Bent signs

Sorry, couldn't help myself. I have another picture somewhere...

Darren Bent, formerly of Charlton Athletic, has signed a 6 year contract in a transfer deal worth £16.5m. Staggering money, at least for us, and as such occasioning worries about the future of other players. If we can afford to pay so much for Bent, is that because there are imminent transfers for Defoe or Berbatov? There has been no talk of Berbatov going for a while, and The Guardian today reports that Defoe (ever the likelier to depart) will stay. If we for a moment dare to believe that our striking line-up for next season will, in fact, be Berbatov, Keane, Defoe and Bent, then we have cause for nothing but celebrations.

Europe next season, plenty of games to be played, and with these four talents there can be some rotation and back-up. Bent is a very good and still young player who really wants to play for Spurs, and as such a most welcome addition to the team. His decision to turn down astronomic wages at West Ham and fit into the comparatively low (comparatively, remember) wage structure at Spurs does him credit. "In my heart of hearts I always wanted to come to Tottenham", says Darren. Welcome.

Ah, here it is...

(Image from www.tottenhamhotspur.com)

Fixtures

Yes, the fixture list. Provisional and all, but still worth a post.

Sunderland away on the first day is tough, but interesting – and should be televised. As should Liverpool at home on the last day, a fixture which I have to admit made me swear a little at my innocent copy of The Evening Standard. The rest of the run-in is impossible to assess now; Reading might be suffering from second season syndrome – or have overtaken us completely, just as Bolton may be a just as strong an opponent as they were this season – or have fallen to pieces due to the departure of Big Sam. On that topic I would think that Newcastle (who despite a crappy season did do a double over Spurs…) are destined for a big revival. I can’t get the image of Sam Allardyce, donning an apron and a broomstick, cleaning up the mess that is Newcastle United like a latter-day, overweight Mary Poppins out of my head. “Just a spoonful of sugar”… Absolutely irresistible.

Playing Arsenal at home reasonably early on looks great, methinks, due to the disarray they seem to find themselves in. Henry’s departure could have strong unsettling effects and even if they sign some big names, Wenger might not have turned it all into a team by mid-September. Oh, allow me my optimism.

The 07-08 Season

Sat Aug 11 Sunderland A
Tue Aug 14 Everton H
Wed Aug 15 Carling Cup 1
Sat Aug 18 Derby County H
Sat Aug 25 Manchester United A
Wed Aug 29 Carling Cup 2
Sat Sep 1 Fulham A
Sat Sep 15 Arsenal H
Sat Sep 22 Bolton Wanderers A
Wed Sep 26 Carling Cup 3
Sat Sep 29 Aston Villa H
Sat Oct 6 Liverpool A
Sat Oct 20 Newcastle United A
Sat Oct 27 Blackburn Rovers H
Wed Oct 31 Carling Cup 4
Sat Nov 3 Middlesbrough A
Sat Nov 10 Wigan Athletic H F.A. Cup 1
Sat Nov 24 West Ham United A
Sat Dec 1 Birmingham City H F.A. Cup 2
Sat Dec 8 Manchester City H
Sat Dec 15 Portsmouth A
Wed Dec 19 Carling Cup 5
Sat Dec 22 Arsenal A
Wed Dec 26 Fulham H
Sat Dec 29 Reading H
Tue Jan 1 Aston Villa A
Sat Jan 5 F.A. Cup 3
Wed Jan 9 Carling Cup Semi-Final (1)
Sat Jan 12 Chelsea A
Sat Jan 19 Sunderland H
Wed Jan 23 Carling Cup Semi-Final (2)
Sat Jan 26 F.A. Cup 4
Wed Jan 30 Everton A
Sat Feb 2 Manchester United H
Sat Feb 9 Derby County A
Sat Feb 16 F.A. Cup 5
Sat Feb 23 Chelsea H
Sun Feb 24 Carling Cup Final
Sat Mar 1 Birmingham City A
Sat Mar 8 West Ham United H F.A. Cup 6
Sat Mar 15 Manchester City A
Sat Mar 22 Portsmouth H
Sat Mar 29 Newcastle United H
Sat Apr 5 Blackburn Rovers A F.A. Cup Semi-Final
Sat Apr 12 Middlesbrough H
Sat Apr 19 Wigan Athletic A
Sat Apr 26 Bolton Wanderers H
Sat May 3 Reading A
Sun May 11 Liverpool H
Sat May 17 F.A. Cup Final

The Under21 Championships

A competition which has largely gone by unwatched by me; the only game I saw was the only one not featuring any of my Spurs lads. England did reasonably well, however, and it is striking to see such a comparatively strong side of players on this level – most of them with plenty of Premiership experience. The game against Italy, which I watched, was very entertaining and contained some nice football. Perhaps the future of English football is not so dark after all?

