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The cockerel is coming home to roost
The MP for Tottenham, presumably having nothing better to do,* has consulted the brilliantly named Alexander Carter-Silk, of the august and even more brilliantly named law firm Speechly Bircham, and been advised that there is indeed a case to force Spurs to change their name to Stratford Hotspur F.C. if they insist on going ahead with their relocation plans. According to m'larned friend, "the Club's exclusive right to use the name 'Tottenham' Hotspur would be open to legal challenge if the Club continued to use the Tottenham reference when it ceased to have any direct association with the locality."
Now then, now then. Apart from Tottenham, the only London clubs whose grounds actually are where they're supposed to be are Watford and Charlton Athletic. QPR should promptly have changed their name to SBR when they moved to Shepherd's Bush in 1917, while Millwall should be Bermondsey, West Ham United should be East Ham United, and Chelsea and Fulham should be Fulham F.C. and Fulham F.C., respectively.
But outside the Smoke - henceforth to be referred to as "the Smokeless" following a recent court ruling in favour of Boris Johnson's low-emission team – an even greater wrong remains in desperate need of righting, an injustice that is at best forgotten and at worst callously ignored. When Everton moved from their original home in a municipal park, they should have renamed themselves Anfield F.C. – oh how half the city would have loved that - before being forced to change their name yet again, to Walton F.C., after they moved on to Goodison Park in 1892. Yes, as recently as that.
As there is no statute of limitations on offences as heinous as this, may I therefore be the first but hopefully not the last to urge the good people of the Everton district to get their MP firmly behind them, hire a fleet of charabancs and the services of Messrs Speechly Bircham, and stride boldly into the Royal Courts of Justice, so that the full weight of the law might be brought down upon the nomenclatural turpitude of the Toffees. One-hundred-and-nine years of ignominy cannot be allowed to continue without redress.
(* The unemployment rate in the Tottenham constituency is the highest in London.)
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Dodgy Research
I assume that most of the geography in your thesis is correct but Watford is in Hertfordshire and has never been a London club so it's just Charlton that's in the right place and that hasn't always been the case.
Vile calumny!
My "dodgy" research required me to spend at least four minutes on the website of Messrs Wikipedia. Tsk.
On the point made: I think you'll find that viewed by anyone from north of it, Watford is most definitely a London club - as is Crystal Palace (Croydon, Surrey.)
Odd
I don't think I've ever heard of Watford being referred to as a London club before and its my home club!
Oddly, I think of Crystal Palace as a London club too but that's probably because its nearly always referred to as such and its name is non geographical.... and the original Crystal Palace was in Hyde Park (I think! - zero research went into that 'fact').
May I just mention Barnet FC?
I know nothing about football, but I know my local team is Barnet, and they are indeed based in Barnet. Which was in London.
Can they have points for having an accurate name? (I don't think they get points for anything else)
Barnet FC
Famous for their sloped pitch. A difference of six feet from one end to t'other.
Ah the mighty bees
Barnet are kind of my second team (I used to live locally but not for a years now) but even I've given up on watching them these days, poor buggers.
same here
never heard the 'orns referrred to as a london club. twas at school with Sir Nigel Gibbs you may or probably may not be interested to hear.
Living in Crystal Palace
it's always a joy to see visiting supporters wandering around lost on a match day and looking for the ground, which is 3 or 4 miles away
That's silly
Next you'll say Wimbledon should renamed themselves to Milton Keyn... oh...
Another MP after a slot on the Sky News paper review
Don't they have anything else to do? Like the ones who raise questions in the House about soap storylines, they should be struck off. They think they're personalities. Tsk.
On the other hand
Brentford have always been in Brentford.
On the other, other hand, Leyton Orient did change their name when they moved. They used to be Clapton Orient.
Up to a point Fraser....
...but Leyton Orient was actually a merger of clubs wasn't it? I think so.
Papa JoLean would know because Grandpapa JoLean played for Clapton O.
Is that a sort of folkie thing?
He was a-playin' fer Clapton-oh?
It's been some years since....
I had the misfortune to live in "that" London but I'm sure Clapton FC (no relation) actually play in Forest Gate.
I used to live near the Spotted Dog Ground which is the best name for a football ground since the demise of Gay Meadow.
What was with the dropping of the 'Leyton' bit during the 70s?
on the insistence
of Laurie Cunningham's retainer.
