Football Focus

[mockney piers]

Boneyard, Spurs fans (and coming from Stevenage vicinity most of my old friends are either Spurs or Arsenal) did spend rather a long time with a certain arrogance, claiming to be the only purveyors of the beautiful game in London.

Right up until the 90s this could be done with quite a bit of justification with regards to their north London rivals and Chelsea, I guess it irked you're average West Ham fan for whom the beautiful game is more important than victory, which let's face it, is just as bloody well. But that's all changed now hasn't it. Spurs seem to be on this weird sine wave of quality with an ever decreasing length, reduced to about half a season between nadir and zenith...not conducive to a decent championship run, nor I warrant a happy fan!!

These days I see less scorn poured upon Spurs amongst the Hammers faithful, they just don't really seem to care as much anymore, I even tend to see a pretty good atmosphere post match at White Hart Lane whenever I venture up. Chelsea receive far more invective these days, and as for Arsenal, I mean seriously, how can anyone hate a team that provides that much entertainment.

[ratty]

That ain't football talk! You didn't mention pies once!

[mockney piers]

LOL

*edit*

Spurs seem to be on this weird trampoline of quality with an ever decreasing springiness, reduced to about half a season between pants and pies...must make fans as sick as a parrot!!

[Keef]

Blatter talks some sense for a change.

And in other news

Big Sam puts the boot in (but he's not bitter, honest).

[bon3yard]

Your right Mockney, Arsenal are now the only team who can truly lay a claim to The Spurs name and that hurts like hell. :-S

[Ladygooner]

UEFA CUP DRAW

GROUP A: Schalke 04, Paris SG, MANCHESTER CITY, Racing Santander, FC Twente

GROUP B: Benfica, Olympiacos, Galatasaray, Hertha Berlin, Metalist Kharkiv

GROUP C: Sevilla, VfB Stuttgart, Sampdoria, Partizan Belgrade, Standard Liege

GROUP D: TOTTENHAM, Spartak Moscow, Udinese, Dinamo Zagreb, NEC Nijmegen

GROUP E: AC Milan, Heerenveen, SC Braga, PORTSMOUTH, VfL Wolfsburg

GROUP F: Hamburg, Ajax, Slavia Prague, ASTON VILLA, MSK Zilina

GROUP G: Valencia, Club Brugge, Rosenborg, FC Copenhagen, Saint-Etienne

GROUP H: CSKA Moscow, Deportivo La Coruna, Feyenoord, Nancy, Lech Poznan

AC Milan in Portsmouth! Who'd have thought it Ratty!

[Tony.London Suburbs]

>:D

Blatter talks some sense for a change.

I agree..Most disagreeable and should be banned immediately after Millwall have been bought by a Zillionaire

[mockney piers]

Hmm, Icelandic bank Landsbanki has been nationalised.

As the bank was owned by our chairman who leveraged his (now worthless) shares to buy the club, does that make us the official Icelandic national team now?

As someone said on a fan forum "just our luck, we get the only billionaire in football who is skint"

Made me chuckle anyway.

[Annasfield]

I do agree with what's he saying, but he ain't half bitter about British clubs' success in Europe!

[ratty]

Think the weird draw works out that we play them away LG!

Edited because we play them at home!

[SeanMacGabhann]

of course, British clubs don't HAVE to float themselves on the stock exchange or lift their skirts up whenever a rich suitor walks by now do they...? If British clubs are so proud of being British why don't they stay private and local? eh ?? eh?????

[mockney piers]

Luckily now that the current crisis has taught us all that greed doesn't pay, everyone's behaviour will change for ever and we'll get back to core values, sensible savings led economics, wise investment, balanced books, nurture local talent, sustainable wages........errrr........

[SimonM]

This is doing the rounds in the usual places...

A little boy gets ?10 for his birthday and rushes down to the Sport Shop

to buy the new football he has been desperate for.

He gets a ball down from the rack and gives the shop-keeper his ?10.

"Sorry son !!" explains the shopkeeper. "This ball costs ?20, but you've

only got ?10".

Thinking quickly, the boy looks up at the different club footballs on the

rack and says: "Ok. If you blindfold me and I guess which club's crest is

on the ball, will you let me have the ball for ?10?"

The shopkeeper decides to humour the boy. He agrees to the lad's proposal,

and so he blindfolds the boy.

First up he gives the boy an Arsenal ball.

"OK," says the boy, placing his ear to the ball, "I can hear the blasting

sound of 2 canons. This must be an Arsenal ball!"

"That was a lucky guess," exclaimed the shopkeeper, "Let's try another

one!"... and he hands him a Millwall ball.

"OK," says the boy, placing his ear to the ball again, "I can hear a pack

of rampant Lions. It must be a Millwall ball!"

"Bejaysus!" says the shopkeeper. "If you get the next one right I'll let

you have the ball for nothing..." and with that he passes him another

ball.

Again the boy puts the ball to his ear and after a few moments he exclaims

"That's a Tottenham ball!"

"Holy Mary Mother Of God!" shouts the shopkeeper. "How on earth did you

get that one? I suppose you heard a cockerel crowing!!"

"No..." said the boy. "It's going down!"

:))

[Jah Lush]

Oh ye of little faith. Good joke though.

[Keef]

SeanMacGabhann Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> of course, British clubs don't HAVE to float

> themselves on the stock exchange or lift their

> skirts up whenever a rich suitor walks by now do

> they...? If British clubs are so proud of being

> British why don't they stay private and local? eh

> ?? eh?????

Agree, and it doesn't really matter where the owners come from, it's more the buying a club as a toy, or purely as a money making tool that bugs me.

[bon3yard]

Blimey, it seems an awfully long time since those envious sidelong glances at Serie A circa 1988-95 and thinking...cor, wish we had some of that.

[Tony.London Suburbs]

Annasfield Wrote:

I do agree with what's he saying, but he ain't half bitter about British clubs' success in Europe!

Who? Blatter's Bitter?

[Keef]

That's all Spurs need!

[Jah Lush]

And the rest. He's buggered off back to Russia even though he's injured.

Pavlyuchenko Joins Up With Russia Squad

[Sandperson]

I like Spurs but I liked them better when they had strikers...I'm afraid we had something to do with that.

[Annasfield]

This is what Internationals week does to the football thread. All the way at the bottom of the page......

Any predictions for tonight?

[SimonM]

4-0 to Inger-land!

[Keef]

I predict a really dull match!

[Annasfield]

Quite close Keef.

[SimonM]

That was the most wretched and unconvincing 5-1 victory I have ever seen!