Tom Huddlestone reaped praise for his efforts early on, but his absence in the Italy game was said to be a contributing factor to the increased pace of England’s game. Hmm. His sending off in the unpleasant game against Serbia (which has prompted new moves against racism) still baffles me; judging by the composed look of bewilderment on his face upon receiving the card, Tom was similarly affected. Anyone who knows what actually happened, feel free to comment.

After drawing 0-0 with the Czech Republic and 2-2 with Italy, England beat Serbia 2-0 and came up against Holland in the semi-finals. The team came very close to a 1-0 win, but the game ended a draw and had to be decided by a marathon of a penalty shootout. England at any level tend to find penalties problematic, but at 13-12 you’ve done pretty well despite losing. Special mention to Stephen Taylor of Newcastle who played on despite injury and then took, and scored, one of the penalties.

Elsewhere, Paul Stalteri and Canada did not make it past the semi-final stage of the CONCACAF cup, as they were beaten by the USA 2-1.

Sweden 5-0 Iceland

National Day in Sweden was celebrated with an amusing Euro 2008 qualifier win over Iceland, certainly not a classic game for the brilliance of the football, but entertaining enough for Swedes.

Even if the game could hardly be expected to be played at the soaring pace of Saturday’s, the lads (in a similar line-up, but with Rosenberg replacing the suspended Elmander) started brightly enough and after having controlled most of the play took the lead after 9 minutes. An ambitious shot from midfield by Linderoth, who advanced unchallenged with an ocean of space around him, was blocked by Arason only to be picked up again by Sweden. Wilhelmsson fed the ball to Allbäck, who chipped it into goal. Iceland responded by putting ten men behind the ball and while Sweden retained much of the possession, they increasingly found it difficult to get anywhere. On 37 minutes Iceland decided to open up and push forward after all; mainly inspired by Spurs reserve Emil Hallfredson, who was one of Iceland’s better players until substituted. His great strike was cleared by Nilsson – Gunnarsson then tested Isaksson. Minutes later Sweden increased the lead, Svensson took a shot from a corner kick.

Iceland, unsettled, soon lapsed in concentration and let the Swedes grab a third before half-time. Lovely work from Wilhelmsson and Alexandersson (a great right wing partnership throughout) allowed the latter to lift a ball over the Iceland defence; it found Mellberg who coolly finished with a right-foot volley. It became the decisive goal, which set the Swedish mood to triumphant and daring and the Icelandic to tired and dejected. Sweden after the break were displaying a lot more creativity, taking chances and, it seemed, having fun. A few minutes into the second half, Rosenberg, just onside, got the ball and made a solo run followed by a nice but narrow finish: the ball hit the post and went into goal.

The final nail in the Icelandic coffin came on 50 minutes, when the Swedish players appealed for a handball penalty, were not given one and everybody seemed unsure what was going on. The referee, Alain Hamer, our old favourite from the first Sevilla game, added to his reputation in my book as strange by confusing absolutely everyone. An Icelandic player seemed to pass the ball back to the goalkeeper (in the belief that it had been deemed a goal kick?), it was intercepted by Rosenberg who played around with it and passed it to Allbäck. Allbäck in turn shot it into goal, the goalkeeper watching him do it as the ball was thought to be out of play. Or something. Everybody was flabbergasted to find that the goal counted. The ball had never been out of play at all.

And that was it, Iceland gave up and the rest of the game saw a lot of substitutions which reflected that the game, essentially, was over. Zlatan Ibrahimovic came on for the final 20 minutes or so, but despite the apparent delight of the crowd and the odd little move he failed to add any more gloss on the evening. The best creative moves still came from Alexandersson and Wilhelmsson and crowd and country at that point were just quite happy with anything that happened on the field. The three points had been in the bag for a while. On Friday UEFA awarded the win over Denmark as 3-0 and Sweden now sit happily at the top of group F, three points clear of Spain.

