Going Out on a Highbury high

WATCHING Spurs v Bolton on the box on Sunday was a weird experience. I can’t ever recall getting so wound up over a game at White Hart Lane, which didn’t involve the Arsenal.

For us Gooners it was a window onto the Schadenfreude world of the masochistic Spurs fan. I’ve enjoyed taking the mickey in recent seasons, over the way their own team’s miserable efforts have left them supporting the likes of Man Utd and even Chelsea, relying on the Arsenal’s opponents for the vicarious thrill of a rare humbling of their most hated enemy.

So it was that I sat here on Sunday with my mobile phone in hand, anxiously awaiting that moment when I might be able to tap out a text message, pointing out to my pals that the goal they’d just conceded was a direct consequence of Carrick’s bad karma, following his failure to put the ball into touch against us. However all this is water under the bridge and I’m more than a little surprised that such a gentleman as le Gaffer hasn’t found a means of recapturing his customary pitch upon the moral high ground, by issuing some semblance of an apology for his uncharacteristic attack on Jol. This might only have required a typically cute, backhanded reference to his remorse.