Tottenham Hotspur 1 Newcastle United 2
White Hart Lane… Sunday October 26th… 1.30pm
Attendance: 35,650
Ticket: £31 (£10 Reduction) – Programme: £5 (Special Edition)
Another re-tread, I hadn’t been to White Hart Lane since 1998, the day I gave up away games. Walking up Tottenham High Road following a 2-0 defeat in the pouring rain, I’d had enough. I didn’t think I’d be back, but here I was…
Again it started badly; 09:56 train from Nuneaton to Euston, plenty of time to get to London, catch a tube to Seven Sisters, get to White Hart Lane and take some pictures. Or so I thought…
‘Delayed’, the message no one wants to see, no projected time, just ‘Delayed’. Another London train pulled in that wasn’t scheduled to stop here, station staff told us not to get on, and then they changed their minds. Problems at Watford Junction, coaches from Rugby, 10:40 and we still hadn’t moved, I wasn’t going to make it. Then we moved, then there were trains to London but we were on the wrong line, backwards again at Rugby, then forwards. Milton Keynes, Watford Junction, made it to Euston for 12:30…
A sprint to the tube, no ticket queues, a race down the escalators; timing was spot-on, Victoria Line Southbound, made it to Seven Sisters for 12:50. Another train, White Hart Lane station for 13.10; a rush followed to take a few pictures of the outside of the ground…
White Hart Lane: Outside…
It would be an understatement to say that I’m not a massive Spurs fan (always preferred Arsenal) but I really like White Hart Lane; it’s not much to look at from the outside (although the fact that it’s surrounded by something other than a retail park gets it big marks), but it’s great looking on the inside, ands you couldn’t mistake it for anywhere else. We’ll miss it when it’s gone…
Pictures taken, I made it into the Upper Tier of the South Stand just in time to see the teams take to the pitch…
At half-time I was wondering just why I had bothered, another typical away performance. Very little possession, no attacking threat, we were very lucky to be only one goal down. The goal, Emanuel Adebayor took advantage of some appalling defending, a free header during the 17th minute applause. A second goal before the break and we would have been finished, fortunately it never came…
A mixture of boos and apathy from the away contingent as the half-time whistle blew. If anyone had told us what was about to happen after the restart, sanity would have been questioned…
Changes, Sammy and Cabella on, within 6 seconds of the whistle it was 1-1; a great ball by Jack Colback that Spurs should have defended, Sammy left-footed across Hugo Lloris and into the corner of the net. Different flavours of disbelief for the two sets of fans…
And we kept coming, we attacked, what was Pardew thinking? We don’t do this; we put men behind the ball and hit it long to a lone striker. We were playing like a team that actually had some fight, some movement, some belief; a team that wanted to win…
59 minutes, another run by Sissoko, a cross from Cabella and Perez glanced it into the corner of the net, 2-1 Newcastle, pandemonium. Not sure what happened for the next 20 seconds but I have bruises on both legs so I definitely crashed into a few seats…
White Hart Lane: Inside…
We could have had a third, Cabella shot when he could have laid it back, would we regret it…?
Spurs picked up but never really generated any concerted pressure or chances, with the exception, that is, of a Tim Krul mishandle that he pushed into his own net directly from a corner. No concern there though, the flag was already up, the ball had gone out of play long before it reached him…
Five minutes of injury time but again Spurs didn’t really threaten; Sammy took the ball down to the corner flag directly in front of the away end and kept it there. The full time whistle blew and we were out of the bottom three…
It’s crumbs like this that keep us coming back, watching Newcastle these days is generally an experience to be endured but just occasionally we’ll twitch. A little reminder of how it could be, how it was for a short time, how it can’t be until the current regime moves on…
A much happier walk up Tottenham High Road than the last one, overhead a comment from a Spurs fan to his mate ‘They only had two fackin shots’; smiled…
Tube from Seven Sisters to Euston, and a train that flew through to Nuneaton… My voice is just about returning….
Tottenham Hotspur; Llloris, Dier, Kaboul, Vertonghen, Rose (YC), Capoue (YC) (Kane 67), Mason, Lamela (Lennon 78), Eriksen, Chadli, Adebayor (Soldado 83) Not Used; Chiriches, Vorm, Dembélé, Davies
Goals; Adebayor (17)
Newcastle United; Krul (YC), Janmaat, Taylor S, Coloccini (YC), Dummett, Anita (Cabella 45), Colback (YC), Obertan, Sissoko, Gouffran (YC), Pérez Gutiérrez (Haidara 79) Not Used; Taylor R, Ferreyra, Elliot, Armstrong
Goals; Ameobi (46), Pérez Gutiérrez (59)
As usual, More pictures on flickr…
