Jim Duggan's TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR site

Danny Kelly has written an excellent article which is reprinted here.

HOW much longer must the agony go on? From the day George Graham was appointed - presumably as some kind of two fingers from Sir Alan Sugar to a crowd who have questioned not his commitment, but his understanding of football - I have predicted disaster for Tottenham. But little did I know that the slimy, bung-taking, arrogant twerp - Graham, not Sugar - would actually try and blame Spurs' fans for his own shortcomings. But that's where we now are. Each of his public statements is now a classic of ass-covering, self-aggrandisement, blame-shifting and provocation. Following last night's debacle at the hands of Birmingham - to whom, no disrespect; they did exactly what was required when confronted by a Tottenham team without organisation, heart, idea or flair - Graham issued another lengthy statement. It is so cold-heartedly disregarding of both the feelings of Tottenham fans and the truth that it needs repeating and refuting. Here then is what this spineless fool said, and what right-minded folk need to know about his words... ''This is the kind of situation I've not had to cope with since my early days as a manager down at the bottom of the old third division with Millwall...'' Wrong! You never faced any such situation at Millwall. At Millwall, you had not just overseen the thick end of £30m worth of spending on poor players (Freund) or once-good players now reduced to drifting rubbish under your tutelage (Perry, Thatcher, Sullivan, Sherwood). At Millwall, you did not have regular crowds of 36,000 paying the second highest admission prices in the country to watch and financially support your team. At Millwall, you did not have a squad that included 15 full internationals (and that's excluding the four sold over the summer!). ''...But I turned that situation around and I'm determined to do the same thing here. I know there are some fans who will never support me purely because I was once Arsenal's manager but I think that is their problem, not mine.'' Straightforward provocative nonsense. Of course your being an ex-Arsenal manager, and supporter, is important, but not for those pathetic reasons. It's important because it means that you can never know what it's like to love Spurs, and it's important because it allows you to believe that Spurs fans will settle for the awful football we're currently being served up provided it's vaguely successful. Well, buster, you are wrong. And in any event, we don't hate you because you were once associated with Arsenal (where your personal dishonesty went far beyond the trousering of several hundred thousand pounds; older Gunners fans will remember the 1971 FA Cup Final where you pretended to have got a touch to Eddie Kelly's goal against Liverpool; your basic character was obvious even then); we hate you because you are creating a terrible team at Tottenham and poisoning the atmosphere at the club in the process. ''I still believe my biggest failing at Tottenham is in not being able to beat the injury jinx that seems to have been on the club's shoulder for years. I thought I could conquer that, but I haven't been able to do so.'' Disingenuous. Every club gets injuries; properly run ones cope with them. Tottenham's ground holds almost the same number of people as, for instance, Arsenal's, and more than Chelsea's.
Why have they got good squads while ours is bordering on the pathetic? The answer here is actually down to Sir Alan Sugar. Alright, he admits to knowing little about football, but surely even a dimwit could work out that teams composed of parts of the French World Cup '98/Euro 2000 winning side is liable to do better than one made up of Wimbledon old boys. ''In the first half we were very poor, especially defensively. It was embarrassing and probably the worst performance since I've come here. It was a strange atmosphere in the ground right from the moment we kicked off. The players' body language showed a lack of confidence and although the fans are having a go at me and the chairman it is clearly affecting the players.'' The usual Graham trick of trying to blame the fans for the performance of players who are paid a fortune to perform and who he is paid a fortune to organise and motivate. There are hardly any Spurs fans at the away matches - and we've managed one point on our travels all season! ''I can only repeat what I've always said. That it is not going to happen overnight here.''
Spin. And ass-covering. The above is what you were saying when you took the job, over two years and 100 matches ago. In a similar time frame Arsene Wenger, for instance, turned a mid-table Arsenal team into Double winners. That's because he's a modern manager who understands the global game, whose glory days are not in the dim and distant and whose main tactics have not been swept away by the introduction of new laws pertaining to offside, the back pass and the tackle from behind. ''I could go out tomorrow and spend money on rubbish just to make up the numbers but what would be the point?'' Duh!!! Simple answer; don't buy rubbish. It is not compulsory to buy rubbish! Chelsea murdered Spurs at the weekend then went out and bought an £8m left-sided midfielder to try and address a perceived weakness in their side. Note: their search for a good player took them slightly further afield than Selhurst Park!

''It is clear that we can only hope to be competitive with the top teams when we have all our best players available and that's certainly not the case at the moment although until last night we have been very strong at home. I know that a certain section of supporters will never have the patience I want them to have but the fact is we are presently in a position of living from game to game, trying to get key players fit again and holding the fort until the next setback. But I honestly believe that whether it is me or somebody else managing the club it would be just as difficult. We've just got to soldier on and keep working for a break.''

Blah blah blah. Same old drivel. George, and Sir Alan, this hypocritical nonsense has been going on long enough. The third-highest paid manager in the country has - in two years and 100 matches - produced a team that could, by Christmas, be the third worst in the Premiership. On top of that, the self-serving manager has engendered an atmosphere that is dividing Spurs fans, and causing actual trouble in the stands (I was witness to one argument ten days ago that ended in violence).

Who should replace him? It doesn't really matter just now. Anyone who genuinely cares about Spurs would get a better response from the players and the crowd than this terrible man. David Pleat. Glenn Hoddle. Steve Perryman is out of work. Chris Hughton. Even poor old Joe Kinnear.

Honestly, I really believe that Sugar could do worse right now than get rid of the creep and let Stevie Carr run the team. At least he actually cares... and would be very happy to be earning anything like what Graham is holding down!