Introduction: St Totteridge: recent results
| Season | Tottenham | Arsenal |
| 2012/2013 | 5th | 4th |
| 2011/2012 | 4th | 3rd |
| 2010/2011 | 5th | 4th |
| 2009/2010 | 4th | 3rd |
| 2008/2009 | 8th | 4th |
| 2007/2008 | 11th | 3rd |
| 2006/2007 | 5th | 4th |
| 2005/2006 | 5th | 4th |
| 2004/2005 | 9th | 2nd |
| 2003/2004 | 14th | 1st |
| 2002/2003 | 10th | 2nd |
| 2001/2002 | 9th | 1st |
| 2000/2001 | 12th | 2nd |
| 1999/2000 | 10th | 2nd |
| 1998/1999 | 11th | 2nd |
| 1997/1998 | 14th | 1st |
| 1996/1997 | 10th | 3rd |
| 1995/1996 | 8th | 5th |
And now to the tale…
By Don McMohan
Now that the Football season has finally come to a grinding halt (as witness England playing meaningless friendlies with Ashley Cole as captain), it is time for a great folktale to be told:
Once upon a time on England’s green shores, there was a Brave Red and White warrior named Robin Van Persecuted whose band of merry outlaws roamed the Emirates forest, snubbing their noses at the other outlaw bands and assorted miscreants who generally stole from their loyal fans. Every year they poached the best outlaws from wherever they could and laughingly sold their best in order to remain in the game and to make a small profit.
Suddenly, Brave Robin was captured by the evil Northerners known as the mancs and once converted to their wicked ways, merrily robbed his former tribe and earned much silver as a traitor and sycophant of their robber baron leader Sir Axel Funguson.
This betrayal supposedly meant that the Red and White clan was doomed to eternal mediocrity because their talisman leader was whisked away, thereby condemning his former compatriots to run around like headless chickens for the remainder of their days.
Well, despite the most dire predictions from the pundits and ¨experts¨ , the great sage, magician, and mage Artistic Winner, whose role was to protect the R&W band from evildoers, cast a spell which brought four braver and nobler freemen to the Emirates glades. Oliver leGrande, Lukas the Pole, Saint Razorla and Natty Manreal slotted into the band and along with Theology Wall-Cot and The Ox, The Ram and the Cheezer, earned more loot than previous seasons and lost less, especially in their final 16 adventures!
What this seemingly dire and fatal defection actually did was to teach these fine lads that teamwork and sharing of the glory actually gets one further than a one man show. In the neighbouring village of Totteringham, this lesson was learned most painfully as the mob known as the Hotspam were pipped at the post by our stellar crew and for the 17th time in a row, and were thus condemned to miss the great Joust known as the Champions Layabout. Their best outlaw, Gotouton Bail, despite his best efforts, was unable to secure his beloved Totts anything more than a token, 2nd class Thursday night in Europe.
Meanwhile the local authorities, known as the Fools Association continued their pretence of keeping the peace and maintaining Law and Order in the realm, while in reality they were fearfully and blindly ignoring serious foul behaviour and lawbreaking by, among others a certain Callous McMisfit of the Wigan township.
They even ordered that a group of young women, known as the Doncaster Rovers Belles were to be ejected from the local social network and deemed to be a coven of witches, all on an apparent whim! Interestingly enough the beautiful Red & White women, led by Maid Mary were crowned the Queens of the local social network after a stunning display of grace and charm on the weekend past.
Well, thanks to the collective effort and impressive expertise of their brilliant mage, their resilient and committed boys in the band and their ever supportive Islington townspeople and fans worldwide, this band of merry outlaws ended their latest adventure richer, more unified and more confident than in anytime since their glory days of Invincibility.
Robin Van Persecuted was successful in the short term and got what he wanted….a shiny silver trinket. However, this never-ending story has many more twists and turns to come so stay tuned for further instalments.
I’ll have some of what you’ve been drinking please 😉
Well-written. I would love Arsenal to win some trophies this year and prove to all our ex-players that they would have been better off staying.
Imaginatively written! (But for purposes of credibility I think you mean St Totteringham)?
The only way such is justified is to win trophy this season.
The tale of RVP (henceforth known as BSR), as sung by his minstrels
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYFefppqEtE
Cool
Haha, …… and some of what you have been smoking!
Nice one!
Would be interesting to pull from the archives some of the articles saying what all the doom mongers were saying after van persecuted left. Yes we have lost key players before, but came back strongly, you’d think these would have learned not to write us off by now. I wonder if van persecuted feels really satisfied by his medal, somehow I doubt it.
And some of what Don has been smoking while drinking!
In the meantime I will continue my Barling pipe-full of St Bruno Flake with a glass or two of Calvados (and figure a way for a further bank loan in order to continue smoking and drinking).
The final epl tables in the last four seasons say one thing and impel us to do another. Spurs have considerably narrowed the gap between us and they,along with other two or even more teams,seriously pose a threat to our fourth place ambition(since we have descended this much). We must bring in quality additions to augment our excellent policy of developing our own.
