Review of the week
Harry Redknapp's shock arrival at White Hart Lane must have come as a huge blow to those intent on witnessing Tottenham's decline when the year ends in nine.
'Arry's the sort of bloke you'd love to have a few of beers with as he regaled you with tales of the good old days, the sort of bloke you'd pick as a Grandad for your kids and who most of us would like to see managing our club.
And there's the rub. If Spurs go down, then 'Appy 'Arry goes down with them and I for one would take no pleasure in seeing the old charmer's distinguished career go out with a whimper.
Pompey and Arsenal fans might disagree - if Nelson Mandela had taken over the reins at the Lane, with Muhammad Ali and Angelina Jolie as his assistants, you'd still be hard-pressed to find a Gooner wishing them well.
And where does all this leave Dr Jay-Kettle Williams? He's the poor fella who was hired just last week by Portsmouth to de-Cockney-fy 'Arry's team talks for the legion of foreign players who hadn't got a Danny La Rue what he was going on about. It's difficult to see how a London club like Spurs could take the good doctor on (coals to Newcastle and all that), so it looks like he's been well and truly left in the Eartha.
And suddenly all the jokes that have continued to bombard my inbox have also become redundant. Oh go on then, we'll have one for old times sake - 'My wife was feeling rather naughty last night - "Humiliate me!" she said. So I bought her a Tottenham shirt.' Boom boom.
On any other weekend, Liverpool's magnificent victory at fortress Chelsea would have hogged the headlines. Xabi Alonso's wickedly deflected strike ended an 86-game unbeaten run at Stamford Bridge, dating back to February 2004, when Hull were in the bottom tier and Ronnie Wood's girlfriend was studying for her GCSEs.
Arsenal, the victors on that day, took full advantage of Chelsea's slip-up to move within a point of the Blues. All the pre-match talk centred around captain William Gallas after he was pictured with a cigarette in his mouth and The Sun marked the win at West Ham with a top 10 of smoking footballers - Paul Lambert & Butler being a particular favourite.
After a quiet few weeks, normal service was resumed at Man Utd, with Rio losing his cool, Fergie blowing his top and Rooney kissing his badge in a fit of petulance - he'd obviously got wind of the rumours that the lads were going to buy him a wig for his birthday.
At my own club, Iain Dowie got the push after a whole 15 games in charge. Caretaker Gareth Ainsworth led QPR to a creditable 0-0 draw at Reading, insisting he and not Flavio Briatore had picked the team. Yes, and Kerry Catona was perfectly fit to be interviewed on This Morning.
But the week's Comical Ali award went to Momo Sissoko, who when asked about his Champions League ambitions, declared: "I won it with Liverpool and now I want to win it with Juventus." That would be the Champions League Liverpool won two months before you joined, eh Momo?
Gordon Strachan was in top form before Celtic's Champions League clash at Old Trafford, declaring his side was so small he wanted to see Snow White leading them out. In the event there was to be no fairytale ending for the Bhoys, although the manner of their defeat could certainly be described as Grimm.
Aston Villa striker John Carew received a hefty fine after visiting a lap-dancing club on the day of the Uefa Cup clash with Ajax. He responded by coming off the bench to net against Wigan - the second time he'd scored that week (possibly).
One thing I've noticed in the last few weeks is the trend for newspaper journalists to use middle names in their copy. Emile Heskey became Emile William Ivanhoe Heskey after his sterling performances for England, while the match-winner for Chelsea against Roma was one John George Terry.
On the managerial front, Joe Kinnear is now known as JFK in tribute his favourite word, but Chelsea's assistant must be relieved you don't hear Ray Colin Wilkins mentioned too much. Oops, sorry Ray.
And finally, while Chipstead's Darryl Coleman won the celebration of the week for donning a pirate hat after scoring against Torquay, the best video by a mile saw 5 Live listener Alex give his rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody, replacing each lyric with the name of a footballer - pure genius.
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~54~RS~)
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You forget that all Southampton fans wishes Harry to be relegated. Then maybe the media might remember he did take us down and left us to rot. For which we are still recovering.
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'Arry's record as a manager is pretty good, but not fantastic. He has had few real successes and as SaintStatto says, he had a terrible period at Southampton, where he left the club in a much worse state than when he joined. The club is still suffering the side effects of Redknapp's spell in charge.
