Review of the week
Tottenham boss Juande Ramos was caught speeding the other day - rumour has it he will do anything for three points.
Just one of the Spurs jokes doing the rounds as the north London club slipped to their latest embarrassing defeat, at Stoke.
And there's more: "London Underground wish to apologise for the severe points failure in the Tottenham area"; "What have Spurs and a cocktail stick got in common? They've both got two points" - and so on and on and on.
As a long-suffering QPR fan, I have seen most of these recycled gags before ("What's blue and white and slides down the table?", was a popular one in my day) and I take no pleasure in reprinting them, particularly as half of the wonderful management team here at BBC Sport Interactive follow 'You Spurs', not to mention my mum - although she "quite likes Arsenal as well".
Along with the jokes there were also a few viral emails flying through cyberspace - including the one above, under the banner 'A Win At Last for Tottenham'.
A quick flick through the record books shows Spurs' last win in the Premier League came at Reading on 3 May this year, when Madonna and Justin Timberlake were at number one with 'Four Minutes' - roughly the length of time Juande Ramos will be given to clear his desk should his side lose to Bolton this weekend.
In fact, Madonna's recent troubles mirror those of long-suffering Spurs fans - they fear their best years are behind them and are involved with over-rated directors they can't wait to get shot of.
At least striker Roman Pavyluchenko has other things to take his mind off all the doom and gloom at White Hart Lane. The 26-year-old has been elected as a Russian councillor, representing Prime Minister Putin's United Russia party.
Deputy Pavyluchenko, as we're now obliged to call him, admitted he couldn't fully commit himself but promised to offer a "concrete contribution" (it's not clear which of his two jobs he was talking about, although 'concrete boots' would be a fairer description of his time at Tottenham).
England did the business in Belarus - 'Minsk Meat' according to the tabloids - after a lecture from Rio Ferdinand tearing into the WAGs and the 'circus culture' of previous regimes. The puns have been done to death by better men than me, but if Crouchy was a shoo-in for the stilt-walker and McClaren the clown-in-chief, what price Wazza as the bearded lady?
Incidentally, did anyone else find themselves singing 'Belarus, Belarus can you do the fandango'? Nope? Must have just been me then.
Thankfully there was no repeat of the Wembley catcalls, but over at the Stade de France, the French national anthem was roundly booed before the friendly with Tunisia, much to the bemusement of the players, who couldn't decide whether they should sing along to the jaunty Marseillaise or not.
The actions were blamed on the opposition fans, but if you listen to the sheer volume of the protest, you have to wonder whether four points from three World Cup qualifiers might have had something to do with it.
In the Premier League, Fulham's Jimmy Bullard got up close and personal with Sunderland's Pascal Chimbonda, as he tinkled the Frenchman's ivories in the wall. A few thousand miles away, Carlos Alberto received an eight-match ban for "immoral conduct" after paying particular attention to his opponent's buttocks during a game in the Brazilian leagues. Watch for yourself and decide whether or not the youngster received a bum rap.
Away from football, Peter Ebdon was doing everything he could to single-handedly liven up snooker's image, swinging his cue like a baseball bat after missing the chance of a 147, and then dramatically falling to the floor after Jamie Cope fluked a snooker at the Grand Prix.
Earlier in the tournament, Ebbo mistakenly potted the brown instead of the red (steady) after admitting he was - wait for it - colour blind. And if you think that's funny, check out his bid for pop stardom a few years back with the appropriately titled 'I Am A Clown'.
In boxing, Vitali Klitschko revealed the secret behind his WBC heavweight triumph - wrapping his mits in his son's urine-soaked nappies. The technique successfully prevented Klitschko's hands from swelling, and his opponent, Samuel Peter, retired after eight rounds, when he realised the Ukrainian was clearly taking the p***.
And finally, after last week's tale of Morrissey the Milwall fan, this week it was the turn of those other 80s indie kings, the Housemartins.
Headline writers were queueing up to mark Hull City's defeat of West Ham (following earlier wins over Fulham, Arsenal and Spurs) with the legend 'London 0 Hull 4'. Expect a new chant to greet frontman Paul Heaton the next time he steps foot in the KC Stadium: "Are you Nostradamus in disguise?"
I am a journalist with BBC Sport, dealing with the more offbeat stories doing the rounds. I am a QPR fan - and also quite fond of football. If our new-found wealth brings success I'll be happy to tell anyone exactly where I was when we were sh... rubbish - row J seat 139.
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~42~RS~)
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In response to your Morrisey comment, he was actually pictures in a Leicester City shirt - so who does he actually support?!
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Hi Quarmboss - I saw that pic in one of the papers. My guess is, having no genuine snaps of Mozza in a Millwall top they decided to superimpose one on him and accidentally got the wrong shirt.
