"He was born to play for Spurs"

I would like to think that the PFA had read my blogs on how Spurs are not a one-man team.
 
Last night they awarded Gareth Bale with the player and young player of the season awards: the first time a Spurs player has achieved this in my memory (mental note to check Gascoigne in 1990).
 
The young player award is Bale undoubtedly deserved. Bale has been one of the finest players overall this year and was undoubtedly the finest of the selected shortlist.
 
However, the problem with the shortlist is that it was generally weak. The best young players were really those who had suffered injuries that had hampered a large part of their seasons:  Sterling, Wilshere, Shaw, Cleverley, Henderson - who just did not make the impact that Bale did.
 
Of course it is deserved; his season was a slow starter, but no one player in his age bracket has made such an impact.
 
Well, maybe apart from Robin Van Persie and Juan Mata, whom he also beat to the player of the year award. This is likely to cause more debate, as Mata for me (and my fantasy team) has been a fantastic player, while RVP has been the difference between this year and last year's champions.
 
You'll never please all the people all of the time, but Bale did just that and did a great job of it. He was named alongside Ronaldo and Messi by some critics and turned games around for Spurs (Sunderland and West Ham to name two).
 
The talk will now move to his potential movements this summer and where he will playing next season. For now, let's just enjoy the moment.

A bit of four-sight for the end

At the time of writing, I am watching Arsenal held by Man United after seeing Spurs held and Chelsea win in the battle for Champions League qualification.
 
This weekend's draw with Wigan has put Spurs in a dilemma; we didn't necessarily expect Spurs to turn them over the way we did Man City, as Wigan generally hit form at this point in the season and Spurs are generally hit and miss.
 
The postponed game against Chelsea is proving to be a play-off for the final Champions League place, with Arsenal looking to take another place with a less challenging run-in. We never expected this season to be easy - the loss of Modric and Van Der Vaart, and the failure to sign another striker and loss of Adebayor's form overall has combined to leave Spurs looking at the end of the season with anticipation.
 
Of course Spurs, Arsenal and Chelsea (and their fans) would all love a crystal ball to know what will happen in mid May, as this is classic squeaky bum time.
 
For fans of those three teams, life will not be easy and with champions and 2 relegations sorted in the Premier League, not to mention the fate of other 'second' teams (bad luck Barnet), there remains little in the way of 'nothing games' where every kick counts.

Worst Liverpool XI

Goal Keeper ­– Charles Itandje

 Absolutely rubbish and was caught laughing during a Hillsborough Memorial                           

Right Back -  Jan Kromkamp

Im not sure why we signed him, he was meant to be good, but this was questionable.

Centre Back – Julian Dicks

Signed by Graeme Souness. We David Burrows and Mike Marsh for him…..He didn’t last too long a season in fact.

                               

Centre Back –  Torben Piechnik

A defender again signed by Souness equally as bad as Mr Kozma but somehow managed to win a medal playing for Denmark’s Euro 92 Championship winning squad. Not one of our best Danish signings

Left Back – Paul Konchesky

This was Roy Hodgson's transfer, yes an awful player who is not a Souness signing. Most useless of useless. Only Roy Hodgson can tell you why he signed him.

Midfield – Istvan Kozma

A Hungarian international so bad he only made 6 appearances….Signed by Graeme Souness

Midfield – Paul Stewart

Allegedly a striker signed from Spurs, made 32 appearances and scored 1….no it’s not a typo, he scored one. No need to work out who signed this idiot.

Midfield – Igor Biscan

Sounded like some dodgy Bond Villain, played like a dodgy Bond villain...if they ever took up football

Midfield –  Antonio Nunez

We swapped him in part for Michael Owen going to Real. How the Spanish club must have been laughing.

Striker –  Sean Dundee

A waste of money and just croc, nothing more to say.

Striker –  Fernando Morientes          

I assume he had an aversion to the colour red. Twelve goals in sixty one games, although still better than Sean Dundee which isnt hard.

Subs

Mike Hooper 

Back up to Grobelaar, easy work for a rubbish goalkeeper

Rigobert Song 

Another rubbish defender. A case of why?

Sebastian Leto

Im not really sure about the point, he was very much out of depth. 

Frode Kipp

Not one of Norway's finest exports, made a sub appearance, but did get loaned to Stoke twice before being shipped back to Norway.

El Hadji Diouf

Arrogant, annoying, offensive and he was a waste of money. Not a sociable team player either

An English couple attending the Roma v Lazio derby

 Disclaimer - I wrote this on the plane on the way back from Rome, and only found out about the violence before the game when I landed back in the UK.

Following our footballing trip to Hamburg at the beginning of February, the second holiday-football trip combo saw my wife Victoria and I attend the recent Rome derby.

Although on an 'escape the British cold weather' visit, we spent nine fantastic days in Italy which culminated in four nights in the eternal city. Tourist tales and verbal slides aside, we managed to score tickets for the 'neutral' zone (more on that later) at the Olympic Stadium and despite the Gazza connection between Spurs and Lazio which have probably been erased after the troubles which marred our Europa league game, we decided to back Roma.

As I said, we were in the neutral zone which contained some Lazio fans, but was mainly filled with cursing Roma fans. Also it is a little safer to back the home team in such a game, and I recall laughing at the double-entendre of Totti, probably while Loaded magazine (which I read at the time) did the same in the mid-1990s.

The match day experience is everything you expect from one of the world's most bitter and controversial cross-city derbies: flares; giant banners; passionate fans; and a blatant disregard for no standing or smoking inside the ground.

Encountering one of Rome's many obelisks, the one in front of Stadio Olimpico bore the name of Il Duce Mussolini, which was so surprising that it was not torn down after his disposal and public flogging in death, or removed for the 1990 World Cup or recent Champions League final.

The stadium itself is a marvel, two 'curva' ends, with the rival fans in either, although a shortage of toilet facilities is a problem. A major consideration for the fans is the quality of the finishing and passing, although Lazio had the better play in the first half and Roma in the second.

The game itself was not without incident either - a penalty for both sides; Totti scored Roma's while Hernanes missed just after half time for Lazio. There was a whistle-happy referee, a red card for Biava and it finished 1-1.

Delightfully I can report that I saw no trouble either inside or outside the game, although this may be down to to the vast numbers of police in riot gear that we saw throughout Rome and on the approach to the stadium. Inside there was flare-lighting and throwing on to the section between the curva and goal (which is adequately protected by firefighters) but despite the predictable banter, the mood was not nasty but remained loud.

The whole event was slightly tainted by the challenge of getting home when the trams had mysteriously stopped running and no buses ran to the city centre's main points, meaning we were among the other fans stranded in a distant corner of Rome. However the discovery of a bus ahead of the rain and a can ride meant our memories were generally very positive.

Overall, as someone who saw Serie A as the place of the superstars and was generally disappointed by the standard and quality of the games when they were broadcast by channel 4 and presented by the excellent James Richardson (I once fell asleep during an AC Milan v Juventus league game), not much has improved. This was my and our first Serie A game, and atmosphere and some individual performances aside, the game was not a great spectacle.

Despite the drama, the referee blew for what seemed to be every infringement, the pace was medium and passing pretty woeful. Italy has a great reputation for football and while the World Cup win in 2006 boosted its coverage and confidence, it seems that it is struggling to match its history and competitors in England and Spain for quality.

I realise it is sweeping to criticise an entire league on the basis of one game, but where former Portsmouth players and Manchester City rebels are seen as stars, you do wonder what the arrival of Neymar would do for Serie A.