When I was 14 I went to a summer camp. It was like a prison camp but with songs. And gels. Which is why my old mate Jem made me go. “My brother went last year and they let you loose on all these girls who can’t escape because you’re locked in!!”. Brilliant. So I went and spent my days playing football and my evenings with my tongue down someone’s throat. And that someone was Lisa. From Hull. Or, ‘Ool’, as they call it up there in Hull-land. We ‘were madly in love’ for the two week duration of face-sucking, grope-fest camp, had a tearful farewell, all ‘sealed with a kiss’ and ‘long lonely summer’ and ‘leaving on a jet plane’, even though it was actually a coach back to Victoria. And then we never made contact again. Never.

Scarred by this emotional trauma (??) I’ve never been to Hull. Its too painful. Like most cities up north. Painful.

And all this because Spurs are playing Hull tomorrow. I wonder if Lisa will be coming to London? To Tottenham?? I wonder if she’s now their biggest fan? Do Hull have fans? Like people who really like them, as opposed to a bunch of bored northerners who can’t find anywhere better to go drinking on saturday afternoons than the KC stadium. Maybe Lisa doesn’t live there any longer. Maybe she moved ‘up’ to Grimsby. The high life. Who knows?

Spurs must beat Hull. There’s no doubt, there’s no question, there’s no other alternative nor consideration. (Just like the West Ham game; SHUTTUP!!) Because I don’t care how flattering Hull’s current league position is, they have no right to be there. They are at best, next year’s relegation fodder, at worst, destined for a late season plummet to oblivion. So we must beat them.

I was very depressed after the West Ham game and then read just last night how (like I couldn’t work it out all by myself with a calculator and computer) we’re just 3 points from the top. Free points. Dat’s nuffink. We just need everyone else to lose, to score 17 goals and we’d be right where destiny is surely leading us.

So first, Arsenal need to lose at Crystal Palace. They lost to Dortmund in the week so anything can happen and although Palace might not be as good as the Germans ‘on paper’, they are English so there’s a good chance for an upset. The Times give the Arse about a 96% chance of victory today. I love an underdog.

Chelsea play Manchester City tomorrow in what some consider a ‘big game’, others just a ‘very expensive game’, as the oligarch’s rabble take on the oil-king’s pawns in the battle of the money launderers. A draw would be the best possible outcome for this horrible game. The combined wealth of the players on that pitch will exceed the GDP of 37.9% of the world’s nations. (Accounts may vary depending on which, er, ‘equation’ is being used or made up).

Liverpool host West Brom, which should be an easy one for the Scousers. But firstly there’s simply no easy games any longer, and also, that one time really intimidating statement that faces all players as they come onto the pitch, the one proclaiming just “THIS IS ANFIELD!”, has now been replaced with something more appropriate. It now states: “THIS IS ANFIELD. NO REALLY, IT IS. HONEST”.

Then there’s the always mouth-watering el classico too as Barcelona take on Real Madrid at the Nou Camp. Always a passionate and hate-filled affair, today might even see El Welsho, the one and only Gareth Bale, play some of the match. His first game for a while and what a game to be thrust into. Those bastard Catalans have been lampooning Gareth due to his lack of fluency in Spanish. Which is cruel. We never took the piss because he could barely speak English, did we?

 

Happy saturday, I’m off to drag the younger daughter onto the tennis court.

 

A xxxx