One of the challenges of having a job which consistently involves lengthy and often deep consideration of documents is a gradual erosion over my adult life of reading books for pleasure or personal knowledge. Terrible admission, but true.
January 23, 2017 11:28I'll still read, vociferously so, on holiday but during the other 48 weeks of the year? Very little.
Until now.
My passion and thirst for reading has been reawakened. Thanks to Spurs. Or more specifically A People's History of Tottenham Hotspur by Martin Cloake and Alan Fisher. There's something fitting in that given my Mum will often remind me that as a kid I was slow to read and only really progressed by consuming myself with Spurs match reports on the back-pages of the newspapers.
A People's History of Tottenham Hotspur made me laugh, smile, reminisce, once or twice it gave me pause to think about a perspective the nuances of which I'd not appreciated previously, but most of all it made me very proud of the club I support. Bursting with pride actually. Of the institution is was, of what its become and becoming, of what it means for so many different reasons for so many people from such a plethora of different backgrounds.
The book's exploration of the impact fans have had on the Club and the impact the Club has had on fans was both a fascinating and informative historical journey, it also reminded me of the weight of responsibility those of us involved bore when establishing the Tottenham Supporters Trust (and the moment in time opportunity that in hindsight was missed to embed fans as corporate as well as emotional stakeholders) and the continued responsibly we exercise through the Tottenham Tribute Trust, yet another in a long list of examples of innovation from the Club and its supporters on and off the field of play.
The book deals sensitively with aspects of fan culture including the hooliganism of the 1970's and 1980's and the more recent 'Yid' topic. No David Baddiel, it's not the Y word to me - there is a fundamental difference morally and in law when a word or phrase is used with hateful intent as opposed to with pride. I'm a Yid and proud, in every respect, and there aren't many places these days you can express that without fear, but I can at the Lane.
One of the often mentioned facts in the book was something obvious but when seen it writing it makes the current season even more poignant: until this season's European games at Wembley, the club had never played a home competitive fixture more than 600 yards from the second lamppost on the right on the High Street under which the lads of the local cricket club met to form Hotspur FC. Marrying this sense of history and location with the need for modernisation in an era of multi-billionaire investors is a tough juggling act but somehow the club has navigated those waters (despite the ill-advised dalliance with Stratford), and now in the week when more spectacular images and information was released about the new stadium, Pochettino explained during his pre-Man City press conference how "it would be amazing, one of the greatest achievements in the history of the club if we could win the title in our final year at the Lane".
Now that would make a good book!
Jonathan Adelman is a season-ticket holder at Spurs, and also co-manages North London Raiders B in the MGBSFL