Lessons Learned.

24^th August 2010 - Tottenham Learn Lessons
from the ‘Double’ Team



Harry Redknapp’s Tottenham Hotspur team 2010 did their
utmost to emulate Bill Nicholson’s great ‘Double’ winning team in their first
foray into European football’s top club competition for forty nine
years. Unfortunately, it was not one
of that team’s outstanding performances that they tried to copy but rather
one of their poorer and most surprising defeats.



In season 1961-62 as reward for winning the 1^st
Division title for the second time in their history, Spurs took part in the
European Cup, the fore-runner of today’s Champions League, which had been in
existence for only six years and had been the preserve of Real Madrid who had
won the first five competitions.



13^th
September, 1961

European Cup (1^st
Round 1^st Leg)

Tottenham were drawn against Polish champions, Gornik
Zabreze with the first leg away from home.
In front of a hostile 90,000 crowd Nicholson played his full strength
‘Double’ winning team and to their horror they were three goals behind at
half-time. In the opening seconds the
home side hit the bar and then were gifted the lead after eight minutes
following a defensive error leading to an own goal. Gornik attacked at will and Spurs made
numerous errors and went further behind on twenty minutes. Mistakes continued and a third goal came
just before half-time. Two minutes
after the interval, having failed to learn from the earlier mistakes, Gornik
were presented with their fourth goal.
The hostility of the crowd increased with Tottenham’s robust tackling
which saw their team reduced to ten men as one of their players wentoff
injured.



Twenty minutes from time the Tottenham revival started
with the battling Dave Mackay making a run and cross that enabled Cliff Jones
to head a goal to reduce the arrears.
Four minutes later Mackay created a second with a cross that Bobby
Smith knocked down for Terry Dyson to score.
With no substitutes in those days Gornik Zabreze were reduced to nine
men when their young centre forward went off injured twelve minutes from
time.



As Spurs left the pitch to booing and whistles, the
Zabreze coach said that they had played many foreign teams but this Tottenham
side was the hardest he had ever known.
However, Bill Nicholson was confident Spurs would overhaul the Zabreze
miners in the second leg at White
Hart Lane.
Desmond Hackett in his match report for the Daily Express wrote: ‘This was Super Spurs reduced from champs
to chumps in ninety uneasy minutes.’



Team: Brown; Baker,
Henry: Blanchflower (Capt), Norman, Mackay; Jones, White, Smith, Allen,
Dyson.



17^th
August, 2010

Champions League (4^th
Qualifying Round 1^st Leg)

After waiting so long this was Spurs’ opportunity to make
a positive start towards the new world of the Champions League group
stages. But what a start – inside four
minutes Tottenham had seen Young Boys of Berne hit the post with Heurelho
Gomes beaten, had Benoit Assou-Ekotto booked for tripping and conceded a goal
which encouraged the Swiss team and their vociferous supporters to even
greater efforts. Unable to settle on
the artificial surface the Spurs players were tentative in their passing,
unsure of their movement and looking in some disarray. This increased after thirteen minutes when
a defensive error from Michael Dawson allowed the Berne
striker through on goal to finish coolly past Gomes. After half-an-hour Spurs were three down
when the defence was caught out by a through ball and Gomes had no
chance. This was not in the script as
perceived by the Spurs faithful many of whom had anticipated a safe passage
past the ‘no-hopers’ from Switzerland. However, it was very much in line with the
copycat performance of events in Poland forty nine years earlier.



Harry Redknapp introduced Tom Huddlestone before the
interval and this brought an element of control to the Spurs play and for the
first time in the game they weren’t chasing around hopelessly but started to
exert some pressure in the match which resulted in a number of corners ahead
of the break and from one of them Sebastien Bassong atoned for this defensive
short-comings by heading the first Spurs goal.



The second half showed Spurs with more control but despite
early possession they were unable to add to their goal tally. The Swiss continued to be dangerous on the
break and could have increased their lead but this time, fortunately for
Tottenham, they were not as clinical in their finishing. Then with seven minutes remaining Roman
Pavlyuchenko who had experience of playing on a similar artificial surface
with his former club but had had a very poor evening in Berne,
received a pass from Robbie Keane and hammered an unstoppable shot inside the
goalkeeper’s near post. Now, only a
goal down Spurs settled for what Harry Redknapp described as a ‘great
defeat’.



Team: Gomes;
Corluka, Dawson (Capt), Bassong, Assou-Ekotto (Huddlestone); Dos Santos, Palacios,
Modric (Kranjcar), Bale: Defoe (Keane), Pavlyuchenko.



Lessons Learned

In 1961 against Zabreze Bill Nicholson was unable to make
any immediate change in personnel as no substitutes were permitted but he
realised that for the away European Cup games he couldn’t afford to play the
same style of football that had brought the ‘Double’ team such success in
domestic competitions. In future away
ties he introduced Tony Marchi as an extra defensive security. He had played football in Italy and his experience played a
vital role in Spurs future progress.



Harry Redknapp was fortunate that with a bench of
experienced players he had the opportunity to try to correct the failings
identified early in the game against Young Boys. Huddlestone contributed greatly to the
control that Spurs took of the game after his introduction and the other
changes saw the manager work with a narrower midfield rather that the more
extravagant wide players of Giovani Dos Santos and Gareth Bale. With Luka Modric and then Nico Kranjcar on
the left of midfield they came inside much more and allowed Bale to attack
from defence.



The Outcome

In 1961 the return leg introduced the football world to
one to the first of those great ‘Gory, Glory European Nights’ at White Hart Lane. In an electric atmosphere, Spurs hit the
bar inside thirty seconds and took the lead on nine minutes with a Danny Blanchflower
penalty. Cliff Jones terrorised the
Gornik defence and scored a first half hat-trick in seventeen minutes but the
visitors also managed to grab a goal to keep their hopes alive. Before half-time Bobby Smith scored and
Spurs were 7-5 ahead on aggregate. In
the second half Smith added his second, Terry Dyson scored number seven and
John White completed the scoring with a minute remaining to make the score
8-1 for Tottenham.



Having followed the 1961 script so closely for the away
match, it is to be hoped that Tottenham 2010 will get their lines right in a
similar fashion next week to ensure the club make it into the lucrative group
stages of the UEFA Champions League and that the fans don’t have to wait
another forty nine years to experience competition at the highest level in
European football.



Come On You Spurs



Logan
Holmes