I am about to smoke what he just did, I might try my hand at story telling too.
Rich: didn’t you notice every name and reference was slightly altered?
Nice read. GFL!!!!!!
I am still laughing my head off……hahahahaha
I hope our tale doesn’t get a new villain this Summer. The fabled hero of yore who wore the number 4 (sorry!!) and left the realm of Les Emirates to visit his Grandmother in his native land, now appears to be ready to return to the island of the Britons. Rumours he plans to join the Mancs abound. Such treachery would surely shatter the legend of the Spaniard.
Tell me it’s not true!!!!!
Only one week into the silly season and we’re all barking mad 🙂
Roll on August
Agree brilliantly written and thank you for bringing some welcome joy to this dull Pre Season.
Tottenham have clearly closed the gap, however for years now we have been operating financially with the hand brake on. I clearly recall how everyone was saying before we moved to The Emirates that the cost of moving would mean no Silverware and no place in the ECL.
There was also a lot of noise about the impact on AFC of the latter, many were saying that we would be left as mid table team with a beautiful half full stadium for years to come.
All of the main media pundits have been proved wrong, and not one of them has come out and stated their predictions were wrong.
If Tottenham do ever manage to build a new Stadium it will be interesting to see how they cope. As has been covered here many times all clubs that have paid for their own move have been relegated from the division they were in, with one notable exception!
If we are to believe what the Club are telling us that we can now compete financially then the future looks very bright indeed.
I do have a friend who follows Tottenham home and away and he admitted to me what a great job we have done, also said that the last 2 seasons have been devastating for them in terms of being so close to being able to finish above us. Its 2 seasons running now and not only have we twice got the ECL £40m, its 2 lots of £40m that they did not get.
From RVPs perspective, I doubt he really cares, he had the opportunity to become a legend with us, but chose not to. £10m for 5 years is a lot of money to turn down. I hoped that as we had stuck by him through his injuries there would be an amount of loyalty from his side, but sadly not.
Good un Don…and nice addition Dec!
A bit of light humour. Tottenham are our local rivals and it’s OK to have a spot of fun. I don’t think anyone here underestimates them as is evidenced by the unanimity with which we hope for squad improvements.
Good laugh Don.
Also Brave Sir Robin.
Nice one Don, just what I needed after getting home from a really boring day at work. Cheered my poor brain up.
Ahhh, what an absolutely brilliant read. More, more, more!!!!
@ Dec, I’m sure no.4 won’t turn up at old toilet – we usually add sell on clauses, and Barca would want to maximize their return so it would be most cost effective sending him back to us.
Excellent – a good epitaph for Sir Axel.
Wonderful stuff!
A good old chuckle indeed. And then when the laughing stops you realize we didn’t actually have a great season.
Perhaps we can all get over RVP leaving now. It’s sort of getting tired. He’s gone, get over it.
Now who are we signing this week, Cavani, Bony, Hummels, Van Der Wiel?
Thanks everyone……Rupert, we did have a great season by beating the Spuds to 4th and showing what we could do given the right motivation (the last 10 games) but in terms of what heights we need to target, we aren’t there just yet….but we will get there!
This summer will tell us what we can expect next season…the first one where SAF won’t be on the bench!
I heard Wenger say that we have made a deal for Messi, Ronaldinho, Falcao, Rooney and Villa in exchange for Squillaci, Park, Arshavin, Denilson and Bendtner….but apparently they are only rumours from Sky Sports.
The memory of the departure of RVP lingers on! Call the Arsenal season ticket renewal number on 0207 7043607 and while you’re on hold you can listen to a rcording of comentary glorifyng one of RVP’goals for us.
See my email to the club below and the club’s reply.
What do you think?
Hi Membership Team,
Please get someone to turn off the recording of the commentary of Robyn Van Persie scoring one of his goals for Arsenal. He’s a gona not a goona!
I appreciate that it may not be your department but please take the time find out who loads the recorded commentary that plays the on hold message on this number 0207 7043607 where fans ring in to renew .their season tickets.
It would be nice to hear from you that this has been done my telephone number is 01252 510881 or simply email.
Thanks in anticipation
Chas Groves
Membership Number2603178
Dear Mr Groves
Many thanks for taking the time and trouble to email us your thoughts and concerns.
As I am sure you can imagine we do get many thousands of emails and letters regarding the manager, the board, the squad, the tactics etc.
The Club has advised that the points you raise regarding the holding commentary celebratory goals by RVP amongst other players, has stressed that RVP has been a huge success for the club and is a part of Arsenal’s Club history and we are and should be proud of that and although RVP departure to Manchester United has caused some strong emotions amongst supporters the club have no intention of removing the recording.
I apologise that we are unable to comment any further, however your comments have been noted.
Kind regards
Diane Anderson
Contact Centre Correspondence Team
Arsenal Football Club