The Times’ Oliver Kay has written in his most recent article that ‘the consensus among the media pack who travelled to Milan was that Tottenham escape the more frenzied scrutiny that some of their Premier League rivals might attract after a third consecutive defeat.’
Say what?
It has long been suspected that the media had something of a soft spot for Spurs. This isn’t an Arsenal-bias thing, although I’m sure that’s in play somewhere, but when you compare their coverage to the likes of City, Chelsea, or United there is a massive difference in how they are treated by large sections of the media.
Although he wrote the above line, Kay’s article was headlined ‘Mauricio Pochettino is not under pressure – but he needs to stop the rot at Tottenham,’ which is just remarkable. Here is a manager that has never won a trophy at a club that hasn’t won anything of note since the League Cup a decade ago who are supposed to be ahead of Arsenal now in terms of their ‘bigness’. I mean, who really cares about the League Cup apart from Tottenham fans?
Against Inter, Spurs bottled it once again to turn an impressive three points into an embarrassing defeat with just a few minutes on the clock to see out. It’s standard. Spursy. That’s three defeats in a row, now, and two of them from a winning position.
“There is none of the fin-de-régime narrative that was unavoidable during Arsène Wenger’s final years at Arsenal,” Kay continues, oblivious to the pressure that was heaped on Wenger for a full decade before he left, not just the final few seasons.
Drink driving, sex tapes, and bending the rules of the game. It’s been quite the 2018 for Tottenham, their players, and supporters, but would any other club get away with this much scandal?
Hugo Lloris is sorry, Dele Alli is probably secretly chuffed, Christian Eriksen is refusing to sign while Daniel Levy is furious. For the rest of football, however, we’re all wondering how one club manages to remain the media’s darling despite a series of scandals that would see many others castigated relentlessly.
They are, of course, scandals of varying degrees of seriousness. You cannot compare being arrested for drunk driving with the leak of a sex tape but the collective value of everything that has happened at Tottenham this calendar year should result in significant pressure from the media to sort their sh*t out.
In case you’ve forgotten what Spurs have been up to in 2018 off the pitch, let’s recap some of the events and milestones the media don’t seem that bothered about…
Club captain guilty of drink driving
Someone who is meant to lead by example, there is simply no excuse for anyone caught drink-driving these days. We know how stupid it is and every offence should come with a compulsory, lengthy ban from driving.
Mauricio Pochettino was said to be ‘very, very angry’ with his captain but not angry enough to strip him of that honour.
No editorials followed demanding Spurs make an example of him.
Star forward in sex tape
I don’t want to have to think about it either, but you and I know we’ve all seen Dele Alli’s knob and that is not something anyone should have to say.
Why did we watch? Because it was out there, but did it cause a ripple in his world? Not at all, if anything, it helped enhance his reputation the way it would have ruined a woman’s had she been the star.
Christian Eriksen refusing to sign national team deal
We all got to watch John Jensen manage a team of Superligen players turn out for Denmark after Christian Eriksen and his mates refused to sign a new image rights deal with the Danish FA.
Is he being accused of holding his country to ransom? Is anyone saying playing for your country shouldn’t be about money or image? What do you think?
Pushing EFL to allow them to play at MK Dons
Spurs got their way and will play their home tie in the Carabao Cup at the MK Dons’ stadium which could be their third home ground of the season. There are rules in place to stop this sort of nonsense, but they don’t seem to matter as the authorities bend to help Tottenham out of a sticky situation that is entirely of their own making.
Spending over £1bn on a stadium that was meant to cost £400m
Most building projects run over schedule and over budget, apart from the Emirates but they had Arsene ‘Economic Whizz’ Wenger in charge of that. But it really is a special effort to increase costs by 150%.
You’d also expect, if you’re paying £1bn for anything, somebody would be able to give you an idea of when you might be able to use it. The management of this project has been shambolic from Tottenham and it will be fans who have to pick up the tab.
Claiming their new ground would be the only place to watch Champions League football in London this season was just a little cherry thrown from Levy to the Arsenal and Chelsea fans.
Not winning a trophy for 10 years
Normally big clubs come under pressure to win things. Arsenal’s trophy drought became the lifeblood for many papers around the five-year mark and the pressure ramped up exponentially every year until they finally lifted a bit of silverware. Even then, it never eased off as the media goalposts simply moved.
Spurs haven’t won a trophy in 10 years, and that was the League Cup. To find an FA Cup win you have to go back to 1991 (27 if you’re trying to count and ran out of fingers and toes) while we all know you have to go back to before colour television to find a league title win.
There has, of course, been some pressure on them, but probably not even as much as they put on Chelsea the year they didn’t win the league but acted like they did.
Conclusion
What I see here, unlike quite a lot of people, mostly Arsenal fans to be fair, is not a media that favours Tottenham. Rather, it is one that treats them normally, with the right amount of hyperbole when truly warranted which is, less face it, not that often.
We can wonder, then, why they get hysterical over certain players and clubs. Mesut Ozil, Paul Pogba, and Raheem Sterling are just three who must be wondering what the headlines would have been had they indulged in any of these activities.
But the question here isn’t really why are the media so nice to Tottenham? It’s why are they so f**king awful to so many others that we think they are?
The second part of this article first appeared on Paddy Power