That said, when I went to see him play a gig a few years ago he was wearing a 'West Ham Boys Club' top - work that one out!
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i saw him wearing a Chivas Usa shirt once. who does he support.
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basically cant find anywhere to report a factual inaccuracy, but on your Arsenal v Fenerbache preview you say the Hoyte is avaiable for Arsenal, but isnt he at Portsmoth?
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It's Traore who's at Portsmouth. I assume Hoyte is Gavin, Justin's younger brother...
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Think you'll find quite a lot of French passport holders have Tunisia and Northern African origins. Hence some of the booing.
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Fair play for the highly risque "(steady)" joke there.
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yes it is gavin. justin hoyte is at middlesboro
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I think the picture's wrong. There is no way that Spurs would currently beat Walthamstow on current form. It has to be a road sign or something.
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Too right, Sciatika. I hear that Walthamstow is a tough place to go.....
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I think, much as it pains mean to say it, that Morrissey is actually a Manchester United fan. Growing up as the son of Irish immigrants in Manchester in the 60's, he supported his dad's team.
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"Juande Ramos turned up at White Hart Lane early one morning and bumped into the head groundsman, after chatting he noticed the pitch and said ?Senor how you keep the pitch looking so good?? The groundsman replied ?Well you do keep putting £70m of $h*t on there each week???..
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Walthamstow seem to be the only team Spurs could beat at the moment, as they have been defunct for 20 years so it should be an easy win.
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Excellent blog. Topical and full of fun. I even found most of the jokes and taunts to be new to me. Morrissey is such a miserable man he should follow the team with the most miserable manager. Does Peter Reid still "manage" clubs? Or should he follow Reading because of Coppell the gnome?
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A loss to Walthamstow and Tottenham have really gone to the dogs....
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I believe for consistency's sake, Daniel-wont-sell-to-United-oops!-I-did-Levy should fire Ramos then come to Kenya on a long Safari hunting polar bear.
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Brilliant Ebdon video, Why oh why oh why??
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Isn't Paul Heaton a Blade? and Quentin, sorry Norman, Cooke is Brighton
- so were any of the Housemartins Hull fans?
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?What does a Spurs fan do when he sees his team win??
Turns off the playstation...
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Ah! I was assuming it was the Old Forresters team that still plays. I could see Spurs beating the defunct Walthamstow team, but not the Old Forresters.
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I'm predicting a season of glory for Spurs. Not this season but the next. The Championship champions trophy is highly sought after by many and I believe Tottenham can win this one!
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8 matches for that??
Ok it was a bit wierd but 8 (final score vidiprinter style "EIGHT") matches??????
It's not as if he donned the gloves and KY and gave him a full body cavity search is it?
Or did the video miss that bit off?
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You just copied these jokes from the guardian they arent original!
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what jokes are original?
what's the difference between spurs and a triangle?
a triangle has 3 points
...sorry, had to be done
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A man was walking past the Spurs training ground. He looked over the fence and saw the Spurs squad playing football with a Hedgehog.
The man was incensed and shouted at the team "I'm going to report you lot to the RSPCA"
The Hedgehog replied "Please don't, I am winning 3-0"
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Wait, wait..............I left Walthamstow some 40 years ago to live in the USA ! Walthamstow does not now have a football team ???
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Regarding that scoreline ...
I remember that match, and 3 - 1 was only the half-time score.
Walthamstow came back to win 4 - 3 in the second half!
Now that IS a Spurs joke, but I still luv 'em ... can we have Marty back now please?
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Heard most of the Spurs jokes before, just with diff teams. They don't get any less funny tho.
As for Morrissey, always thought he was a ManUre fan. one of his songs was called 'Roy's Keen', while the b-side of Irish Blood, English Heart was a tribute entitled Munich Air Disaster 1958. Rumoutr also has it that he didn't go to the Millwall match at the weekend as he decided to stay in LA and catch the United match on cable!
Well, even a genius has his faults...
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No 6. Yes, think the general consensus is there were a lot of Tunisian supporters with French passports involved in the booing, but if you watch the video, there's surely too much noise for it just to be the 'away' fans.
23 - The jokes were actually sent in to our Quotes of the Week section by Josh Finlay (cocktail stick), Derek Elmore (points) and, er, I seem to have lost the email for the first one, but as Tarquin (24) points out, they're all pretty much out there.
Some more good gags from you lot and as for Morrissey (28) he's obviously a bit misunderstood - no change there, then.
22 - I couldn't possibly comment - that's the only video I've seen.
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Do you take all your clips from The Guardian's weekly youtube roundup?
