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The only thing Bale left were glorious memories of a wonderful footballer, goals that we all dream of scoring, a man who made our club be noticed internationally, who won games almost single handedly, and thrilled us all with his skill and made us proud to support Spurs. He left us with 80 million in the bank and a profit of around 74 million.Bale is the only current world class British player. I watched a showreel of his Spurs goals and they were all quality. He is up there with Hoddle and Gazza in terms of talent, although he is not so much an artist as a machine.
I think the manner in which he left is the reason Spurs fans are in two minds about him.
Jimmy Greaves, no shadow of a doubt. How many points have we dropped because we haven't got someone who is ruthless in taking chances. I love Harry but even he would admit he's not in Jimmy's class - in fact, I don't think anyone gets close to his goals to games ratio.So as an aside to this thread, if you could airdrop just ONE of our previous players, at their peak, into our current squad, who would you bring in?
Not acknowledging King as a spurs great is a bold statement Vince, i think you're probably in a club of one. He played over 300 competitive matches for us.I was born in 82. I remember Italia 90 as my significant football following moment. So, a group of best Spurs players of my life time are:
Gascoigne
Ginola
Bale
Modric
Linekar
Klinsmann
Armstrong
Berbatov
Carrick
Davids (although he was over the hill with us)
Lloris
Sheringham
Waddle
I don't acknowledge King or Anderton as Spurs greats because of their injury/fitness issues.
Toby and Jan will probably be remembered as greats but generally I'm keeping the jury out on current players, with the exception of Lloris who is the best goalie I've seen in a Spurs shirt.
I have to be honest I am too young to have seen him play live, but the archive footage of him shows he was a player of his age, good for the standards of the day but appalling by modern standards. Greaves and Mackay stood out and you can see they were different. Hoddle also stood apart from mortal players in his day. If Hoddle was active now he would be at Real Madrid and the Spaniards would be creating a new religion around him. He would have made Zidane at his best clean his boots.That seems to under-rate his contribution immensely. When he played for us, he was widely considered the best player on the team, including Greaves.
Anderton, perhaps, but I think King's ability to play through his injuries makes him unarguably a Spurs great.I don't acknowledge King or Anderton as Spurs greats because of their injury/fitness issues.
I appreciate that Gazza, Klinnsman and Bale were more impactful players but there was something so magical about Ginola who lit up many an otherwise dire Saturday afternoon in the late 90s.
From a defensive point of view King was such a rock. Harking back to Ginola era it's hard not to appreciate Carr despite the farcical career decision he made to join Newcastle.
My Dad, who only started watching properly after the double winning side, would put Greaves, Ardiles and Hoddle in there too.