So, here we go again.
Football is weird, isn’t it.
I wrote a piece last year opining that the game is important as a passion for those who value it as much as music, art or any other outlet that elicits a strong emotional response.
The events that gradually unfolded all over the world then put into sharp focus the microscopic link Premier League football takes in the chain of humanity. It was hard to have empathy for multi-billion pound clubs complaining of a financial squeeze at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK.
The audacity of the likes of Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool to try and seek external help to mitigate their losses was met with such swift indignation, their reversals were like backward somersaults.
The return of the action was, however, a major tonic to a life much changed and limited by the circumstances we still find ourselves in. To reiterate last year’s piece, passion in anything is key to feeling alive and connected to reality. What is truly missing is the community and shared experience that no zoom conference calls or facetime calls can ever properly capture.
It is wonderful to see live competitive football back. A spectacle where the result is completely unknown, events unfolding in front of your eyes with any number of parallel outcomes.
But without fans, it cannot ever be the same. Indeed, the power of fandom is being the mythical 12th man and actually being able to impact the result of the game through the power of vocal support and fervor.
Until spectators are allowed to attend games again, the game is not much more than a reality TV show.
Still we support. Still we argue on social media. The bragging rights with rival fans continues unabated. For some it can even get too much, as I read a piece last year arguing that Everton should just secede from their rivalry with Liverpool – such was their despondence at the humiliation they have endured in recent years.
The beauty is that there is always another season, this one coming quicker than any other, to provide hope that past wrongs will be righted. Football moves quickly and past glories lose their shimmer with every passing year, at least in the eyes of supporters.
HERE AND NOW
It’s all about the here and now. Perhaps that is a thought that Daniel Levy and the Tottenham Hotspur board had in mind when they appointed Jose Mourinho to replace the hugely popular but trophyless Mauricio Pochettino as head coach.
Mourinho is a mercenary, something he does not deny. He does not arrive at a club to make friends or create philosophies – he comes to make warriors and create triumphs. Those triumphs come in different sizes, given the context of where he finds himself. It all contributes, though, to his legacy as a manager.
I have not chosen to watch the Amazon Prime series focusing on Mourinho – sorry, Tottenham, but I have seen quotes and especially those about one of the Portuguese’s early speeches about the team being too nice and how he wanted to give them a nastier edge (paraphrasing).
From now on it is clear this will be a Spurs team very different to the one that made fan’s hearts swell with full throttle, attacking football and the philosophy to never give up until the last ball had been kicked.
It didn’t always work. Now, more than ever given the constraints imposed by the pandemic, comes the time to find innovative ways to gatecrash the top teams who can and regularly outspend Tottenham on the best players from around the world.
Spurs could splash out themselves, given the billions of owner Joe Lewis. But have chosen to back the craft of Mourinho to deliver a sucker punch and upset the status quo.
If there’s anyone that loves being the underdog, it is Mourinho.
Come on you Spurs.
Christian Radnedge 