Its not enough to win. Not at football. That’s why God invented adverbs. So you can win brilliantly, win convincingly, even win ugly-ly. The three points are still the same, still feel great, but when you win against (allegedly) top-flight opposition, you want to win well. And its still not enough. Because you then want everyone else to lose. Obviously there is a problem here, mathematically, logically, because every other team can’t lose at the same time. So it gets selective. You want the teams you don’t like to lose and you want the teams around you in the league to lose. They’re the priorities. Having secured your own win. And this is all so unconscious and visceral.

Spurs won last night. Against Manchester United. So that’s immediately a double whammy. They’re immediate competition and I hate whingeing Jose. Then, amazingly, Chelsea managed to lose 3-0 at home to mighty Bournemouth. Who’d’a thought? Who’d’a put a bet on that?? Probably only an insecure Chelsea fan in ‘hedging’ mode. And that’s brilliant for Spurs, wonderful for Bournemouth and… not great for Chelsea. Certainly not great for Alexis Sanchez. So we’re all happy there.

Liverpool won on Tuesday, which is a bit depressing, but at the same time strange things were happening all the way over in Swansea City. Where mighty Arsenal went to play. And having taken an early 1-0 lead, the Arse managed not just to ‘snatch defeat from the jaws of victory’ but to forcibly thrust it on their opponents. I’d immediately have started looking for unusual betting patterns involving Arsenal team’s relatives and friends. Such was the way our aulde rivals went about the match they lost 3-1. To the bottom team, at the time.

Whilst Arsenal were losing I was playing bridge. And when you bid in bridge, there’s a convention every player in the world uses. Your partner opens the bidding, “1 spade” he might say. You look at the useless few spots on the cards in your hand and realise firstly that there is no God, and secondly that you don’t got no spades. You have shit. So you bid “1 no trump”. It doesn’t mean you fancy playing the hand in no trumps, it doesn’t mean anything other than “I’ve got a poor hand”. Its called the ‘dustbin bid’. And then I was reading about Kensington Palace. And realised that’s its basically, the ‘dustbin bid’ for Royals. The ‘one-no-trump’ reply for the truly blue blooded homeless.

Kate & Will live there. Harry lives there, soon with Meg, Duke of Norfolk, or maybe Kent (old bloke, beard, face like it was on a 1926 postage stamp) and Princess Eugenie and hubby-to-be. Others too. But its not like its a proper ‘palace’ with one bathroom they all share and, ‘who’s nicked the last’a my fucking milk, AGAIN???’ type conversations. Its a commune. A village with lots of ‘cottages’ that will house royals who can’t afford the deposit on a shared-buying scheme. A care home for the Windsors. A retirement village for those who’ve never had to work.

Very happy, Spurs-ey Thursday

A xxxx