Whilst it is unlikely that the same fate will happen upon Spurs, Redknapp does still have one hell of a job on his hands. Who's to say that he will rescue Spurs? A quick look at their forthcoming 6 or 7 games suggests that they will still be rooted to the bottom of the table come mid-December.
And January will be interesting as he tries to get a few new players in (presumably from Pompey).
Defoe will be a shoe-in but what betting an emotion packed return to White Hart Lane for Sol Campbell to shore up that leaky defence? Now that'll set the pulses racing.
My money is on a long fight to beat the drop, but they will probably survive and finish around 15th.
I just cannot help but think that Spurs' lack of success is due to the expectation of their fans, who still think that the club is big enough and good enough to break into the top four. Well, can I let you all into a little secret - it isn't.
Martin Jol had got Spurs to 5th for two consecutive seasons, but was sacked because the fans wanted more. Get real!
What would those same fans give now to be fifth?
And before all the Spurs fans belittle West Ham, I am aware of the limitations of my club. Just like you should be about yours.
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Harry will be fortunate if he steers Spurs from doing a Southampton this season. They'll finish mid-table at best.
Harry can't be a long term choice though. He's already intimated as much and then what? Any progress made by Redknapp will be gone and the incoming manager will have to start from scratch. Maybe a spell in the Championship would do Spurs some good, and teach their fans that they are not top four material.
I can see only one winner in all of this and thats Redknapp.
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Forgot to mention before. Someone asked John Carew how much a lapdance at the Rocket Club costs. He replied "About £100,000"
That was in the Times on Monday, had me chuckling all day!
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Great article Chris, I'm also disappointed to see the end of the Spurs jokes doing the rounds. Whils't I dont dislike Spurs I'm quite pleased this has happened to them if only for their treatment of Martin Jol. I have read a few times now that Redknapps appointment means service will resume as normal and that we may see Spurs in a top six finish, personally I think they will be lucky to finish in the top half of the table. I think Villa and Man City have now established themselves as frontrunners for 5/6th place through their home form alone. With Spurs getting three points and looking healthier all eyes will now be on the other side at the so-called wrong end of the table, Hull. I think most of the country will be cheering on the tigers on Wednesday against Chelsea...if they win then we may well see Hull jokes doing the rounds.
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Good article, and more laughs than Robbo managed this week.
How has Redknapp maaged to get such a good reputation? Didn't his miraculous saving of Potsmouth from relegation follow an appalling run of results when he first returned anyway? The rest of his managerial record is patchy at best.
Rather like the Sainted El Tel, he seems to do no wrong in the eyes of the media, and even accusations of dodgy dealings are (again as with Venables), conveniently glossed over.
I would like to read his autobiography at the end of his career (assuming he left nothing out), though.
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Ive gotta agree that Spurs have been held down by the fans expectations...and i cant say I blame them for being a bit tiffed by the teams form.
After signing players like modric, dos santos, pavlechenko (sp?), bentley and corluka they should definately be up around the top 6 or 7 somewhere and its a shame to see such a previously successful club doing so poorly (although the same can be said for newcastle).
I can see them avoiding the drop this season, although it will be tight. My money is still on Stoke, Fulham and West Brom (or Bolton) to go down. Spurs will end up finishing in a similar fashion to last season, picking up a load of points from draws and getting through by the skin of their teeth.
Its not going to be pretty though. Jol was hugely successful there (finishing 5th two seasons on the trot behind arguably the four best teams in Europe at the time - and im a Man City fan saying that). he brought his own players in and played his own style of football, shortly before being sacked and replaced by Ramos - who again was successful (league cup) and attracted some amazing players in before himself being sacked. Methinks that Levy and the fans need to actually back the manager for once (look at the two biggest clubs in English football - Arsenal and Man Utd - how long has Wenger and Fergie been there now... I may be wrong but consistent management leads to consistent results, successful teams and happy fans and chairmen.
Now Redknapp has to deal with getting two different groups of players that he might not necessarily want or like to play for him - all of whom would have come to the club thinking that they were going to be playing under either Jols or Ramos' system. Good luck to him.
Do us a favour 'Arry - sign a new goalkeeper. Your not going anywhere with Titus Bramble the 2nd in goal mate :-D
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and as for saintstatto - whilst it was partly 'Arrys fault you went down. You cant blame the manager solely...
