champions League, crikey I will have supported Spurs then for over 100 years !!!!
I see that twit, Baddiel, is still banging on about the ‘Y’ word.
Tomorrow, Spurs play Chelsea at White Hart Lane. Before the game, there will be a screening of The Y-Word, a short film made by my brother Ivor and I, with contributions from Frank Lampard, Ledley King, Kieran Gibbs, Gary Lineker and others, for football’s Kick it Out campaign.
The fool doesn’t even know where his own team is playing, and as a writer, shouldn’t he know where to use ‘me’ rather than ‘I’?
YIDDOS! YIDDOS!
Well said TMWNN, oh to be a celeb, when any crap you come out with is taken with such great gravitas!
just a shit frank skinner… or bob newman come to that. yid army!