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PNB Lifts The Lid On The Spurs Squad

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Good morning. 

Cracking interview with Pathe News Boy from Henry Winter in yesterday’s Telegraph. The quotes below merely serve to confirm some of our most positive hopes.

“It’s probably the best team I’ve played in. Look at Gareth. He has exceptional ability. He can carry the ball 60 yards up the field. Aaron too.

When the team-sheet goes in, the opposition full-backs must be thinking, ‘This is going to be a tough day today’. And Kyle Walker and Benoit Assou-Ekotto are unbelievable. I wouldn’t even class them as full-backs. I class them as wingers/defenders.

“Then we have Luka in there as well. He’s a fantastic player, technically, who puts a shift in. And we’ve got Rafa [van der Vaart] and Jermain [Defoe]. Top players.

So is Manu. He’s a real bubbly character, one of those happy-go-lucky fellas. I’ve never seen him looking miserable. He’s a joy to be around. You have people in your team who are buzzy, and you want to be around, and you sometimes have quite negative people, always moaning about something. I always want to be around Manu. Before I met him, I’d read stuff about him but he’s great. He’s a good man.”

“I’ve heard him say to Adebayor in meetings: ‘They are not going to live with you today. Today’s the day. You’re going to score two goals, you’re going to win the game for us’. I can see Adebayor getting bigger and bigger as Harry’s saying it.

“Harry makes you feel good. What you see is what you get with Harry. There are some managers who you think I don’t quite know them.

Like Mourinho. You’d need to speak to people who’ve been in Mourinho’s company to understand him. But with Harry, it’s him. He was one of the main reasons I wanted to sign. He’s a great manager. He gives you freedom. ‘Go out and play’.”

The comments about Ade are particularly interesting. My impression of Parker from what I seen over the years is that he’s a pretty straightforward, ordinary chap. An English everyman if you will. So if there were some ‘side’ to the beaming Togolese nutcase – whilst it is arguable Parker wouldn’t gossip about it to Winter – it is even less likely he’d praise him for no good reason.

I was unconvinced before we signed him. This is no secret. And in this I wasn’t alone. But he won us all over with not only a work rate that shamed so many of his predecessors but an effectiveness that dwarfed them. 

He wins most of his tackles. His internal Sat Nav is permanently programmed to advance towards the other lot’s goal. If he passes laterally it’s because it’s that or stand a bloody good chance of losing possession. 

There was a story doing the rounds that he gave his West Ham colleagues a ‘Churchillian’ pep talk in the dressing room when the chips were down. Having had the pleasure of him in the Lilywhite for a little while now I can completely believe it.

 

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54 comments

  • Matt says:

    Sargeant Wilson did the job but we have moved forward. Parker is the man for the hour, he gives us balance. Something Sandro will also do as he matures. The Scott Parker we see in Lillywhite is unrecognisable from the young man that has been seen in the blue of Chelsea. Maturity brings skills and control that youth can never know.
    It’s true you can’t buy experience, and Scotty Parker continues to prove that every day

  • Edi says:

    To think that we ever had Wilson Palacios…Well, it brings shame to me. Scott Parker is 100 times the player I ever gave him credit for in the past. His tackling is so much better than I thought it was and he’s even set up a couple of goals. Great player, under-appreciated by me for a long time.

    • Gilbo says:

      I’m not going to throw about words like “gloryhunter”, ask questions like “how long have you been a Spurs fan?” or make assumptions in line with “you’re a dick”

      but think that’s unnecessarily harsh on Sgt. Wilson – anyone who went to matches after we signed him in January will have been impressed with some top drawer performances.

      He went down hill in a major way cos of a personal tragedy. To say you feel shamed that he played for us is over the top, or suggests you’re a total numpty.

      • Harry Hotspur says:

        I’d be up for giving Sarge a break here too.

        You hang J**** by his ballet shoe strings from a lamp post, but Wilson as Gilbo says quite rightly had a particularly horrible death in the family to deal with.

    • Cyril says:

      Unacceptable comments about Sergeant Wilson, who did a great and necessary job for us when we first signed him.

      He had a fantastic attitude on and off the pitch; he terrorised the scum midfield on his own, all while living the dread of losing his kidnapped brother.

      He was a broken man after the awful death was confirmed, and his performances reflected it.

      Yes, Sandro and Parker have more to their game, but Wilson does not deserve that sort of comment from a Spurs fan.

      • Lil' Wayne says:

        Just to echo what others have been saying about Sarge, I’d like to add that the central midfield performance of both himself and Sandro in the San Siro against AC earlier this year was one of the best and most disciplined performances I’ve had the pleasure of witnessing. We should be thankful for the half a season of consistency and desire he gave us as we may not be the team we are now if he hadn’t arrived.

  • Gilbo says:

    As for sentiment on Adebayor and Parker; I wholeheartedly agree and really couldn’t feel more gushy and giddy at games right now.

    I’ve gone beyond getting excited, but just sit back and enjoy some excellent football while the nagging “we’re still Spurs, we’re gonna throw this away” thoughts are dispelled by Scott Parker running seventy yards and crashing through them, carrying remnants of said daydream past four imaginary opponents and deftly flicking it to ratface.

    To Dare is to Do and all that. Very Happy Days.

  • TMWNN says:

    It’s no secret that rent-a-gob is way down on my Christmas card list, but here is yet another player extolling the virtues of our wobbly headed supremo; even going so far as to compare him with the most successful manager of recent times, a.k.a. Maurine.

    The dressing room has become a weekly lilywhite love-in. Long may it continue.

  • Gilbo says:

    I wonder if PNB would’ve been the man he is today, had we signed him at any point previously.

    Would he be quite as desperate not to lose had he not spent time at the Boleyn Ground? Come to think of it, he had a rather naff time at the Barcodes too…

    let’s rejig that song – “Scotty Par-ker, Scotty Par-ker, he was born to play for…”

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