Today is Monday and I generally don't watch league matches during the week. I only watch champions league matches when Manchester United is playing. But somehow I had a feeling that today’s match would be good to watch. I seldom watch league matches of other teams, but for last one year whenever I have watched spurs playing they have always been entertaining. I will explain the way spurs entertain. Since tomorrow being a national holiday I decided to give a chance to me to get entertained by spurs. And here I am so much filled with gratitude that I have again started my laptop and thought to write only my second post. Sorry Mitesh I said I am going to sleep but couldn't resist watching Martin Jol and his team. And now I am feeling like calling and telling you the story what happened. Anyway let me try to write what I witnessed.
Pretext of the match , Tottenhem is a good team, they finished 5th last two years in the league and they had a few good players added to their team and looked very formidable during the preseason. But as always they have started dreadfully in the league and have won only one match against the bottom of the league team. They are in the relegation zone i.e. bottom three in the league of twenty teams. Their manager Martin Jol looks to be a good manager but has been under pressure of being sacked by the Tottenhem board due to the poor results. His cause has not been helped by the long term injury to his center back and captain Ledly King. Statistics says Spurs have only managed 3 clean sheets in their last 35 games. So going into this game Spurs are supposed to beat Astan villa at
Anyway so score is 1-1 curtsey Robinson. At around 40th minute Astan Villa get a freekick on the left side , Young takes it , he observed Barry's run towards left corner place and passes the ball to him, Barry has acres of space and no Tottenhem defender bothered to track his run. Barry sends in a superb cross in front of Tottenhem goal. Ball misses two Astan Villa players at near post and reaches to Chimbonda on the far post, It hits his knee and rebounds in the center where Larsson scores the second between the legs of Robinson. The guy had scored only one goal in the last five years and here he has doubled his tally for his club within 45 minutes, courtsey Robinson. Tottenhem 2-1 down and supporeters feeling it.
Just before half time Abangalhore gets the ball just outside the penality box of spurs and very easily beats Dowson and shoots low shot towards far post. Robinson is not able to do anything and Astan Villa is 3-1 up. Its half time and Spurs are 3-1 down , where they were supposed to win this match and ease the pressure on Martin Jol. I guess if it was any champions league team all three goals against Spurs would not have been scored.First one was sure saught Robinson howler, Second one was defensive organisational mistake and third Dawson gave too much space to Abangalhore. But here only comes the entertainment value for neutrals. Spurs is a team which let you score the goals and scores the goals.
After half time Spurs kept on attackin in search of goals. Against the run of play Astan Villa gets a free kick just outside the penality area. Within the wall there is One Astan Villa Player and he turns and makes gap for a ferocious shot by Gardener. Robinson's initial movement is wrong way and then its too late to recover , Spurs are 4-1 down and some fans are not able to bear, they have started to leave. Beofre Martin Jol changed I observed it, Tiano was not playing well he went out came in Defoe. Then Berbatov's body language didn't give any hint of him even trying anything to reduce the margin, Jol reacts and Off goes Berbatov and in comes Darren Bent.
In the midfield zakora is playing like a lion and Gareth Bale who was lively in the first half seems to be getting nervous . But then it was his burst down the left which allowed Tottenhem to score their secong goal. Bale runs towards the goal line and then pulls back the ball into the penality area. Defoe is quick comes back and hammers a left footed shot against the post which rebounds and goes towards Chimbonda on the right , He took a shot and score is 4-2. I was hoping for spurs to score and they were not letting me down , thats why I call them the entertainers, they let go lots of goals and they score also lots of goals.
Anyway score is 4-2 Spurs are trying hard and then incomes Marlon Hayword . At one point ball is harmless but inside the Astan Villa penality area , Bent is on it and Hayword comes and pushes him on the floor and referry whistles for the penality. Robbie Keane steps up and slots home a cool penality and score is 4-3. Stadium is buzzing and people are expecting something special, me included. And as the good script is written Spurs level the score in the goal mouth bhasad (harakiri) in the last minute of the stoppage time. Whole stadium is standing and they all are singing as if they have won the league.But yes looking at the situation 4-1 down and then level the scores at 4-4 , It was quite incredible stuff . I was spellbound, what I wanted has happened. Long live Jol. I am impressed and I think I have utilized my time .Commentators said this is a premiership classic and in the end Football Won.
It is very rare when a team is three goals down and comes back strongly. I wathced the champions league 2005 final between AC Milan and Liverpool. There Liverpool were 3-0 at half time and then came back in the second half to level the scores 3-3. There AC MIlan were better team so that was more outstanding feat. Spurs are better team than Astan Villa, but they were down 4-1, they kept attacking no matter what Robinson was doing in their goal ad thats what we fans like, attacking football at all costs.
