TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR STADIUM — Over the last few days, you will no doubt have heard a variance of the idea that Tottenham Hotspur deserved this torturous day. I wanted to sit among their supporters for a few hours because the point is this: the owners may have long had this coming. These people did not.
Theirs is the ultimate triumph of hope over experience. After so much pain endured, it is a happy ending. “Believe, believe, believe,” they were told at kick-off. They will play Premier League football next season and this can never, ever be allowed to happen again.
At full-time, tears of disbelief. Delirious hugs with strangers. Buckets of sweat on the hottest, most fractious day of the year. It takes nearly losing something to realise what it means.
The Russells have been coming here for 30 years. “This week I got the all clear from prostate cancer,” Norman tells The i Paper. “It would have been unfortunate to have a heart attack four days later.”
“This is the most sick and nervous I’ve felt,” says Ben. “Am I allowed to swear?” asks Naomi. “Please Spurs – don’t ruin my f***ing life”.
The news of West Ham’s first goal trickles through with dread. The second half is needlessly delayed. The air is sick with it: “we can’t have nice things”.
They had climbed lampposts and scaled bus stops to welcome the team bus, a sea of navy-white mist and a coronation normally reserved for league champions.
That they lined the streets in such numbers speaks to an unfailing loyalty, when so many have felt exploited, taken for granted, described as “legacy fans”. They have been derided by virtually the entire country and theirs is the last laugh. “Tottenham away, ole ole.”
This has been the home of genuine distress and the relief feels all the more palpable because so much of the pent-up angst has been building for years. The club of Greaves, Gascoigne, Hoddle, Kane, reduced to this. So many fear Tottenham Hotspur will never be what it was.
The fact Spurs fought this battle as the ninth richest club in the world can be cast aside for now. Even the cultural vandalism this grand old club has suffered can be forgotten for a few hours. Spurs are staying where they belong.
On the whistle, a banner called for “change”, one last hollow scream into the void. Nobody is convinced these owners have any inclination to change. It simply cannot get worse.
So it had to be like this, one final scrape over the line from Joao Palhinha. You can feel the air plummet from the lungs in real time as Everton surge forward with nine minutes of stoppage time and Antonin Kinsky is the hero again.
“An overwhelming feeling of relief,” Callum Lidington tells The i Paper. “We deserved that.”
“Once this fades, we cannot forget how close this club came to disaster,” says Ben Overlander. “And slightly painfully,” adds Solly Jackman-Overlander, “we did it the Arsenal way: 1-0, a goal from a corner.”
It has been hard to maintain a sense of humour through all this. On the PA system, they have tried, every home defeat ushered out with Stereophonics, “I don’t know where we are going”, and from Harry Styles, “you know it’s not the same as it was”. Well… quite.
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Amidst the misery has been the resurgence of a song I believe is the perfect serenade from any fan to their football team: Barry Manilow’s Can’t Smile Without You. I feel glad when you’re glad. I feel sad when you’re sad. If you only knew, what I’m going through.