Bolt-on entertainment

The match was definitely entertaining yesterday: 4 goals shared, monsoon conditions followed by sunshine followed by gale force winds, a comedy of errors in defence and a novelty linesman who seemed to have forgotten his glasses and rule book. The best thing though was this poor bloke they sent on at half time. The tannoy is so bad at the Reebok that I didn't catch his name but you had to feel for him. He ambled around in the centre circle singing his head off while the bulk of the Bolton fans and all the Spurs fans laughed. Between songs a chorus of "shall we sing a song for you?" rang out between playful boos which, to his credit, he had a laugh about. It was the little, jiggy dance that he did that made me wince most. I bet, unless he's really skint, he won't accept that invitation again.

I know this is lazy

....but yesterday at the Villa (2-1- Yes!) there was some lovely banter between the two sets of fans. One or two were doing that snarling and agressive 'I'll kill you' type of thing but mainly it was fun. At least that's how it felt to us as we were winning the whole game.

I was trying to find the words of one of their chants because it sounds like it's quite inventive but the exact words get a bit lost in the Brummie accent. I couldn't find it but I did come across this.

While I'm (back) on the subject of noise and chants, Stan Collymore said in his commentary that 60,000 at the Emirates feels like 15,000. It's not just us Spurs fans that call it the library.

Chants of the season
By Chris Charles

Music

Middlesbrough (Bon Jovi's Living On A Prayer):"Ohh! We're half way there! Ohh-ohh! Aliadiere!"
Man City (Pink Floyd's Another Brick In The Wall):"We don't need no Phil Scolari,We don't need Mourinho,Hey! Thaksin! Leave our Sven alone!"
Bishop Stortford (Toni Basil's Hey Mickey - sung to St Albans goalkeeper Nick Eyre):"Hey Nicky you're so fine, you're so fine, you're two behind, hey Nicky!"
Arsenal (The Jackson 5's Blame it on the Boogie):"Don't blame it on Henry, don't blame it on the injuries, don't blame it on the referees, blame it on Eboue!" (notice how their chants are directed at their own players- weirdos)
Man Utd (Black Lace's Agadoo):"Anderson-son-son, he's better than Kleberson,Anderson-son-son, he's our midfield magician, To the left to the right we'll dance the samba beat tonight, He is class, our midfield brass, and he dumps on Fabregas!"
Newcastle (The Beatles' Let It Be):"When we find ourselves in times of trouble, Kevin Keegan comes to me. Speaking words of wisdom, Geremi!"
Tottenham (Elvis Presley's The Wonder Of You):"That's Ju-ande, Ju-ande Ramos!"
Everton (Black Lace/The Tweenies' Music Man):"I am the Music Man. I come from far away. And I can play (what can you play?) I Play The Pienaar! Pi Pi Pi Pi Pienaaaaaar!"
Chester (The Outhere Brothers' Boom Boom Boom - to Simon Yeo):"Boom, boom, boom, let me hear you say Yeo, Yeooo!"

Blackburn (Christmas standard Santa Claus Is Coming):"You better watch out,You better beware,He's good on the ground and he's good in the air, Santa Cruz is coming to town."

WHAT DO YOU LOOK LIKE?
"You're just a fat Paris Hilton."Arsenal fans to Liverpool's Andriy Voronin.
"There's only one Tina Turner!"Doncaster's big-haired Jason Price gets the treatment from Forest.
"You're just a fat Annie Lennox!"No More I Love Yous from the Spurs fans to West Ham's Dean Ashton.
"There's only one Roland Browning."Bognor Regis fans taunt big-boned Eastleigh sub Steve Watts.
"He's big, he's Scouse, he looks like Mickey Mouse!"Sheffield Wednesday fans take the mickey out of Franny Jeffers.
"You're supposed to be a gnome!"Millwall fans to Northampton's pint-sized full-back Danny Jackman.
"Sit down, Pinocchio!"Spurs fans to Boro boss Gareth Southgate.

Yesterday Ashley Young got 'You're just a shit Aaron Lennon'

GALLOWS HUMOUR
"Que sera sera,Whatever will be, will be,We're going to Forest Green,Que sera sera."Newly-relegated Wrexham fans against Hereford.

"Can we play you every week?"Man City fans while 6-0 down to Chelsea.
"Can we play you every week?"Man City fans while 7-0 down to Middlesbrough. .
"Easy! Easy! Easy!"Man City fans when the score reached 8-1. (all credit to them- I was told they were conga-ing around the terraces too)

"We're going down in a minute!"Gillingham fans at Leeds.

