A Bridge Too Far for Tottenham Hotspur?

(From left to right) Tottenham Hotspur's Harry Kane, Toby Alderweireld, Eric Dier and Mousa Dembele look dejected after Chelsea's Gary Cahill scores his side's first goal during the Barclays Premier League match at Stamford Bridge.

The fact that Spurs received NINE yellow cards (and I welcome the fact that, at last, a Spurs team are showing some grit) is seen as evidence that, when Chelsea ‘spoiled their chances of catching Leicester’ the boys from White Hart Lane threw their toys out of the pram.

What rot! Like the rest of the country, they knew that that boat had long since sailed, and that only an unprecedented (if you exclude Devon Loch) implosion could prevent Claudio Ranieri’s heroes from coasting home.

The games which sabotaged the Lilywhites’ chances were at White Hart Lane against those giants of the Premier League, Newcastle United (0-1) and West Brom who actually (like Finn Harps at Brandywell) ventured out of their own half ONCE to score an equalizer!

Those five lost points would have left us LEVEL with ‘The Foxes’ – and with something to play for. No, the Chelsea fireworks had an entirely different genesis. Like 99.9 per cent of the rest of the country, the Spurs fans, and players, hate the Chelsea ethos – or, in this case, lack of ethos.

The Stamford Bridge herd have worked very hard, especially during the Roman Abramovic dictatorship, at making themselves detested so, when they are so successful at it, it ill becomes them to whine about it.

And it just so happened that, with the tension of the league race virtually over, abandoning the discipline shown all season to have a couple of free hits was an inviting prospect.

So am I justifying the actions of a team kicking the opposition up in the air? Not at all. It’s just that, in this particular instance, I’m prepared to make an exception.