Didnt southampton go down in the same season that there were 4 teams that could all be relegated on the last day of the season - and all 3 spots still up for grabs. Im thinking Norwich and Palace were 2 of the other teams involved but i cant remember properly. If they did, that was just bad luck more than anything else.
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hey i think harry has made the right choice to go to spurs, got a good squad and he just needs them to play well..yh berbatov has left and well im a united fan so overjoyed with tht, but spurs still have a good squad, plus some purchases in da jan transfer window n they will be set, mid table is my prediction.
As for ppl sayin harry is a judas, i agree with tht, and leavin a good team like pompey is idiotic, but da man knows wat he is doin, he just wants to progress to a bigger club n streer them to safety with his knowledge of the game..if he pulls it off then hats off 2 him.
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I have just read some rubbish here spurs held back by the fans ambitions what utter twaddle ,at least we have some ambition if you are happy just to accept mid table well good luck but please dont blame spurs fans for there present position,spurs fans did not sack martin jol or juande,martin jol was adored by the fans I was there the night he was sacked completely unaware of what was happening and the fans were fantastic towards him and still are,something he acknowledges,the board is responsible not the fans please get real,most of us accept we are not up there with the big four but please dont blame us for trying
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The reason we are in this mess is because we sacked martin jol, yes he had a bad run of games but he had kept us in fifth place for 2 years running against good teams. unfortunatly
levy sacked him. and to make it worse he messed it up for ramos as well, if he was going to sell keane and berba he should of done it much quicker and given ramos time to get new strikers and train the team together instead he waited until 5 minuites before the transfer dedline to get a inexperienced 21 yearold championship striker
this is what happens when chairmen get to involved in football, the same thing happened with newcastle
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I may be wrong, and i have re-read my post, but did i say that ambition was a bad thing. if your a team in the premier league without ambition you dont deserve to be there. if your a team in the premier league who dont want to break into the big 4 then you dont deserve to be there, simple as.
All ive said is that with the players at your disposal, its suprising that your not there, and the fact that the majority of your fans, and in fact premier league followers in general, would have expected you to be up there fighting, which makes the fact that your not even more significant.
go away and read what the masses of spurs fans on here are saying though mate, most of the comments ive read blame both jol and ramos (and comolli - completely agree with that one, directors of football dont work in PL :-D) for your poor form over the last two seasons and all ive said is that the blame lies elsewhere.
must remember not to try and praise spurs in future for fear of having my nads chewed off...
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I may be wrong, and i have reread my post, but did i say that ambition was a bad thing. if your a team in the premier league without ambition you dont deserve to be there. if your a team in the premier league who dont want to break into the big 4 then you dont deserve to be there, simple as.
All ive said is that with the players at your disposal, its suprising that your not there, and the fact that the majority of your fans, and in fact premier league followers in general, would have expected you to be up there fighting, which makes the fact that your not even more significant.
go away and read what the masses of spurs fans on here are saying though mate, most of the comments ive read blame both jol and ramos (and comolli, completely agree with that one, directors of football dont work in PL :D) for your poor form over the last two seasons and all ive said is that the blame lies elsewhere.
must remember not to try and praise spurs in future for fear of having my nads chewed off...
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Thank you goldensupergreaves... Someone finally speaks some sense !!!
Us spurs fans get a raw deal at times, the media makes unrealistic expectations for the club, and we for some reason get accused of believing them. How many spurs fans actually believed we would do anything this season??? Not many!
You can't sell a vast part of your squad and replace them (apart from the strikers) in a season and expect them to play well as a unit and compete against established groups of players. We sold all that Prem experience and brought in only one player from the prem, the rest where from abroad and are obviously going to take time to settle.
Please stop accusing the fans of gettng rid of the managers, i have never given any manager there P45. Jol is a god and will always have a very special place in the hearts of the spurs faithful. CL but for a dodgy lasagne. Ramos, was the right manager at the wrong time and i will bet my house on the fact that he goes onto great things back on the continent.
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'Arry's the sort of bloke you'd love to have a few of beers with as he regaled you with tales of the good old days, the sort of bloke you'd pick as a Grandad for your kids and who most of us would like to see managing our club.
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Is this some sort of wind up?
The guy's tucked up Portsmouth and Southampton, and according to your Panorama team, he's received more backhanders than Leslie Ash. (Allegedly etc.) I'd be devastated if he ever managed the Villa.
