Not A Bed of Roses

“Oh Danny Boy, the gripes, the gripes, appalling.”

I’ll give our MIA left back this much—he’s in a profession when the window to earn serious, life changing money is only open for so long. Can any of us proclaim with certainty, presented with the same career options, we wouldn’t try to maximise our income?

But can you leave the stuff about Mum at the door, please? If you want to go slumming with the Donnie Rovers and eat home-cooked meals every night, then best of luck to ya. “Up north” just happens to coincide with two of the three clubs in England who seem to have unlimited coin. Isn’t that funny? Walker jumped to one of them, and maybe Rose will go to another.

But not this year. Bully to Levy and Poch if they did fine Rose two weeks wages, and presumably laid down the law in a manner which produced a) an apology and b) some penance in a meeting with the Club President. Whether or not we fully agree with Levy’s stated philosophy or not, the fact is you can’t have one of your players wrecking the wage structure in one fell swoop, and certainly not one who hasn’t even played in seven months. There are by my count 11 real quality footballers on this side—not counting Davies, Trippier and Lamela. Nearly all are under 30 and many under 25 and if you pay one of them at closer to market value, they all should and would come calling expecting the same treatment. It matters not if we are compromised by the debt servicing of the new stadium—unless and until this club rises to the top of England and/or Europe—and then stays there for more than a cup of coffee—we cannot hope to match the turnover of at least four other clubs in the Premiership.

Now as to the signings, or lack thereof, I too fret and moan and worry. Trippier’s injury on the heels of Walker’s exit only sharpened those concerns. But then I sit back and think, a la Arya Stark and her list of deathly targets:

“Dier…Wanyama…Son…Alderweireld…Vertonghen…Lloris….Eriksen…Lamela…Dembele…Davies…Trippier…Dele—every one of them came from elsewhere. We can bitch about Sissoko (deserved), Janssen (I still take a wait and see approach), N’Jie (not sure what that was about) and the Bale haul (and let’s be honest—counting Eriksen, Lamela and even Chadli and Capoue—that is really just a gripe about Soldado) but the truth is the club management given the budget they must follow has done extremely these past five years. So if it’s Barkley and/or a defender and a young forward, I’m good, even if it’s at the stroke of midnight at the deadline.

Once again Spurs, despite the best record in the league over the past 76 games, have slipped into 3^rd, 4^th or worse in the experts’ estimations. Good. Disrespect us. I like it that way. Beat Newcastle and Chelsea and we’ll see what they say then. And how Danny Rose is feeling about his situation. And besides, if he’s really dying to go back North, I know of a club he is familiar with, and where the supporters like him, that would love to have him back. He’d be a terror in the Championship.