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30. Hi Un-Bell-ievable. Hand on heart, I didn't even look at the Guardian site when writing this piece. Some of the clips come from independent football blogs - whether they got them from the Guardian or vice-versa, I know not.
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i think this blog its typical of the london centric attitude that seems to pervade throughout the bbc. when you freely admit that you find it hard to be tough on spurs because you and all your mates are supporter's, here is one football fan hoping that one of the so called 'big team' go down as it might teach them to eat s bit of humble pie.
When you look down your nose at the plucky upstarts from hull and secretly expect that they will be put in their place in the return leg, you and your prawn munching friends may just notice that there are just a few football clubs that do not reside in the southeast of England.
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I'm seeing Paul Heaton in Norwich next week. He is definately a die-hard Blade though, so I guess the next time he sets foot inside the KC will be the next time Sheffield United play there...
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A man is sitting in a pub with his Jack Russell dog one Saturday afternoon. The football results are coming up on the television in the corner, "Liverpool 2, Tottenham Hotspur 1," reads the announcer in his normal, rather sedate, voice.
Suddenly the Jack Russell dog jumps up and shouts out, "Oh, no, not again."
The shocked landlord says, "That's amazing. Why did he say that when the result was announced that Tottenham lost?"
"Because he's a Spurs supporter," the dog's owner replies.
The landlord then asked what the dog says when Tottenham win a match, to which the man replied, "I don't know. I've only had him three years."
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Morrisey is from Manchester so he supports United. Heaton from Hull so he he suppors the blades!?! er can someone please work that one out for me?
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Jermain Defoe, Paul Robinson and Robby Keane were all fired from Spurs and told to go there own way.
Defoe went to Pompey, they won 2-0 against Spurs, Robinson went to Blackburn and Keane went to Liverpool who Spurs have not played yet. My point really was for people to notice the score against Pompey!
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Distin left city on a free to go to pompey, i can't remember what happened a few weeks back?
Must be getting on a bit!
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ayoungcom, Walthamstow (or Walthamstow Pennant) merged with Leyton to form Leyton Pennant (later Leyton FC again) in 1995. In 2003, they became Waltham Forest, but have struggled for years. They now play in Ilford. The Stags are now somewhere near the bottom of the Essex Senior League, I think.
We still have the Old Forresters in Snaresbrook, Jossi's Giants in Chingford, Wadham Lodge at Walthamstow's old ground and a raft of pub and school teams, so football is still alive and kicking in Walthamstow, unlike White Hart Lane it seems.
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vertigo_timbo
Hard to believe I know but I can recall seeing him with the Blades fans in the away end when they played either Grimsby or Hull, can't recall which it was. ... It was the early 90's
Why do I remember?
He did the loudest burp I've ever heard !!
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Paul Heaton supports Sheffield United because he is originally from Sheffield. He later moved to Hull and formed The Housemartins (and The Beautiful South for that matter) there but, as football fans are so fond of telling me, you don't change allegiance just because you move house.
From what I have read recently, following all the reporting on the London 0 Hull 4 thing (great album BTW), I get the impression that he has adopted Hull City as a second team and will root for them ... unless they are playing the Blades, and especially against Sheffield Wednesday.
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Re the Heaton/Hull debate - here's some comments from the article I linked to in the piece....
'Heaton stayed in Hull for 20 years and watched the Tigers at Boothferry Park several times.
'Heaton, a Sheffield United fan, thought he would be jealous when last season City were promoted and the Blades were relegated. But he said he always looks out for the Tigers' score.'
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33. 'This blog is typical of the London-centric attitude that seems to pervade throughout the BBC. When you freely admit it that you find it hard to be tough on Spurs because you and all your mates are supporters.'
Whoah there, Neddy! I said some of the senior management team were Spurs fans - the inference being I better not take too much pleasure in reprinting the jokes in case they fire me!
I'm a QPR fan and know more than most what it's like to be 'plucky upstarts' - even though our recent cash injection foolish attempts by the board to up ticket prices have now seemingly made us more hated than Chelsea.
I'm a fully paid-up member of the Hull fan club and think it's brilliant for football that they're daring to break up the gang of four - even though, realistically, we know normal service will soon be resumed.
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Morrissey has had West Ham Boys Club flags and scarves at gigs as well as wearing the t-shirt. I think he's been taking the p*** the whole time and actually supports Palace.
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What's the differnce between a spur and Spurs?
A spur has 1 point
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Did you hear the one about BBC impartiality?
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The Housemartins' second album was "The People Who Grinned Themelves To death."
Even more apt!
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I've just been to Hull and it's more like cheshire cat land than the land of green ginger, with grins as wide as the River Humber.
That's mile wide grins!
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Your affected bemusement at the booing of the French national anthem is just so BBC. As if you don't know just how overrun Paris is with North African immigrants.
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