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Hammerbod
"Martin Jol had got Spurs to 5th for two consecutive seasons, but was sacked because the fans wanted more. Get real!"
I seem to remember most spurs fans backing Jol as the whole long saga of dealings behind the scenes at the club played out. The majority of them wanted to give him time and for him to stay, knowing that 5th place was pretty good!
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"Defoe will be a shoe-in but what betting an emotion packed return to White Hart Lane for Sol Campbell to shore up that leaky defence? Now that'll set the pulses racing."
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Oh yeah, I can see Sol going for that one, definitely. He was in the news the other day wasn't he, talking about how much he loved going back to White Hart Lane with Pompey.
And the fans'd love it too! They could sing him that song they wrote for him. How does it go again?
Idiot.
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'Arry's record is, and always has been, pretty poor. His dealings in the transfer market have been decidely dodgy and his only saving grace seems to be that - gawd bless 'im - he's a true grit, "proper" English manager.
Well, if by "proper" you mean a shady wide-boy willing to take backhanders, bring in dodgy foreigners/washed up has-beens into his squads and bemoan the demise of the good-old English sport, I'm glad that even the clueless crusties at the FA turned him down for the national job.
What he DOES excel at, however, is backstabbing and gross hypocrisy. He's double-crossed Portsmouth twice and left Southampton in a mess they still haven't extracted themselves from.
My one hope for last season was that they would get turned over by Cardiff in the FA Cup, as the useless Cockney does not deserve to have a major trophy success on his resume. As it is, they scraped through in both the semis and the final and, lo and behold, 'Arry finally gets that elusive and totally undeserved silverware that somehow justifies him as the man to take Spurs forward.
Utter cobblers. The man's a joke and it's a telling sign that the one media commentator who seems to be his biggest fan at the moment is.........his own son. Take a bow Jamie for even having the audacity to compare your old man to Sir Bobby Robson. More like Linda Robson if you ask me.
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I find it strange that Harry has left Portsmouth for Tottenham citing the reason that he wants to manage a 'big' club before he retires. Portsmouth fans have already seen him depart for their nearest rivals, a cardinal sin in the eyes of most fans around the country. Yet they accepted him once again and to be fair to him he has delivered. However if I were a Pompey fan I think it would be the timing that would frustrate me the most, as he appeared quite settled. It has also come to light that he considered the Newcastle job off and on several times before declining. Clubs become big through success and history, both of which Portsmouth achieved last year in winning the FA Cup. He could have gone on to be a legend and in doing so made Portsmouth a so called 'big' club. Now he has a relegation battle on his hands!
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im a proud saints fan
but what harry has done has left us in shear disaster
bad manager
i actually feel sorry for pompey!
but i am laughing at them cus hes betrayed them twice now
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on the link to the video it says 'sign along'.
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I cant believe southampton fans blaming Harry for the mess they are in, it is the boards fault for giving people contracts they couldn't honour, doing dodgy deals with players like Gareth Bale which they could have held onto and got twice as much for now, the problems southampton have got go right back to when (and forgive me if i get the name wrong) Rupert Lowe was chairman, he fleeced the club for everything he could get before he sold it and then tried to buy it back again once you were nearly broke, wake up and realise a manager alone is not responsible for the club off the field, you cant blame O'Leary for Leeds problems and you can't blame anyone that has managed Newcastle recently for there problems, a football club needs to be managed well from the board down or there is no point, Man Utd are the prime example of how a club can build into an empire when it is ran well from the top, we didnt have a billionaire buy our team for us we made money from building up our fan base and making the most of it, wake up and realise without the boards making the decisions a manager can't do anything so stop blaming Harry and look at the people who are still running your clubs badly, when Ferguson took over at Utd we were not the club we are today, as i said we are the prime example
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Digital Jack Knife has the wrong end of the stick. Rupert Lowe may have taken money out of the club (in many Saints fans opinions, not mine actually) but he never sold his shares. He was replaced as Chairman and came back to the board as we hurtled towards a 2nd relegation. Most of the dodgy deals involving Bale were made when he was away from the club. However, all of this happened becuase we were relegated in the 1st place and we were relegated becuase super Harry bought in a load of unfit journeymen mates of his (and relations!) and took us to the bottom of a very average Premier League. He then took us to a great 12th place in the Championship before heading back to his spiritual home in Portsmouth. Which is no longer his spiritual home as that is now Spurs even though he was an Arsenal fan as a kid!
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