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Can't smile without you

A few weeks ago I suggested that Spurs weren't Spursy anymore. In the weeks that have followed, the team collected league win after league win and then lost an FA Cup semi-final, despite playing well. Old Spurs would surely have then suffered a mental and physical collapse in the aftermath. Dropping points like confetti. But not new Spurs. Not Pochettino's Spurs.

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Two London derbies in a week, two victories, two clean sheets - and despite Everton not doing us any favours this weekend (The title will almost certainly evade us this season), the pursuit of Chelsea will be down to a solitary point if we can add a third london scalp next weekend at what was the Olympic Stadium. 

That the second of those victories was against Arsenal, and ruthlessly comprehensive was something that no Spurs fan will forget. Not just a victory, not just bragging rights, not just finishing above that lot in the league, not just a step closer to a highest Premier League finish, not just the maintaining the pursuit of Chelsea, not just a +49 goal difference, but importantly a fitting way to mark the penultimate game at White Hart Lane.

The old lady is drawing her last breathes, the lingering notion that she might be spared for a further season was finally dismissed on Friday afternoon. The club announced the move to Wembley for 2017/18 and the 'decommissioning' of the Lane in the hours after the 'finale' against Manchester United.

The passing of a much loved family member, scripted and choreographed, compete with her own hashtag #theLanetheFinale 

This final north London derby at the Lane, just like so many before was a deeply family affair - traveling with mum, sitting with cousins, uncle and friends made over nearly 25 years sat in the same seat on the same wooden floored square foot or two of the East Upper, with its picture perfect perch on the halfway line. I will miss that view, that perfect height and position to watch my Lilywhite clad heros, the familiarity of those sat behind, in front and next to me - as they by and large have been for my entire adult life.

I write these words now, filled with sadness at a change not yet upon us and yet inevitable and inexorable in its approach. It's not merely the familiar bricks and mortar, the view and the people, nor just the memories of which there have been so many both good and bad indelibly etched on me. It's the knowledge that whatever great new memories are made, there is now only one final opportunity to experience and help create the uniqueness of the rumble of stamping feet on the hollow floor of the East Upper - the noise and vibrations that tell me, I'm home, with my people, in unison.

With all that emotion flying around it's likely that Old Spurs would have delivered a damp squib farewell on the pitch, an exit stage left with a murmur. But this group of players and management just seem to have their rhythm in sync with the universe. They are 90 minutes away from completing an unprecedented unbeaten home season - a record all the more remarkable given it currently features a 16-game winning streak. Only Manchester United stand between this team and home turf invincibility. The Lane is taking her last breathes but she's going down in a serious blaze of glory.

During the game the strains of Can't Smile Without You rang out from the Park Lane - whenever I hear that chant I think of my old friend Darren Alexander who sadly passed away a few years ago at an age no-one should. He fought hard against the move to Stratford, to keep Spurs in Tottenham and I doubt there would be anyone more proud of how this final season at the Lane is shaping up. 

As for the NLD itself, there will be many column inches written on the match itself. Suffice to say that the 20 spell starting with Alli's opener was like watching a pack of lions take down and then rip away at the carcass of a lame zebra left behind at the rear of its herd. But for the excellence of Cech a one-man barrier against wave after wave of Spurs pressure, it could easily have been five or six at least.

The final score may have been 2-0 but make no mistake, it was a thorough drubbing. One win doesn't mark a shift of power but the fact that it's now more than three seasons - before the Pochettino era - since Spurs were defeated in league battle against the south London Nomads tells its own story.

At the final whistle it was noticeable, for the first time, that many of us lingered for a few extra minutes, a few extra renditions of "Oh When the Spurs" - more than a few wistful glances back over the shoulder on the walk out.

For the last 18 months we've seen the new stadium develop from a big hole in the ground to the ever rising concrete and steel now dwarfing the Lane. We've all know it's been coming but the announcement on Friday that confirmed it has suddenly made the loss of the Lane very really, and very raw.

Can't Smile Without You feels all the more apt.

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