Couldn't agree more with this concept
There's only *one* United.
Newcastle United were formed from the amalgamation of Newcastle's East End and West End clubs, resulting in the city's only major team. I'm pretty sure that the other so-called *Uniteds* (in the Premier League at least) were the result of some arbitrary name change.
Only one United you say
Have you seen this? Newcastle may be the only "true" United in the Premiership, but there are plenty about.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/jan/12/newcastle-united-england
Yes, I am aware of this
That's why I included the disclaimer "in the Premier League" ;-)
I know it's emotional nonsense...
...but I *really* don't want to move to Stratford. I want to stay at the Lane.
I can see the business arguments for it, and why staying at the Lane is not perhaps ideal, but my Tottenham supporting isn't based on a business model, but emotion (and early memories of men built like brick s**thouses in really short shorts and really tight tops).
The last football match...
that I went to in the UK was at White Hart Lane, to watch some un-key European non-title-clincher against Borussia Completely Vergotten. I'm not sure exactly how long ago it was, but the prestigious firm of Perriman Crooks Archibald was almost certainly involved.
Emotions are key to football,
without them what's the point?
Ah!
That's where I've been going wrong.
*runs to "What is the point of..." thread.*
I don't want Spurs to move to Stratford either
The Olympic Stadium is supposed to remain an athletics stadium, with a bit of everything else thrown in if necessary. West Ham's relocation allows this. What we didn't sign up for was it to be bulldozered immediately after the event, and another footy stadium built in its place. This idea goes against every promise made in our Olympic bid.
If that's the case
The only time they will get more than 25k in there after the Olympics is if they hold gigs there. At the end of the day West Ham, as far as I can see, have no reason to move to a bigger stadium as they will never fill it.
If you'd said 40k you would be nearer the mark
West Ham currently average 33k per game, just 2k less than Spuds, and around 2.5k short of full capacity. And that's base on a bottom of the table position. Gullivan knows that with half way reasonable performance selling up to c.40k will be possible when the opposition is halfway reasonable. Tickets for London derbies and Man U / Liverpool are still scarcer than rocking horse poo.
Even when in Division 1 they were still averaging 31k in the first year and 26k in the second, with away fans accounting for around 2k less per game than in the Premiership. And there are 9 teams currently in the Premiership that average less than 26k.
"Tickets...
...for London derbies and Man U / Liverpool are stil scarcer than rocking horse poo."
How's that like? I thought the elevated status of Liverpool football club was all in the collective head of their deluded fans?
Some theories
1. It's the buying power of the London based scousers.
2. If it's a choice between seeing Wigan, Bolton or the Pool, the latter get my vote every time (that's Liver, not Black). Bit like going to see the Stones really - more for what they were than what they now are. I could rationalise 40 years of supporting West Ham much the same way.
3. It's becasue of Joe Cole. Could we have him back? You don't seem to be using him. Ditto Glen Johnson. We'll pass on Konchesky
This is not really true in my opinion
What was promised was an athletics legacy, not the preservation of a particular stadium. The Spurs bid includes financing the renovation of the Crystal Palace athletics stadium - which is the real home of British track and field.
So there will be a modern, state of the art, purpose built athletics venue that is more appropriate to the needs of that sport than a large and expensive stadium they will fill once every generation.
At least that is what Spurs lawyers will be saying ...
will you
still go fella?
enjoy ...
when Bill Nick came up at the end I was in floods.
Glorious
Thanks for that. Made my evening. COYS!
Archie........
Can you drop your missive to David Lammy? The only MP in the country who seems intent on driving his constituency's biggest employer and source of external revenue out of the borough...
He's now trying to spark some sort of intellectual property debate by throwing in a (probably absolutely over the moon) lawyer claiming Tottenham Hotspur couldn't be called Tottenham Hotspur if they played in Stratford. Heaven knows what the MP's of SE18, NW10, E14, E16 and SW3 make of nasty football clubs misappropriating the names of their localities.
The nationwide bakers of Tottenham cakes and the good denziens of Mars are particularly worried!
He had three options
1. Show his support for the continuance of match-day trade for local small businesses by campaigning hard for Spurs to stay put.
2. Call Cholmondley Floggam or whatever they're called to come up with some kind of half-cocked (or perhaps half-cockerelled) legal case for the club to be forced to keep the name "Tottenham" at all costs even if they do move, to maintain his constituency's profile worldwide.
