A Very Tottenham christmas

With a glimpse back to the wonders of following Tottenham in Arctic conditions and how the lads have fared on the twenty fifth of December in past years. Stick in there 1911 is worth waiting for. What ever your faith or otherwise, Christmas is a time of peace and goodwill. A time to spend with your loved ones. Which might explain why so many of us put on as much clothing as possible and leave home to face the elements of the British winter to follow our team.

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For those India Spurs fans who haven’t enjoyed the pleasure of a London winter. The joy of watching your team in dreadful conditions is one of the great adventures in life. We would wrap up and wear as many socks as our shoes could hold. One year a friend of mine actually worn his big brothers shoes as he could get another few pairs of socks on! Then we put on as many jumpers as possible, even when it meant walking around with your arms stiff as you couldn’t bend them.

It could be a lot worse, teams use to follow a full programme of fixtures on both Christmas and Boxing day’s. Quite often meeting the same team home and away. Traditionally it used to be local derbies over a bank holiday in an attempt to avoid fans traveling the length of the country when public transport was at its lowest. Although peace to all men never spread as far as West Ham.

The Christmas Day fixture list had been long consigned to the history books before my time. The English winter evenings still carry the menace of frostbite. I do remember one evening game at Arsenal in the 70’s in November when it was so cold that the steam coming of the crowd reaching the stand roof and reverted to rain, inside the stand. That wasn’t so bad as we were jammed in unable to move, just wet.

As we tried to leave at the end of the game ice had actually formed under our feet and people were sliding and doing their best not to fall. If they had then it could have been a disaster with people being trampled in the crowd. Oh happy days.
These days Christmas is marked by the fans staying in front of the fire whilst the team trains.

1948

In 1956 we had a morning match with Everton. Bobby Smith and Terry Medwin both got two goals, Alf Stokes added one and Tommy Harmer (Harmer the Charmer) added a penalty. Nearly twenty eight thousand had turned up to watch the destruction of Everton 6-0. This was our equal biggest win over the toffees. The next day another 20,000 turned up for the return at Goodison Park and George Robb scores in the 88th minute as we draw 1-1.

Another high scoring festive fixture came in 1952 as we met Middlesbrough. When they equalised to make the score 1-1 in the first half of the First Division fixture at the Lane, there must have been hoping to take something home with them. Santa  was wearing blue that day and four goals from Les Bennett, two from Len Duquemin and one from Eddie Baily saw Spurs win 7-1.

Family folklore says that our wingers Les Medley and Sonny Walters played out of their skins. Les Bennett should have had even more but was actually injured scoring the first goal and spent most of the game on the wing!  That must have been a very long enjoyable trip back to the North East.

Spurs V Everton 1969

Tottenham played their first Christmas day fixture in 1894 and over the next 64 years played 54 times. Christmas Day one hundred years ago Spurs actually had the day off.
That first game was a friendly with Sheffield and District which we won 7-1. The first competitive game was two years later when we beat Millwall 4-0. Sweet revenge for them beating us the previous year in a friendly.
Friendly with Millwall doesn’t sound quite right some how.

1963

In fact we played Millwall and Portsmouth seven times each on this day. Portmouth were our opponents six times in seven years starting in 1899. The teams had 1904 off. Jimmy Banks helped himself to a present with a hat trick in the Millwall game of 1917 in a another 6-0 win. Other notably games on this day, 1926 sees a 1-1 with United, the year before Tommy Clay scored his first goal for us as we lose to Birmingham. While in 1936 the 4-0 away win at Blackburn was a club record.

The first Division One game fell in 1909 and started with a 2-2 draw with Nottingham. Debut boy George Robb scores in a 3-0 win at Charlton in 1951. Our last Christmas day clash was away at West Ham in 1958 when we lost 2-1. This result leaves Spurs just above the drop zone, although we would climb to 18th (from 22 teams). Bobby Smith scores our last Christmas Day goal.

Leaving the best to last in 1911 we welcome a South London team called Woolwich Arsenal to the Lane in a first division match but we don’t give out any presents. The 47,000 inside the ground, and another 10,000 locked out see us win 5-0. The heroes that day were Billy Minter with two, Bert Middlemass, Jabez Darnell and John McTavish.

TV crews have problems too. John Motson talking to camera.

The only other time we played the South Londoners on this day was when we visited them in 1897 and a crowd of six thousand enjoyed our United League win 3-2. Goals from Joyce 2, and Stormont see us finish runners up that season above Woolwich.

With Seasonal Greetings ! Or as Tiny Tim might say ’And a Very Tottenham Christmas  to us all.‘
Thanks to THFC, THOS, Top Spurs, Bob Goodwin Complete record, Phil Sour official history, Getty Images, South Carolina Spurs, Amazon, BBC

About the author:
Keith Harrison, Nilgiris, TN
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