By Tony Attwood
- The appalling side of football neither clubs nor media will ever admit to
- The three worlds of English football – and why you don’t hear about them
When Arsenal players play for their countries, all one can do is hold one’s breath and hope they come out of the experience without breaking anything. Indeed, with England’s game yesterday, we got that with Declan Rice continuing to be Declan Rice with some wonderful displays of how to push forward from midfield. Saka of course, scored a great goal and looked in stunning form.
But most importantly, as far as we know, neither was injured. And interestingly, both players got the same top ranking from the media while some some like Neco Williams and Joe Rodon were hammered by the press. But there is always a chance that these press commentaries will then affect them in club matches, which yet again shows why clubs should unite to stop the automatic right of countries to steal their players – but the media love something to write about, so I have no hopes for a change in the near future.
The manager of course, criticised the fans (it’s always our fault, never his) as did the media (“The stadium was silent”, says the Guardian), but of course it was, when you compare the quality of the game at Wembley with what we can see most weeks watching Arsenal.
Besides, just how much noise would be generated if Arsenal played against Crewe Alexandra in the League Cup and charged the sort of prices Wembley had the nerve to demand last night? But of course, journalists don’t pay to watch the games, so they don’t understand such nuances.
Elsewhere, we have the headline that “Spurs get £100m cash boost from owners with promise of more to follow” with the implication that just spending money will take a club higher up the league. There is of course, no evidence for this, although there is evidence that the reverse is what mostly hapens to Tottenham. As the table below shows
Tottenham are currently third in the league while and the last time they were third after seven games was 2022 when they ended up eighth. The time before was 2020 when they finished seventh. In fact, only once in the past five seasons has Tottenham improved on its league position after seven games by the end of the season, and that was in 2021.
| Pos | Year | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts | End |
| 3 | Tottenham Hotspur today | 7 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 13 | 5 | 8 | 14 | |
| 9 | Tottenham Hotspur 2024 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 14 | 8 | 6 | 10 | 17th |
| 2 | Tottenham Hotspur 2023 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 17 | 8 | 9 | 17 | 5th |
| 3 | Tottenham Hotspur 2022 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 18 | 7 | 11 | 17 | 8th |
| 8 | Tottenham Hotspur 2021 | 7 | 4 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 10 | -4 | 12 | 4th |
| 3 | Tottenham Hotspur 2020 | 7 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 18 | 9 | 9 | 14 | 7th |
Of course, coincidences do happen, but perhaps this does look like a little bit of a pattern. The odd one out, incidentally, was Tottenham in 2021 when they had a miserable start and were sitting eighth after seven games with a negative goal difference. It was pretty hard not to improve on that!
Now obviously one can’t predict this season based on the six previous campaigns, but it is interesting that there is a near universal view that Tottenham have now turned a corner and will be significant challengers for the title or maybe other trophies at the of the season. It is certainly what the media looks forward to.
Meanwile our fingers and legs are crossed in the hope that at least half of the players involved return in one piece.
Spain have taken David Raya, Martin Zubimendi and Mikel Merino
England have tied up. Eberechi Eze, Bukayo Saka, Declan Rice and Myles Lewis-Skelly
Italy have removed Riccardo Calafiori’
Norway, fortunately for us, can’t punish Martin Odegaard further by playing him while injured.
William Saliba is now back and fit after his long lay off and so of course France have got him in their squad, ignoring any issues he might still be carrying
Viktor Gyokeres is in Sweden‘s squad with no word of thanks to Arsenal
The Netherlands have Jurrien Timber
Denmark have taken Christian Norgaard
Gabriel and Gabriel Martinelli are in the Brazil squad and so will be adding to their air miles collection.
And if you thought that was a load of overkill don’t forget that Cristhian Mosquera is with Spain’s under 21s and Ethan Nwaneri is in the England under 21 squad.
Thus, it is not unreasonable to wonder just how many of these players will be sent back fit and well, and how many will come with the preverbial note, “sorry about your player – just make sure he is ready for the next break”.
That next break actually occurs only a few weeks later – between the 10th and 18th of November. And then there is a very tiny pause before players are called up for the Africa Cup of Nations, which runs from 21 December to 18 January. Just when clubs need their players for league and cup games.
One day, one day, the clubs are going to get together and say, “Hang on a minute, who pays the wages of these guys?” And when they do they will have my full backing (not that that counts for much, but I will be pleased).
