Talking Tottenham - Best Of - Volume Four

Welcome to the latest roundup of some of the better bits from Talking Tottenham just in time to take your mind of dreadful weather and brighten up your festive / new year celebrations, (sound of party poppers).

So as we used to introduce TT every weekend - And in a packed complication programme tonight, we have guess the waxwork, great Tottenham haircuts of our times, once again (well twice actually) the club follow where India Spurs lead, there are some of your favourite silly pics, a few quotes and I recall what happened when I ran into Peter Crouch.

Lets Talk Tottenham.

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And that top waxwork is of course Paul Gascoigne (yes it is) and there are more (recognizable) Tottenham waxwork stars later, but first one of the items that ran over a number of weeks during Talking Tottenham’s run was great ‘Tottenham Haircuts’ where we looked at some of the great fashion statements our boys have embraced at different times from the bright red which then rapidly turned blue to the Spurs blond bombshell. We featured styles from Defoe’s zip look to Waddles mullet via Huddlestone’s slightly over enthusiastic ‘not being cut too I score’ appearance, and weren’t we all glad when he finally did. I’ve included some of the ones that provoked the most replies. Starting with Kyle Walkers ‘No, that’s the live wire look’.

On my last trip to the rather disappointing Spurs Shop I noticed they are now using Parfitt Payne’s art work on several items. Young Parfitt produces some interesting retro looking images mostly for clubs in the midlands but he does get around.
We featured some of his work a good while back, and there is one below,  so rather well done to the chaps who agreed with us his work called out for a wider audience.

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Once again where India Spurs lead the marketing department follow. Which brings me back to something I thought we had heard the last of. Way back when Talking Tottenham was learning to tie its boot laces we asked if they had considered following a few other clubs and producing an e-programme. They said they had and it was still being worked on.

When we asked at the start of this season if there was any movement they told us the idea had been dropped. My lawyers still have the email in case they try to deny this. So despite interested fans from Asia, Europe and South America as well as England the idea looked dead. So what a nice surprise to see what they are now promoting. Thanks for listening chaps.

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Apart from everything in the World of Hotspur I dug out a number of different images to brighten the weekends whilst we waited for kickoff.

I've included a couple that drew witty replies, and a repeated / belated ta to everyone who joined in the fun. Feel free to add your thoughts now if your not to shy you little rascal. This first one proving what I’ve always believed that Celtic have a lot of plastic fans.

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And this one - ok I said turn the sprinklers off now.

Talking Tottenham also liked to keep an eye on the media and we did like the twit that appeared when THFC asked for saluting tweets, at that time Erik Lamela had not been seen for a long time ‘You tweet us a picture of Lamela holding today’s newspaper first so we know he is alive.’

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The other thing to do before a game is to curl up with a good book. Here are two we included in these early days. The famous White Hart Lane Mystery involved a murder and robbery of the box office on match day and I still don’t know who done it so no spoilers please.

The other work of fiction (below) from Norman Giller not just one of the top sports writers but also a Spurs man and our own Jimmy Greaves, its football Jim, but not as we know it!

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We revealed that former players Steffen Freund once worked as a locksmith and Terry Medwin had been a car mechanic before joining us. Now as I have to sign in as someone else it does mean I don’t always get to see all your comments, I suspect that’s one of the reasons people direct message me rather than sharing with the rest but, anyway this trawl back through the TT’s of time gone by has had me stumbling over a few. Also with the weather currently playing mayhem with the internet and Face Book, I try and respond to everyone but if I’ve missed you then do feel free to take me to task whilst we wait for the mega wizard chappies to eventually sort the problem out and I shall make amends.

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In an attempt to cover every aspect of our club over the last few years we included these wax figures of our legends brought together for the first time, have your admission fee ready please. 
First up is Jimmy Greaves. He is followed by Jurgen Klinsmann below.

Next up another bright moment with TT was when I was in the lounge at Heathrow and Stoke City walked in, off on some pre-season trip, why do footballers have to travel in their track suits is it to stop them wandering off and getting lost, maybe they should put them all on leads! Anyway I looked him in the eye, yes I was standing on a chair, and wished him a good season as long as Spurs stuffed them twice. He had to stop and have half a dozen shelfies taken whilst he was eating. I considered telling Shawcross and Huth what I thought of their use of GBH to compensate for their lack of footballing skills but neither looked like they were very happy at the time so I decided not to bother them.

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Whilst we are all very excited about how the team is doing and the future of our great team its vital that we remember the vast wealth of our heritage and we were delighted that blue plagues were erected too two players that played important but very different roles in our history.

Danny Blanchflower and Walter Tull were so honored by various historical groups. Both players have been featured in our Hotspur Towers series. I did also contact English Heritage who are responsible for blue plagues around London and nominated Bill Nicholson however one has to say that respond was somewhat discouraging.

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Talking of Stoke there was this picture of their ground in 1963. I invited captions at the time, I did receive email one asking why were the fans on the pitch ?

Talking T had a number of quizzes, competitions etc including the short lived Goal of the Month. Then when Barbatov said he wanted to go into movies we asked you what roles you could see various players taking, apart from Dimitar and Dracula. Still open to ideas there…

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Hair today, gone now Sandro turns blue.

One item that did gather a few responses comments was the random quotes gathered over the years, so here for those who missed them the first time are a few more from the dust covered shelves.
 
Jimmy Greaves and Cliff Jones discussing Garth Bale in his early Spurs days and Cliff said he had been talking to Bale and “and he’s got something about him. But I don’t think he’s a left-back, like they’ve been playing him, he’s going to be a bloody good winger.”

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David Pleat said in 1998 “One of my big tasks here is to keep the mediocrity away. Tottenham in the last few years have signed mediocre players.”
Which seems a little at odds with what Les Ferdinand said just the year before “If things go according to plan I wont need to move to a bigger club because Tottenham will be big enough, if we add to the squad we can challenge for the championship in a year or two’s time.”

I don't know about you but this goal line technology still seems to be having a few problems.

As we mentioned Blanchflower, this is what Danny said when he was asked if players like Glenn Hoddle were a luxury in the team, “Hoddle, a luxury? it’s the bad players that are a luxury.”

Danny was always willing to speak his mind, once when a  club director said to him “Your trouble is you think you know all the answers” he replied “Oh Bless, you don’t even know the questions.” 

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Last one in this collection goes to former deadpan comedian Les Dawson who delivered the line “White Hart Lane is a great place. The only thing wrong is the seats face the pitch”.

Its only fair after that top picture that we end with one of young Gazza in a more serious mood.

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You remember last summer I invited your input on the future of TT and what quickly became the readers panel who were amazing brill, (I like having someone to blame) anyway we were going to get together but unfortunately the tandem they were traveling on had a puncture so maybe later lads, in the meantime don’t forget to catch up with the first three volumes of ‘TT, best of’ and we will be having another delve into the Talking Tottenham’s glorious past in not too distance future. So do chip in any thoughts on these golden moments, go on you know you want to really, so from here in the hilly hideaway to you out there in the modern day.

And don't forget to follow the links below for up to date info as the scribbles appear.

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COYS
Keith Harrison.
t- Keith 16024542
f- peter shearman (old non de plume)
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