Tottenham Is First English Club In Everything

They won the FA Cup when they were not in the Premiership, they won the double, they won European Cups, like nobody before.

London`t Tottenham Hotspur is a unique football club with an exceptionally rich history and exceptionally good results, but also with many years in a gap, which leaves the impression that it has never achieved a thing.

Nobody heard about them, they won the FA Cup

Although Tottenham is today famous for white kits, because of which the players are called “Lilly Whites”, at first, the players wore navy blue shirts. It is only during the 1899/1900 season that the club took on today`s colour as a symbol of tribute to Preston North End, the most successful club of that time.

In the beginning of league competitions, the Spurs were unfamiliar to everyone locally, but as they had young players in their prime, they could take on any opponent. This is how they won the North London League in 1900, which they were not allowed in for years (it was established by Arsenal), because they were not professional.

When they won the league, they took it a step further and everything seemed wonderful. They won the FA Cup in 1901 already thus becoming the first club to have done so which was not in the most elite of ranks. Today`s equivalent would be someone from a conference league (semi-pro) winning a valuable trophy.

They continued advancing in the next years: they entered the Second League in 1908 and a year later, the Premiership. However, this is when the golden era ends. The young men from the beginning of the century were not so full of zeal and spirit, which was reflected. When World War I broke out, they were supposed to have been knocked out of the league, but the competitions ended.

Arthur Rowe invented the “double pass”

At the end and new formations of league competitions, 22 clubs were introduced instead of 20 in the most elite league, but Tottenham lost at the green table. The heads gave Chelsea a chance, which came in 19 th the season before and deserved to stay, along with Arsenal, which was only sixth in the Second league, which stirred wind and rivalry that has not yet ended until this day.

Clearly, this left a mark, because they won the first spot that season and returned to the best straight away. A season later in 1921, they won their second FA Cup and proudly showed it off all over London, which enraged Arsenal fans, as well as other clubs, but Tottenham did not seem to care.

Again, the famous gap followed. They finished second in the league in 1922 and were knocked out of it in 1928. This was new proof that the club was playing poorly after realising excellent results and when expectations run too high. This time, they stuck with the lower league until the end of World War II, but they were no longer winning the FA Cup, which was the case previously.

With the arrival of Arthur Rowe in 1949, the Spurs had a second coming. They introduced a novelty to English football, the double pass and thus broke their opponents. They won the first position in the Second League and won first place in the first season of the most powerful league in the country. The heroes which Tottenham fans still remember today were: Alf Ramsey, Ronnie Burgess, Ted Ditchburn, Len Duquemin, Sonny Walters and Bill Nicholson. A generation which has never been seen since.

Legendary Nicholson spent 68 years in the club

Still, a player of that generation, Bill Nicolson, took over the team at the start of the 1960s and brought new reasons to celebrate. The club`s greatest success happened in 1961 when they wound their only Double, they were Football League champions and winners of the FA Cup at the same time – the first English team to have done so. They won the FA Cup in 1962 and the Cup Winners` Cup in 1963, thus becoming the first English team to have won a European trophy.

Before he retired, Nicholson brought the Football League Cup in 1971 and 1973, just like the UEFA Cup in 1972. He retired from the coach post in 1974, but remained in the club his whole life. To be precise, he arrived there as a boy in 1936 and spent his life in the club before dying in 2994. He spent unbelievable 68 years helping the club in all possible ways.

Only two years later, they were knocked out into a lower league and had difficulties there until the

start of the 80s, when they won the UEFA Cup and the FA Cup twice. However, they found it harder and harder to keep up with the best teams like Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal. Perhaps everything would have been better if Heysel had not happened and if English clubs had not been banished from Europe for five years, because Tottenham had a great generation at the time.

The club could not boast about many successes in the 1990s. They won another FA Cup in 1991 and the Football League Cup in 1999, even though they constantly had many stars in their team. At the start of the 1990s, they were headed by Terry Venables; Ardiles followed, they played with Klinsmann, Sheringham, Barmby, Anderton, Dumitrescu, Savage, Ginola, Nielsen…

They have many stars at the moment, they spend vast amounts of money in a good way, but the results are absent. This is a great shame for two Croatia international players, Luka Modric and Vedran Corluka, who play for the Spurs. However, perhaps its time for the gap to end and the sun to come out after a disastrous season for the English club which has always been first at everything.