3. Do what he did.
COYS
well said. Lammy all of sudden cares about spurs, do me a favor.
Big Bird & Ball
Isn't that a statue of the Liver Bird (doesn't it lay big eggs)?
(grabs coat and dashes quickly out side door)
Could it be Emu?
And could that be Parky looking peaky under the trilby?
Henceforth
Shall the Trotters be known as Horwich Wanderers F.C.
I thought about that one
But isn't Horwich at least in the Borough of Bolton? (See also Royton Athletic down the road.)
Classic case...
...of an MP, growing tired of the ineffectiveness of the things he is in a position to change, seizes instead on something he can't change. I don't listen to Question Time but I caught the end the other day where Matthew Parris said the following, which was applied to bankers pay but could be equally applied to all kinds of things:
More questions for the House
Although it's not specified on their website, the case-appraisal services of Chancery Lane briefs surely don't come cheap.
Out of the MP's own pocket? Or could Mr Carter-Silk be a disguntled WHL season-ticket holder doing a pro bono favour for "the cause"?
Not Not Not Not Nottingham
Notts County are in the city
Nottingham Forest are just in Nottinghamshire County.
I thought they were moving to Trafalgar Square?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-12190456
My Daily Train Passes The Olympic Stadium
Nailing my colours to the mast, I'm a big supporter of the London Olympics. As a local I'm also looking forward to the legacy of the stadium. To think that some bastard is actually intending to knock the thing down as soon as the last Paralympics medal has been awarded fills me with anger, shame and all sorts of other very negative emotions.
Fair enough my football allegiance rests somewhere between Dagenham and West Ham and I make no apologies for hoping that the Hammers ground share proposal with Newham and the Athletics Association goes through.
The same bastard who wants to knock it down claims that West Ham's proposal means that the pitch will be too far away from the stand and that views of the game will be from a long distance. Surely every idiot knows that "miles away" is the best way to watch West Ham anyway.
and by 2012
West Ham and Dagenham will probably be in the same division anyway, so there are 2 derby games sorted.
As luck would have it
Both of my teams are firmly rooted to the bottom three of their respective divisions. I certainly cant be accused of being a glory hunter.
Over my dead body ...
... I just don't know what the board are playing at. As a season ticket holder I haven't met one supporter that wants to move to Stratford. We've got a perfectly sensible option to build a new stadium in Tottenham. I hope the IOC or the Government or whoever it is hurry up and give the stadium to West Ham and end all this nonsense. If we move from Tottenham (the place of my birth) I, for one, will be giving up my season ticket and I don't think I'll be alone either. Sort it out ENIC and stop going against the wishes of the overwhelming majority of Tottenham supporters!
Whatever happened to the idea
that was floated a few years back of building a new stadium at Alexandra Palace?
Although they might have to change the name to Wood Green Hotspur if that came about.
Ahem
It was Arsenal who looked at moving to Ally Pally.
I'm getting old
At least I remember there was a plan to move a football club there.
yes
in the 80s, a ground share was mooted. But english clubs being backward to this sort of thing was neevr gonna happen
If Haringey council have any part in the plans...
....nothing will happen.
Knowing Haringey Council
as I do, I wouldn't be in the least surprised to find out that there was still a team employed to plan the move of Arsenal from Highbury to Ally Pally.
Indeed
*nods sympathetically*
Really?
I've recently moved from Hackney to Haringey and Haringey seem positively forward thinking, dynamic and efficient compared to the other shower.
If I might differ,
when you say "...they should have renamed themselves Anfield F.C. – oh how half the city would have loved that" the dichotomy you allude to did not of course exist. Because, as you correctly state, Everton moved to Goodison in 1892 and some squatters then took over the old ground.
There's a tiny part of that quite enjoys the idea of reverting to the name St Domingo's. Am I right in thinking it originally was St Domingo's Cricket & Football Club or am I merely conflating the origin as a cricket club into a name that never existed?
As mentioned above
My research for this blog was not as in-depth as it might have been, but, yes, I do vaguely remember something about Methodists at some point in the improbably detailed history of Everton that I ski... scrutinised.
Of course what should have happened
As the original and best, Everton FC should have called themselves Liverpool FC. And remained as Liverpool FC as they moved around the city. When the squatters moved into the tin mine, they would then have had to call themselves Anfield FC.
Good job we didn't move to Kirkby...
