At Spurs nothing is constant apart from distress

It’s a confusing time to be a fan of the lilywhites. The only constant appears to be that nothing is constant; not least performances and results. The weekend’s painful loss at the hands of the pragmatic Portuguese Jose Mourinho might bear resemblance to certain other displays of Spurs self-destruction this season. However those were months ago and months apart; much has changed in between each of these dismal results so surely there can’t be a pattern?

City put six past us in November, Liverpool helped themselves to five at White Hart Lane in December, City then greedily took their goal difference against Spurs this season to 10 at the end of January and finally Chelsea stacked on more misery in March (hadn’t we suffered enough?). In between these demolitions Spurs’ performances have varied violently from losses to West Ham to beating Man United to losing to Norwich to beating Everton to drawing with Hull to thrashing Newcastle at St James Park.

Does the side that made it so easy for Chelsea on Saturday bear any resemblance to the one that just a couple of weeks earlier picked itself up to put on a great comeback against Juande Ramos’ Dnipro?

And does the side that embarrassed Newcastle away even play in the same league as the one that drearily drooped to defeat at Norwich?

On top of the inconsistent performances we have changed our manager (surprise, surprise), brought Emmanuel Adebeyor out from “the cold” and suffered various injuries/gained players back from injury.

[linequote]Why bother theorising after every game when the next one will just require you to go back to the drawing board?[/linequote]

In short; it is extremely difficult to discern any sort of pattern. Everything changes so much that a pattern seems impossible.

Those unwise enough to have bet on Tim Sherwood’s men this season will testify that nothing seems to happen twice in a row at Spurs in 2013-14. Fans can therefore be forgiven for being more than a little lost and perhaps struggling to keep up with it all.

Each time somebody presents a seemingly solid theory explaining Spurs’ latest performances along with an accompanying blueprint for success the pro’s will put in a couple of baffling performances that discredit said theory. It’s as though they do it on purpose.

To this problem I present a ground-breaking solution; why bother? Why bother theorising after every game when the next one will just require you to go back to the drawing board? I only have so many drawing resources with which to go back to the board.

Surely it would be more beneficial just to support the team rather than explain it and its results (we must have learned by now that explaining Spurs is possibly more difficult than explaining zips to Arsené Wenger)?

They say the game can turn on its head at any second and this does make one wonder; is there really any point in the fans searching for ways in which to improve Spurs when all the circumstances they considered will likely have changed before they reach their conclusion?

The professionals whose jobs are to improve Spurs can’t seem to figure out how to do it so what hope to we have? It seems particularly pointless when you consider that most theories developed usually culminate in disproportionate anger directed at somebody within the club. That benefits nobody (and club scapegoat Kyle Naughton might agree with my preaching here).

[linequote]The professionals whose jobs are to improve Spurs can’t seem to figure out how to do it so what hope to we have[/linequote]

Of course, discussing the game is part of the fun of it. We all enjoy discussing our club with fellow and opposing supporters (except maybe after a day like Saturday) and I don’t dispute that.

However, in the current climate where each week at Spurs holds more twists and turns than we can bear, we simply do not know what is going on and what the club should do in the future. It’s futile to discuss what we do not know and whilst this doesn’t mean we should not discuss Spurs at all it does mean that we should be discussing things we do understand such as moments of brilliance or hideous mistakes or the merits and demerits of certain players.

Merely cheering the team on and only discussing what we can understand seems a much less angry and much less difficult way of supporting Spurs than guessing what’s going wrong (its often going wrong unfortunately) and how to fix it. It’s certainly a more relaxed way to support than to constantly complain about anything and everything which is what aforementioned guessing often leads to.

[linequote]All this considered; blind love appears to be the most appropriate course of action for fans of Tottenham Hotspur these days[/linequote]

Furthermore, less theorising would also likely benefit the club itself. A set of supporters that cheer the club on regardless of the score and regardless of the politics would go a long way to making White Hart Lane a fortress; imagine the security our players would have knowing that the crowd will not get on their backs and the extra boost that constant support would give them.

Fortress White Hart Lane would undoubtedly be a more enjoyable place to visit and it would bring the results that we crave. It would probably also do away with the inconsistency that plagues us currently.

All this considered; blind love appears to be the most appropriate course of action for fans of Tottenham Hotspur these days.

I’m not suggesting we must give up our theorising completely; just that during this turbulent time we should tone it down a bit and maybe take each game as it comes. Then once Spurs begin to do something consistently other than being inconsistent (why do I feel that will never happen?) we may once again start to speculate as to why.