No more Roller Coaster.
To the Stars and beyond next season.
To the Stars and beyond next season.
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The JimmyG2 Column.
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So how was it for you our last 'home' game at Wembley and our 1000th. in the Premiership? A crazy way to finish the season and then some. It's football Jimmy G but not as we know it.By the end as goal after goal went in during the 'nine goal thriller' with Champions' League already confirmed I was helpless with head shaking incredulity verging on hysteria.
Third place and bragging rights over Liverpool and London secured. Next up Manchester.
This is not my usual reactions to watching Spurs which usually ranges from anger, bewilderment and frustration to euphoria, delight and deep satisfaction. Oh well a change is as good as a rest.
We played our final game at our adopted temporary home in a defiant stance which clearly proclaimed, 'We don't care how many you score because we will score more'. Though at 3-1 down on 46 minutes it looked like an empty promise.
3 goals in the first 20 minutes it obviously couldn't last. But it did and got even wilder. If this was a movie it would have been laughed out of the cinema. But it included another Oscar nomination for a youngster for the second time this season.
He's only played twice.
So what did we learn? That Kyle Walker Peters is ready to go and perhaps should have got the nod before we paid 23million for Aurier; that Moura will be a key asset next season, he had a hand in four of the five goals.
That Lamela has proved he has a role to play; that Maverick Danny Rose should stay; that Harry Kane is priceless; that top keepers can concede four goals without a stain on their characters and that the midfield needs radical restructuring.
If that performance and coming in the top three again was, in pundit speak, an example of 'bottling' it then I wouldn't mind a crate or two of whatever they're drinking.
Dier, Sissoko, Dembele and Wanyama are strong but not creative enough for a team with our aspirations and that the problem of what to do with Dier an ever present founder member of the Pochettino Revolution will loom early next season.
His Jack of all trades versatility will probably save him initially. In this context Winks has been an unfortunate loss. Toby will be a miss but not as much as first feared. Sanchez and Foyth are clearly the future.
Vertonghen and Eriksen rightly won the club accolades and Harry got his first 30 goal haul but just fell short in the quest for his third Golden Boot.
Dele demonstrated his increasing maturity in a 20 minute cameo consisting mainly of winding up the opposition with a smile on his face and running down the clock. Useful skills when deployed appropriately.
Lamela trotted forward, the proverbial Bambi on Ice, to get on the end of two measured KWP crosses. Not sure where Harry was. Probably checking on Salah's progress on Merseyside on his phone.
An uneven season beset by injuries to key players including Harry, Toby, Danny and Moussa Dembele of whom we may have seen the last.. The earlier rumours of the demise of Josh Onomah are I hope greatly exaggerated in the light of recent updates.
The focus switches now to off field matters before the US tour and the transfer window. But these are even further above my pay grade than reporting on events on the field.
Plenty to chew on though and the pre-season regrouping will tell Pochettino a lot more. His post season remarks have been widely interpreted to suggest that unless Daniel Levy relaxes the purse string he will not stay.
I think that's mostly Pundit Poppycock and mischief making and that there will be more money and that Mauricio will stay whatever. The new stadium and a third top three finish should be enough to tempt new players, retain old players and the Manager.
Pochettino himself a cautious man tactically wants us to take more risks, presumably financial ones but I'm not sure that this is high on Levy's agenda if it appears at all.
Remember that this is the blog that is not always wrong. A modest boast I know but we got the boys over the line despite widespread doubts and fears. And yes I know we haven't won anything yet except respect.
Which is enough for me at this stage of the 'Project'. Until we actually win the Premiership, the Champions' league and probably the World Cup too preferably all in the same season it will continue to be a stick to beat us with.
So happy day and something to savor over the coming weeks before we go to the USA for the the 'prestigious', it says here, International Champions Cup where we play Roma, Barcelona and Milan.
Let's hope with Mauricio that players leaving go early in the Spurs tradition of 'sell before we can buy' so that we can re-invest the money in some new young blood especially as back up for Harry and some support for Eriksen in the creative department of the engine room.
After we've looked down the back of the sofa of course to check out the Academy, the injured and the loaned before we splurge millions we haven't got with the new stadium to pay for. Keep the faith. Build it don't buy it. COYS.
Perhaps we are at last leaving the funfair Roller Coaster for a more sustained journey to the Stars and beyond.
Jimmy's Video Spot.
Nice atmospheric season review. All my favourites from Dele, Wanyama, Harry, Son, Eriksen
and beyond.