This is distressing viewing. Unless of course, you’re the sort of person that doesn’t regard what happens on the pitch as the ‘be all and end-all’, and take a deeper satisfaction looking at the wider picture. Like going to the Tate Britain and coming away not lauding the majesty of Turner’s work, but instead telling people you felt the introduction of the Wine Cellar was a ‘game changer’.
Bill Nicholson once said that it was magnificent to be in Europe, and this club – a club like Tottenham Hotspur – if we’re not in Europe… we’re nothing. We’re nothing. Lord only knows what he would have made of the way clubs are run in the 21st century. Money coming out of Tottenham’s ears, and yet under Mauricio Pochettino the Champions League final was an embarrassment as the Argentine was fielding his best XI that had already run out of steam. Now under Mourinho, we’ve just been ejected from a lesser competition, it’s difficult to know on balance, which experience was more humiliating.
All that currency sloshing about and neither side able to live up to their cosmetic appearances. A crying shame for all concerned. Well, nearly all.