Sweden
Andreas Isaksson, Niclas Alexandersson, Olof Mellberg, Petter Hansson, Mikael Nilsson, Christian Wilhelmsson, Tobias Linderoth, Anders Svensson, Fredrik Ljungberg, Markus Rosenberg, Marcus Allbäck
Substitutes: Rami Shaaban, Max von Schlebrügge, Daniel Majstorovic, Daniel Andersson, Kennedy Bakircioglü, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Rade Prica
Goals: Allbäck (11), Svensson (42), Mellberg (45), Rosenberg (50), Allbäck (51)

Iceland
Árni Arason, Grétar Steinsson, Gunnar Thor Gunnarsson, Ólafur Örn Bjarnason, Ivar Ingimarsson, Theodor Bjarnason, Arnar Vidarsson, Emil Hallfredsson, Brynjar Gunnarsson, Hannes Sigurdsson, Birkir Saevarsson
Substitutes: Dadi Lárusson, Kristján Sigurdsson, Stefán Gíslason, Hjalmar Jonsson, Ragnar Sigurdsson, Matthias Gudmundsson, Veigar Páll Gunnarsson

Attendance: 33358
Referee: Alain Hamer (Luxemburg)

International round-up

…and a short international round-up of our Spurs players.

Teemu played for Finland, who lost to Serbia 0-2 at home; Paul Stalteri’s Canada drew 2-2 with Venezuela in a friendly; Didier played with the other, slightly more famous, Didier for the Ivory Coast in a 5-0 thrashing of Madagascar.

Our English lads are in the England squad to face Estonia on Wednesday after the friendly against Brazil.

And Dimitar put in a stunning performance and two goals for his country, who beat Belarus 2-0 away. I highly recommend watching the highlights of the game – absolutely marvellous stuff.

The Scandinavian derby drama

What a spectacular drama! And no, I’m not talking about the mess at the end – I’m talking about the game which preceded it…

For 88 minutes this was some of the most energetically entertaining and interesting football these two countries have managed for a long while, played at a pace which made even me, an observer fully aware how it would end, breathless. On the night I had made a guest appearance in my former job, standing behind the bar in a busy pub and thus reduced to watching the reaction of the Swedes around me rather than getting a chance to see anything on the screen. Sweden, it had been thought ahead of the game, was the underdog and the crowd went from happy to happier to euphoric – and then to subdued to nervous and finally erupted in excited disbelief. Throughout the remainder of the evening I was puzzled by small little acts of solidarity with our neighbours, like the man who came up with a sad face and said “I want a Danish beer”. He was given a Carlsberg and drank a toast. Yes, we really want to beat the Danes – but we want to do it by playing the better football.

The game kicked off and saw Denmark with a few near chances inside the first minutes as a pattern emerged – full pace football from end to end, Denmark with the quicker breaks and more elegant passing, Sweden with the harder pressure and sharper chance taking. As well as defensive slip-ups and heroics on both sides. Gravgaard’s feeble attempt at a defensive header fell to the feet of Johan Elmander who saw his chance, controlled the ball and took a clean and confident finish past Sörensen on six minutes. Dream start for Elmander, undoubtedly the best Swede on the field, who continued to pose a threat. By the time Sweden got a free kick, 21 minutes into the game, both goalkeepers had been forced into plenty of action and play had been distributed evenly on the entire pitch – still with the Swedes looking that bit sharper. Centre-half Petter Hansson took the free kick, from 34 metres, and cannoned a shot (which took a small deflection off Jacobsen) into goal. Manager Lagerbäck sported a priceless smile as he saw the defender score his first Sweden goal. There was nothing of the underdog left when, a few minutes later, Christian Wilhelmsson (also in truly impressive form) ran around Kristiansen and passed a ball to Elmander which the striker back-heeled past Sorensen. 3-0 and cruising, Wilhelmsson and Elmander looking like they could pull anything off.

Denmark continuously tried to explore Sweden’s weaker left side and were eventually rewarded – a Gravgaard pass landed in the middle and Daniel Agger took a shot straight through the legs of a host of Swedes. His shot took a deflection off the post and found the back of the net; Isaksson was chanceless. Denmark manager Olsen saw a chance to turn the game around and made the first of three key substitutions, which eventually turned the game somewhat – Kristiansen, unable to deal with Wilhelmsson, made way for Andreasen and Jacobsen moved to left-back. The game continued at full speed, even when Allbäck fell down injured; the Danes proceeded with their attack and aggression mounted as Elmander decided to break their stride with a tough tackle. His booking means he will be suspended for the next game. A few more chances for either side, most notably a shot from Ljungberg into the arms of Sörensen, concluded the final minutes of the first half.