"Who needs Mourinho, we've got Dave Pacio."Droylsden fans get behind their manager as they finally win their first game of the season - at the 14th time of asking.

"We should have stayed at the funfair."Watford fans after going 2-0 down to Southend.

"Let's pretend we've scored a goal!"Bradford City fans during a 3-0 home defeat to Accrington Stanley, followed by all participants going crazy.

And a few more:

"Does your livestock know you're here?"Colchester fans to Norwich.

"We can see you washing up!"Swindon fans to the occupants of the flats in the corners of Leyton Orient's ground.

"I love Tottenham more than you!"Spurs fans to their loved ones back home while watching Tottenham on Valentine's Day in Prague.

"Are you Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch in disguise?!"Wrexham fans.

"Does your butler know you're here?"West Ham to Fulham fans.

"Can we play you every week?"Havant & Waterlooville fans when 1-0 up against Liverpool at Anfield in the FA Cup.

"Vera's dead, Vera's dead, Vera's dead!"West Ham fans away at Man City following the death of the character Vera Duckworth in Coronation Street.

"You should have banked with The Woolwich!"Derby fans to Northern Rock-sponsored Newcastle.

Re: post below

...just in case you're thinking that this noise thing (in the post below) is a new phenomenon and Spurs position is a one off : http://www.metro.co.uk/sport/football/article.html?in_article_id=73059&in_page_id=43

Post script 28th Oct: Just seen this in the Mirror. Wenger's been having a go at the Asenal fans again. Seems he's blaming it on the recession this time! http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/2008/10/24/arsene-wenger-attacks-quiet-arsenal-fans-for-making-emirates-new-library-115875-20834046/

Normally I'd hide a long URL like that but there's something poetic about the wording of it. Can you hear the Arsenal sing? No! No.... etc.

12th man

Spurs fans describe the Emirates as 'the library'. This worked slightly better when the arses played at Highbury but the suggestion of silence irritates them for sure. We know they don't sing much because it's hard to when you're downstairs eating the almost proverbial corporate prawn sandwich so really they can't be blamed. Layer on top of that the number of fee paying clients from overseas in the pricey seats who have yet to master the offside rule let alone songs in a foreign language. I happened upon this though in the paper yesterday. It says it all really. Les Arses not even in the top ten. They're somewhere below Boro which is, frankly, very very embarrassing. Spurs are a creditable second in the decibel chart. Most of that is me and the boy, by the way as we are embarrassingly noisy.

Me and the boy were up at Stoke last Sunday and they really do crank up the volume sometimes. I'd still say we sang more and for longer but the noise when they did get going was impressive. So, despite all our woes and all the mockery, Spurs fans are doing the team proud. When you think about it, it's the only thing you can do as a supporter. The jibes about the team's quality are hollow and meaningless when they come from some lard arse waste of space who's done nothing more than shovel pies and pints down his throat all his miserable life. Jibes about the other team's 12th man are the only ones that count in my book. This is probably why two of Spurs' favourite chants are 'is that all you take away?' (referring to the number of empty seats in the small away section at the Lane) and 'shall we sing a song for you? (to the same tune, so no points for creativity).

Amusingly, Bolton only had about 100 fans at the Lane yesterday and this is after Bolton provided FREE transport to London. The only song they sang was about their manager Gary Megson and how he pleasures himself (not quite in those words). How must that make the team feel? Team captain is heard to shout: 'Come on lads, listen to those forty fat blokes telling the boss he's crap... what more motivation do you need?'

Stoke's football style seems to be something like this: kick the ball down either wing, hope it's cleared for a throw in, get Rory Delap to throw it really really hard into the penalty area. They've scored three times from that method this season but teams are gradually wising up. I think they'll need something more than that and the 12th man if they're to survive. At the game against Man City yesterday the City fans were singing:

We've got Robinho

You've got the long throw

The only thing that let Stoke down really was their crap attempt at a 'United against racism' message. Nothing wrong with the sentiment and you could travel a long time before coming a cross such large sections of overtly racist fans (and that was from the mouth of one of their stewards) but the organisation of the coloured cards was embarrassing. No point in me describing it; have a look at the shambles for yourself:

Going back to my original point: you often hear opposing fans singing 'You only sing when you're winning' to each other. Considering Spurs have only been winning once this entire season, that's a charge that can never be levelled their fans.