That’s Spurs club motto: to dare is to do. Hence the ‘Dare Skywalk’ they offer to stadium tourists. At least half of whom look so much like Son its uncanny. And as they all wear replica shirts, I spent half the day wondering how our new club captain could be walking round the Tottenham Stadium at the precise moment he was on the pitch at Brentford.

If you’d asked me, before 1.47 pm yesterday, if I had any issue with heights, I’d have laughed in your face, pushed my chest out and taken another swig on my can of lager. I always remember when people said “oh, I can’t go skiing, I’m afraid of heights” to which I’d reply that you may be 3 kilometres above sea level but… most of the time… your skis are on the ground; there is no ‘height’. Ok, some of the rest of the time you’re dangling 100 metres above certain death by virtue of a tiny, thin steel wire holding up a great big metal seat with two people on it and you’re thinking about the whole ‘physics’ thing.

And then you go on the Dare Skywalk. And its an attraction for sightseers and admirers of the stadium. So all the ‘dare’ bit is just marketing bollocks to make a totally innocent and easy walk along the roof a bit more ‘sexy’, so they can charge more for it. But then you have to change your shoes!!! I don’t think its just a sales play but you can only walk on the roof of the stadium in Nike footwear. But its ‘special’, black trainers, with super sticky, climb-up-walls, Spiderman type footwear. Then you get the harness, the clamps, all manner of paraphernalia, and they remove all hard objects from you, like phones, coins, daggers, guns and step-ladders, in case they should fall and kill someone underneath.

Then you walk up. And up. And up. And they hook you onto a handrail and you go up more. Then more. Until… you’re walking on the glass roof bit. Wow! Awwww, look’a dat viewwww!!!! Lundun!!! Innit!!! All good. They even give you your phones back for 5 minutes to appreciate it properly with a selfie. To validate it. Then they hook another clamp on you, basically, chaining you to the rail, and you walk round the cockerel. On a little ledge (seems little) 43 metres above the pitch so you can look down at the grass and… and…

And feel almost violently ill with the fear of falling, jumping, plummeting or… Its actually not a conscious thing. Its visceral and it just happens. Well, it did to me. I stood there, both arms wrapped around the cockerel, crying for my mummy, staring anywhere but down at the pitch, wanting to be… anywhere. Even sitting on a seat in the Emirates would have felt good at that point, that’s how bad it was.

But I survived. Phew. Cos I’m a MAN! Even though I probably didn’t look or feel quite so ‘manly’ up there with the cockerel.

And now it seems funny.

Happy daring Monday

A xxxx