The second half started exactly where the first had left off, and saw the introduction of rising star Nicklas Bendtner. Despite a bright opening and a good chance early on for the youngster, the next goal fell to skipper Tomasson, who took full advantage of the hole left in the Sweden defence when Mellberg slipped. The introduction of Gronkjaer allowed the Danes to push further up and put more strain on the already hard working Swedish midfielders, who needed, and received, defensive help from the strikers. Elmander continued to be everywhere at one until he was replaced by Rosenberg with 15 minutes to go. Finally, the Danes equalised, with a shot from Andreasen after a corner, and the final 10 minutes were all about Denmark – Isaksson had 5 saves to make. How anyone was still standing, let alone still running at full speed, at this stage is a mystery.

And so we reach the end, Rosenberg falls and remains down in the penalty area. The referees conferred and replays confirmed that he had been heavily punched in the stomach by Poulsen. Herbert Fandel had time to show a red card and point to the spot before receiving a blow himself – from a man who had run onto the pitch and was wrestled away by Gravgaard. The German referee immediately stopped the game, the players left, two more “supporters” came on – security was confirmed to be substandard and the game was abandoned. The Danish supporters stared in disbelief at the screen which read “Sweden win 0-3”.

A result which reflected the game as a whole would have been the 3-3 it looked to end with. A dramatic Swedish win could have been effected by the awarded penalty (Poulsen really should be thoroughly ashamed of himself) and put the game in the history books. But nobody wanted this great game to be abandoned because of bad security and bad breaches of said bad security. Just bad. UEFA have yet to confirm the outcome, of course, but it looks set to be awarding the win to Sweden. And I will just remember this game for the 88 minutes of marvellously entertaining football – skill, speed, tactical manoeuvring, passion and glorious mistakes.

Denmark
Sörensen, Jacobsen, Gravgaard, Agger, Kristiansen (Andreasen 35), Rommedahl, Jensen (Grönkjaer 62), Kahlenberg (Bendtner 46), Poulsen, Jörgensen, Tomasson.
Goals: Agger, 33; Tomasson 61; Andreasen 75

Sweden
Isaksson, Alexandersson, Mellberg, Hansson, Nilsson, Wilhelmsson, Linderoth, Svensson, Ljungberg, Allbäck (Bakircioglü 80), Elmander (Rosenberg 74).
Goals: Elmander, 6, Hansson 21, Elmander 26.

Attendance: 42083
Referee: Herbert Fandel

England efforts

Whenever I watch an England game these days, especially if I haven’t written anything before reading the paper, I feel more like analysing what other people are writing, and how, rather than the game itself. When it comes to Premiership games I usually feel as though I have watched the same game as the reporters (not always, but usually), when it comes to England – not so much. Firstly it seems as though everyone had their eyes on Beckham, intent on scrutinising his contribution and hail it either as the knight (yes, it may happen, headlines already going mad) in shining armour, saving his country – or an utter failure to add to the manager’s many shortcomings. As good old David played well it seems we are going with the former option.

I, of course, was mainly interested in seeing how Ledley got on, and hence had a completely different focus. What I saw of the game was a pretty decent but rather uninspired and somewhat defensive performance which left the strikers a bit alone – and the goal coming from a Beckham set piece. Have we seen this before somewhere? Joe Cole for all his stylish moves didn’t contribute much substance and could have come off sooner – Downing brought more action in. I would have preferred Crouch to Smith, probably for the full 90. Steven Gerrard was a one-man midfield, it has to be said, but I would still like to see him play with a strong holding midfielder (not Frank Lampard) – as it was he had too much defending to do. Jamie Carragher is a waste a right-back, through no fault of his own. He just isn’t one. Shorey did well on his England debut. And Beckham did play very competent football, not just with the set pieces. John Terry was great as, I think, was Ledley. I felt that the two of them played well with each other, covering the ground well and cleaning up nicely. Ledley made the odd (three?) mistake, but was a joy to watch. It can only get better against Estonia, a game which he should certainly (?) be selected to start in. Jermaine Jenas came on for Beckham for the final minutes and had little opportunity to make an impact, but Robbo was on fine form and made some nice saves when he wasn’t reduced to just watching the game – which was most of the time. I look forward to new matches and developments - and for the first time in a few months, so it would seem, do fans and manager...