Oh, and we should have kept the Liver bird on our badges to stop the usurpers appropriating it and then trying to copyright it.
Having traisped to their dreary ground a few times
via various county buses and branch lines, I'd always assumed Tottenham were a Birmingham Club as it's only 2 buses and half hour walk from the Bull Ring.
Accessibility
Considering that I live in the same borough as Spurs, it is galling that the only matches I've arrived at late have been at White Hart Lane.
That was not down to any sort of casual approach on my part, thinking it's not going to take long to get there.
I always find the bitter and vehement allegiance to London
sides amusing mainly because well they are in London and not some important to get steamed up about. I mean half the time you can only tell where you are in town because the takeaways' names have changed from "Balham Kebab Centre to Tooting Kebab Kabin". Also all London footy fans seem to live in Kent.
Come again
I don't understand the above at all. Is it just me?
It's just coming from
a town surrounded by fields you sort of knew where it began and ended where's in London peoples allegiences seem to change across a main road. Also they do seem a little fluid working with kids for 20 years the team to follow swapped from Wimbledon to Palace to Arsenal to Chelsea something that doesn't happen so much in other places.
Oh and the transport links to Tottenham are terrible.
No they're not ...
... you either get off at Seven Sisters and have a 10 minute walk, get the train to White Hart Lane or get a bus down the High Road. How's that any worse than anywhere else? It's a lot easier than getting to West Ham, believe me.
Depends where your start from...
when I lived in "that" London I walked down Shrewsbury Road, Plashett Grove and onto Green Street. Dead easy.
Selhurst Park. Now that's a challenge. Went there once and still have no idea how I got there.
fair play
if you can do that in 10 mins. more like 25 for me, the transport links definitely overplayed. Palace now there's a ground that defies logic
Start point, end point
It's impossible to be definitive about how difficult or easy a journey to a ground is when travelling around London.
After Arsenal (walking distance) and Orient, West Ham is the easiest ground to get to for me.
Overground from Crouch Hill to Barking (passing Leyton Midland Road, where I could alight for the short walk to Orient) then change to the District Line. 2 stops to Upton Park.
The worst journey for me is probably to Brentford.
Few and far
I get your point but those sort of towns are few and far between. I think they do breed more of a local identity though. I was brought up in Watford and at one side it joins onto Bushey and not far down the road you're in Middlesex and then London without really leaving a conurbation. Although I support Watford, I identify myself more with London than with Watford but that probably has a lot to do with Listening to Capital Radio (when it was good) and BBC Radio London in my formative years than anything else. I was at college in the Potteries and there are 5 or 6 towns there that are just joined together. When I moved to Stevenage (yes, I know, all the big glamour towns!) I noticed that there was more of an identity and you knew when it starts and ends.
Or.....
they live in Milton Keynes. My in-laws (Burnley fans) are surrounded by Arsenal, West Ham and Spurs fans. Bloody overspill.
That's a point. Wimbledon play in Milton Keynes. Now that is so so wrong!
No they don't...
Wimbledon play in Kingston-upon-Thames (they groundshare with Kingstonian), Franchise FC play in Milton Keynes.
That's outrageous,
slanderous and I simply WON'T HAVE IT!
They live in Surrey too.
Don't worry, Dave ...
.. he must live in some Godforsaken satellite town and have a chip on his shoulder. Actually that sounds like most Ars*n*l fans
yep that's me gooner til I die ! ?
and Spurs fans can hardly start talking about "chips on shoulders" can they really? Having not won anything in living memory and yet still harping on about being "a big club" they do seem to have self esteem issues. They are the Newcastle of the south.
how did
that game at the emirates pan out. It may only be the carling cup to you, how's that working out?, but to beat your bitterest off the field rivals 2-1 at wembley in front of 90,000. yeah nothing in living memory. chin chin sweetcheeks
I knew irony and football fans never works
I'm not a gooner.I'm sorry I got in the way of this on going North London ex love affair Spurs being obsessed with Arsenal , Arsenal fans have moved on in my experience. I'll leave you to your huge mound of maris pipers and yes fresh from the shower my cheeks are very sweet.
Sorry, no post here
Changed my mind
irony?
a charge that could be levelled at you. will leave it at that then.
and no you're not a gooner, there was only ever about 200 of 'em tops.
