Basel backlash: why the Ade haters need to get real

It was always asking too much to make whatever fate that may eventually lie in wait for us to be quick and painless.

As it goes, defeat to FC Basel on penalties was indeed the most heart-wrenching and excruciatingly painful way to go out imaginable. Luckily for us, we’ve got the whole weekend to drown our sorrows without the impending doom of a Premier League fixture and for both players and support, the postponement of the Chelsea fixture now looks like something of a Godsend.

But as the dust starts to settle on the morning after the night before, perhaps we can see things a little clearer now the red mist has slowly evaporated. Or perhaps not, judging by the anger that’s still seeping out on out Twitter timelines this morning.

Like the mutual friend that we all put up with but have a burning disdain for, Emmanuel Adebayor appears to have finally crossed the line with some and if last night was a knees-up in a Yates, it would have been the one where Adebayor got a bottle of 1664 poured over him.

Some of course will wake up after such an incident beset in their ways with a staunch refusal to acknowledge they might have got a bit carried away. Others will like to pretend it never happened. And there will of course be those still hammered from the night before roaming the streets at 4am ready to finish the job off.

But even though Adebayor might currently find himself public enemy number one in N17 today, he’s not the first player to miss a penalty. The sooner we all come to terms with that, the better.

There seems to be a notion going round this morning that Adebayor took some form of solace out of his penalty miss last night or that the big Togolese was pissing himself laughing at the thought of his side crashing out of the Europa League.

Have a day off.

From where The Hotspur Way was sitting, Adebayor wore the look of a man absolutely and quite rightly appalled with himself after shanking his effort over the bar. It was a desperately, desperately poor attempt at a spot-kick and although we can hardly claim to be amateur psychologists, he seemed to exude more a look of disbelief, than one of utter joy.

But if it makes you feel better, then yeah, why not; of course he was over the moon last night after humiliating himself in front of 33,000 people.

Let’s not go kidding ourselves here, Emmanuel Adebayor has enjoyed a woeful campaign and the odds are that he’ll probably end up being offloaded in the summer. But over the past two games – including last night – he has in fact been one of the side’s hardest-working and most effective performers.

This isn’t trying to defend him for the campaign he’s produced so far and supporters are well within their right to tell him exactly what they think. But booing him till you’re blue in the face isn’t going to aid anyone connected with the club in the race for the top-four.

It’s time to regroup, refocus and move forward and as already mentioned, the next nine days gives us ample time to swallow the bitter pill and prepare for what will be a massive match against Manchester City at the Lane.

But when all is said and done, there wasn’t a player who didn’t leave it all out on the pitch last night. Emmanuel Adebayor included.

Enjoy your weekends – the only Basel you’ll remember this time next week is the two-bob satanic ginger thing, anyway.

COYS

You can follow me on Twitter @samuel_antrobus