So the club have announced, rather inevitably, that our three home Premier League games against Watford, Newcastle United and Leicester City, as well as our home Champions League tie against Borussia Dortmund will now be at Wembley.
As a season ticket holder I think I am more than entitled to feel anger and frustration at the latest setback. But I just don’t. For a few reasons.
Firstly the club have refunded the three games as one lump sum to us. This is something they haven’t done before. The club would announce a group of home fixtures that had been moved to Wembley and drip-feed the refunds to us, one game at a time. This left a bad taste as it felt like they were holding on to our money to make interest on it, despite knowing we were entitled to the refunds. The club have now rectified this and that’s to their credit.
The club have also downgraded all three home Premier League fixtures from a category-B to a category-C. Obviously this saves us money going to these games.
I guess for me though, the feelings of anger and frustration are now just feelings of acceptance and a general feeling that it just is what it is.
Of course I want to be watching Spurs in our state-of-the-art, world-class stadium, but as long as I live long enough, I’ll be watching them play there for the next 30-40 years.
Daniel Levy has received a lot of flak for the delays, with some fans demanding his head should roll, but he is not overseeing the garden shed being built in his back-garden. He is overseeing one of the biggest build projects sport has seen for a long while. It was always going to be complex, and the unrealistic completion date, for me, wasn’t intended to deceive us fans, but came from a place of hope. No doubt of course a financial hope.
Speaking to fellow Spurs fans, season ticket holders and non-season ticket holders, the decision to now stay at Wembley for the rest of the season is what is splitting opinion. I would like to stay at Wembley now for the rest of the season. Harry Kane has been quoted as saying Wembley now feels like home, and I think moving to the new stadium so late in the season could disrupt our momentum as we are hopefully challenging for trophies.
I also understand the other side of the argument though, that the excitement generated by moving to the new stadium could be the lift we need to push us over the edge towards Spurs’ first trophy since 2008. I just feel like the beginning of next season would feel like a better, more fitting time to move, although I understand from a financial point of view the club will move to the new stadium as soon as it is made possible.
Whenever the eventual move does happen though, I know the feelings the club have put me through over the last few months in regards to the delays will be long forgotten as I sit in the new stadium and hear the roar of 60,000 voices singing “We are Tottenham, super Tottenham. We are Tottenham from The Lane”.
-Admin MC
