Has this year’s panto season kicked off early?

Published: 11 November, 2010
THE CROW

ARSENAL
BOOOOOOOOOO. Boo. Boooo. Boo. Hear that? Boooo. Boooo. Boo. Booooooo.

That’s the sound of the north London football fan this week. These are the rotters who serenaded “their” team’s players at the final whistle with a boo, like an overexcited mum at a school panto. How fickle they are.

Last week, Arsenal fans were telling the world how wondrous the club was for beating Emmanuel Adebayor [Man City] away and then beating West Ham at home.

This week, the team stall in first gear against some bullies from Newcastle and it’s straight to the boo. There’s no middle ground, no thought process here. Just a simple equation. Did we win? No. Ok, let’s boo. Boooooo. Booo. Booo. People, this is not the X-Factor.

Tottenham fans were at it too – and their team didn’t even lose at home. All this just a week after prancing around town like the big-I-ams just because they beat Inter Milan.

Whoff-quoff-whoff, their lips parped last week, “we’ve beaten the champions of Europe, we have”. Yet on Tuesday, players were being booed off for the grotesque crime of not beating Sunderland at home.

Harry Redknapp had every right to remind these ungrateful suckers how the team was heading to the Championship before he took them on.

What have our fans become? Mad emperors who are either very, very happy or very, very mad. No good will come of it.

RICHARD OSLEY

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TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR
I WANT to say a massive well done to Tottenham legend Chris Hughton for withstanding the abuse he got at the Emirates on Sunday. 

He responded by ramming those chants back down Gooners’ gullets (sounds like a film) as his Newcastle side took all three points. I‘d also like to thank Liverpool for their win against Chelski, blowing open the title race once again. 

However, a glimpse of the past is the only way I can describe Spurs’ loss at Bolton on Saturday and their draw with Sunderland at the Lane on Tuesday. 

We were well off the pace with the all too recognisable defensive frailties and teams stifling Gareth Bale’s potential by denying him any space. 

In both matches Harry looked bemused while his charges continued to contribute to their own downfall, and against the Black Cats he surprisingly only made one substitution while the crowd bayed for at least another. 

David Bentley, a shadow of his former self, took the brunt of the Tottenham home support ire. Some of the abuse fans give out would probably get them arrested on the street. One fan in particular took offence at the constant haranguing of Bentley, telling another in no uncertain terms to shut up – a request that many in that section of the crowd had quietly longed for. 

Incredibly, I hear that Jack Wilshere is no longer the crowd favourite down at Arsenal? And oh yeah: aren’t big teams supposed to win something?

TONY DALLAS