The Gooners
Living in an area with lots of Arsenal supporters, I can confirm that these days they generically refer to themselves as Gooners. For example my good friend Tony, who is an ex copper, approaching 60 and emphatically was never a member of the hooligan gang, calls himself a Gooner. It's definitely not because he sees any cachet in the name through its hooligan associations.
The Elephant in the room...
ok...I'll say as no-one else has...
Manchester (so called) United do not not play in Manchester. The ground is in Trafford.
and just to continue the tradition the anti-Glaser mob FC United of Manchester play in Bury.
You English
are so quaint
Is the word you actually mean
...parochial?
What about
The Mighty Port Vale ?,not in London,Premiership fans.There is no such place,Or is there ?
Burslem Port Vale
to give them their original name. One of the six towns of Stoke.
Just realised
Any team with a Rangers or Rovers suffix ought to be able to retain their original name wherever they go, after all with a name like that we should expect them to move around.
My local team
when I was growing up was Shamrock Rovers. At the same time I was of an age to leave home they were evicted from their ground in Milltown. As they roved around Dublin (Phibsboro, Santry, Drumcondra, Donnybrook) I found myself - entirely coincidentally - living in these same areas (the timing wasn't exactly the same but close enough to be spooky). In the end we separated as they found a permanent(?) home in the suburb of Tallaght and I couldn't afford that move.
Having "Rovers" in your name helps but being the more general "Shamrock Rovers" is even better - one can't help thinking if, say, Blackburn Rovers set up camp in Burnley the second half of their name wouldn't be enough to camouflage the jarring effect of the first.
Or Wanderers
.
Don't think we'll be reverting
To the Black Arabs.
Pity poor Chester FC
Currently languishing in Evo Stick First Division North (currently topping the table though) as they seek to clamber up the ladder to the Football League, they have a ground half of which is in Wales.
It's also a pain to get to, even for the majority of Chester fans. After the old Sealand Road ground was demolished (and it was a pain to get to), the exile in Macclesfield, a new ground was built another half mile or more further from the old ground.
It now glories in the title The Exacta Stadium.
Although we like to give it in the neck to the Arse
for being the Woolwich Wanderer I think we have reached a point in time where the club is bigger than the locale. WHL is a pain in the arse to get to and to get out of whether you are going by car or by public transport. I, for one, would be sad to see us leave but fully understand why it might happen.
Don't forget Spurs have AEG behind them and money talks...
A dim bulb
When I moved to London 25 years ago the first place I lived in was Kensal Green, next stop on from Queens Park, so I'm, well-acquainted with the then-shabby/now-"gentrified" London borough. But until I read this post I'd never connected it at all with the football club Queens Park Rangers. This might be because outsiders' mental map of London is hugely influenced by the Tube map: Queens Park and Shepherds Bush are fairly close, but one's on the Bakerloo, one's on the Central so they're different spheres. It may be because you never actually say "Queens Park Rangers", you say "QPR". Or it may just be that I'm a dim bulb.
Good old QPR. Always have a soft spot for teams whose kit involves "hoops".
Where you from mate?
The following blog might be relevant.
http://bigthink.com/ideas/26493
As a Hull born Liverpool fan living in Bradford, I think I'll keep quiet about the rest.
Oh, and they think Watford is in London too.
50th Anniversary T-Shirts and ...
dvd's with all the black & white footage of the last time they won the league (1961 - can anyone here remember it? !!!!) being sold in the club shop at The Lane. Big club eh? lol
Wherever they move to they will always be in our shadow :-)
Yawn
"lol" ? What are you, a texting schoolgirl?
You bandwagon jumpers will always be playing catch up, doesn't matter how many trophies you win.
Golly gosh
There does seem to be a bit more needle between you Spurs and Arsenal fans than we get between the Everton and Liverpool fans.
I can't recall anything bad between Man U and Man City, Birmingham and Villa or N. Forest and N. County to name a few others. Possibly because none has been manifested here.
Maybe there is more than a grain of truth to the usual media bollocks about the "friendly derby".
I think I touched a nerve!!
"Bandwagon jumpers" ? I am assuming you are referencing our move from Woolwich in 1913? Well North London needed a decent club!
Let's see....
More trophies (27 to Sp*rs 17)...Check
Bigger/better ground...Check
Most seasons in the top division (84)...Check
Longest run of unbeaten league matches (49)...Check
Twice won the league at WHL...Check
Yup,lots of catching up to do! Laughing out very loud now ;-))
Looking forward to the trip to Stratford already.