At 9 pm last night Tottenham published a ‘club announcement’ advising that Spurs had joined Europe’s leading football clubs.
By 1055 pm Tottenham’s ‘club statement’ was a short recording of a monotone voice saying vehicle reversing with intermittent beeps. The dream was over.
What transpired behind the scenes? What caused the clubs to lose their nerve in such a short space of time? I am confident that The Athletic will provide a 6,000-word explanation in due course. The reality is, it was nothing to do with fans hurling rattles, dummies, and full nappies from their prams.
There’s a good summary of who said what in this Press Association piece which gives us a good indication of who will be wandering around like Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore in the forthcoming weeks.
We’ve heard much talk of pressure – but unless I missed something – all we got was a lot of wailing and presumably a lot of irate emails. Is that all it took to stop a commercial revolution? A bunch of stiffly worded letters from outraged consumers?
The climb-downs have been essentially unapologetic, with Spurs apologizing for the anxiety and upset caused.
The Arsenal apology was exceptionally devoid of warmth. The sort of thing a stroppy teen would proffer.
I take a view that this is a massive opportunity missed for Tottenham, but what I really want to know is what was it that caused the plug to be pulled, because as things sit right now, none of this stacks up at all.