On Sunday Spurs pretty much reached their ‘do-or-die’ day with a visit to Burnley. Even though only the most sadly blinkered and optimistic fan would still have been holding out any hope, prior to that match, that our glorious team could somehow squirm our way into the top 4 and claim the Champions League slot that we so obviously deserve, that last hope, like almost all that have preceded it this season, was dashed against the mud in Lancashire. We failed to win. We pretty much completely failed to even turn up. Without wishing to put too much stock into a mere football match, my life pretty much ended when Paulinho’s shot on goal (I think it was ‘on goal’) after the only attacking move in the entire second half, missed the near post by just 30 or 40 yards. Half the Spurs fans, who’d travelled 200 miles just so they could later say ‘yeah, I was THERE when we drew nil-nil with Burnley, I was farkin’ THERE’, half of them were actually laughing, the other half, pretty much crying. I just sat there on my couch with my mouth open. Well, I was about to put some Easter Egg into it, but instead just sat there with jaw a’hanging.

Every year at about this time Spurs go into self-destruct mode and flop through the last 10 games or so like a group of salmon swimming upstream to die. Or a bunch of players looking for their next contracts.

Whereas Arsenal come good. From indifferent form they suddenly become simply unbeatable, at home, away, bloody anywhere. It may be the ‘lack of distractions’ since bowing out of European competition, but they suddenly become invincible. Bastards.

Chelsea struggle a bit, but only by Chelsea standards. Meaning they still beat everyone, they just don’t look quite so comfortable doing it. Whereas Manchester City have gone into ‘we stand by our manager’ mode as they lose the plot totally and forget how to win matches. And as we all know ‘we stand by our manager’ is a euphemism for ‘he’s out’.

Meanwhile in the Championship, which I love now because its not as painful as the Premiership, Bournemouth go back on top as Watford beat Middlesboro near the end of a truly epic season up there in the top three slots.

And tonight QPR play Villa to see who might be next year’s Championship contenders. I’d like to see Villa go down. Mainly because I’m a nasty old git. And I like QPR and feel just one more season (surely it would only be the one) in the top flight would be fun. And Chris Ramsey is a thoroughly good bloke, and Tim Sherwood isn’t.

Next year Spurs need to be top of the league at Easter. By 24 points. Then as we start our usual rubbish we might at least end up with the holy of holies 4th place finish.

Happy depressing Tuesday

A xxxx