Football is meant to be fun. Let's go back to that.

 

Football has always been an escape for me. Memories of Saturday afternoons and midweek evenings spent in the stands or watching Tottenham Hotspur play on TV punctuate all recesses of my mind. It was always a great experience and often the match become was the least important part.

As I’ve got older, that seemed to change. Yes, there was a sense of excitement about the game, especially on derby day, but the focus tended to be more on stats rather than the games itself. Showing off to your friends as you can name the highest scorer in some obscure league or being able to pull random records out of nowhere. Statistics are important, especially when trying establish which player is better and generating excitement about a team. However, what tends to get lost along the way is the reason we watch football in the first place.

My son is five years old and doesn’t really care for league tables or who the top scorer is each season. He doesn’t retain the names of hundreds of players. In fact, he only really says about three. More importantly though, he looks at football in its purest form. It’s just meant to be fun. I realized this when watching Tottenham’s capitulation against Newcastle. Over the past few weeks, it has been easier to just watch games as whenever a goal goes in, he just cheers. Not because he supports any team, he just likes seeing goals.

This is the problem I now find with watching Spurs. Right now, it just isn’t fun. Take the results out of the equation as nobody likes to see their team get beaten. It is more the manner in which the results keep happening. You can predict exactly what will happen each match and due to the turmoil at the club, I just find myself watching games without any excitement as every game just seems like Groundhog Day. Sit back, defend poorly, start playing too late, rinse and repeat.

I’m not asking for the world. I’m not even expecting to see the club start challenging for trophies. It is unrealistic and with key players probably set to leave and no new manager on the horizon, there is a huge rebuild to do. All I want is a bit of excitement so fans can down to watch a game, knowing the team will give their all even if it ends in defeat.

The club worked on the ethos of ‘To Dare is to Do’ for decades and somewhere in the last few years that mindset has been lost. Negativity encircles the club with unrest both and off the pitch. Essentially the club needs to start again and this summer will be the first step in a long and arduous rebuild in North London.

They need to tap into that mentality more than ever now as fans are turning their back on the club that once brought them so much joy. Use the likes of Greaves, Hoddle and Ricky Villa as inspiration, or even modern greats like Harry Kane, Gareth Bale and Son Heung-Min. Embrace that history and channel through young players and new recruits to excite the fans and give them a reason to keep coming back. Football is meant to be fun after all

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