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MIDDLESBROUGH v SPURS - BLAST FROM THE PAST III
Boro returned from a 2-0 defeat in Villareal's El Madrigal Stadium for a White Hart Lane encounter on a rainy and miserable Sunday afternoon.
Could Boro lift the rain-clouds and dispel the myth that we never win on a Sunday after Europe? No. But it was still a good day out.
TOTTENHAM AWAY 28-11-04
Photo by Andy Craig
Despite the problems that occurred in The Madrigal after Thursday's final whistle leaving a bad taste in the mouth, we agreed to not let it ruin our holiday and tarnish our opinion of a much favoured country where we have enjoyed many great times.
And it seemed pointless to arrive in London too far in advance of Sunday's White Hart Lane encounter, so there we were, back in Valencia on Friday early afternoon, taking in the delights of the architecture, culture and beer.
Within a mere hour, the decision to stay on was justified as I spotted a group of lads all in maroon t-shirts, hanging around on a street corner. My first thoughts were that they were a group of British Paras or Marines but as we got closer, I thought that I recognised some of them.
I was right because that was no military badge on their t-shirts. It was the badge of the North East's best and most successful football team. I wanted to get talking to them but I struggled to come up with an opening line. I didn't need one because Mark Viduka approached us and asked if we knew anywhere where he could get a coffee. It turns out that he asked us because he thought that we looked Spanish(!).
Well we had a smashing chat as we walked down the street together and I have to say that he is probably the most personable celebrity that I have ever met. Genuinely interested in what we were up to in Valencia and very enthusiastic about the common ground that we discovered in our interests away from football. Best of all though, it turns out that he is a fan of this very website. It was a truly magical ten minutes that we spent with him and I cannot praise the man highly enough for the person that he is.
Spain seemed to get better and better as the time rolled on and I wish that I had a picture of the huge 'Smoggies On Tour' banner that was hanging from the balcony of one of Valencia's grandest hotels.
London was drizzly and cold. If we hadn't been there for a Boro game, I would not have wanted to stay there.
The Wizard of Smog summed up the whole occasion perfectly with a class bit of punditry.
"Never mind your Sunny Saturday afternoons in August and your big occasions. This is where it's won and lost- on a dark old windy and drizzly Sunday afternoon in England."
Well thanks for that Wizard. Sure made me feel a hell of a lot better as we walked the long, long walk from Seven Sisters to White Hart Lane. And by long, I mean one damn long walk. I am a firm believer in building football stadiums in close proximity to public transport amenities but quite obviously, Tottenham Hotspur are not.
I doubt if they will be changing stadiums in the near future though because White Hart Lane is nothing short of magnificent and quite possibly the best ground that I have been in. Apart from that one on the bit of waste ground by the River Tees of course.
But I do have one piece of advice concerning Spurs' stadium. I do not recommend sufferers of vertigo to attend a match there because if you are in the upper echelons as we were, the steepness of the stand can make you very nervous if you look down towards the people in the bottom tier.
Packwolf had no such anxieties though as he spent most of the first half watching not the action on the field but the antics of the Spurs mascot, Crappy the Cockerel or whatever his name was, as he rolled around the touchline, crawled on all fours and japingly peered over the perimeter fencing. Crappy I mean, not Packwolf. Whatever he was up to is anyone's guess but I found it a little disturbing that PW had paid thirty quid for a ticket and was getting more satisfaction from staring at a giant cock (erel) than from the match itself.
But we left him to it because although the match was played at a fairly slow pace throughout the first half, I thought that we dominated and apart from their slight edge on the right side, we looked for the best part of the half as though we were going to stroll towards yet another three points.
And then it happened. Franck had one of his moments of madness. They are thankfully a rarity these days but like any great artist who can produce a masterpiece one day and then slice off his ear the next, the red mist is always present. It descended on Sunday and his double footed challenge on Noe Pamarot altered the whole course of the game. Off he went and Boro turned into a shadow of their former selves. We missed him and we never recovered from that moment on.
Debate will rage long and hard about whether he deserved to go and Steve McClaren certainly is in no doubt that he didn't. Those feelings were made bluntly clear to referee Phil Dowd at half time and whether or not the man in black got that decision right, he deserved a mouthful for his god awful performance during the rest of the match as Boro were denied clear cut decision after clear cut decision.
But no excuses for this defeat because we simply did not regroup and take the game to Spurs after Franck got his marching orders.
Somehow, I held out hope of us securing a point at one nil down, mainly due to Mark Viduka's best performance for several weeks. He chased every loose ball and tackled at every opportunity and still managed to pull off some neat little backheelers and intelligent passes into the path of the running man. It was a major disappointment when The Lizard replaced him late on because even towards the end, I was convinced that he would score. Any game now, the floodgates will open again, that much I am sure about.
However, I was no longer convinced that we would win after their second goal which was almost like something straight out of 'Danny Baker's Howlers' as Mark Schwarzer's clearance hit the arse of Freddie Kanoute and rebounded straight into the goal. Game over.
Losing at Spurs was not a disaster of catastrophic proportions but we certainly do need to win our next few games to redress the balance. All is not lost. Let's keep it like that.
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