White Hart Lane: Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Cardiff City

Wednesday, 5 March 2014

Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Cardiff City

Aerial shot of White Hart Lane (Photo courtesy of www.standard.co.uk)

Programme - £3.50

Ratings

Overall Ground Quality : 8/10

Ease of getting there : 5/10

Atmosphere : 7/10

Programme : 7/10

View of Action : 8/10

Quality of the game : 4/10

The "football" feeling : 8/10

Chances of coming here for a random game : 2/10

Legroom : 10/10

Surrounding area : 5/10

Overall : 64/100

West Stand

North Stand

East Stand

South Stand

Rather expensive car parking close to the ground

Bill Nicholson Way

The crowds gathering to welcome the teams on Bill Nicholson Way

The Vision!

East Stand

South Stand

West Stand

East Stand

South Stand

West Stand

The famous Tottenham Hotspur gold cockerel

East Stand

South Stand

West Stand

East Stand

South Stand

West Stand

The planned 4 phases of the building of their new stadium

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Tottenham 1-2 Leicester City

With Leicester City struggling in the Premier League, our attention turns our FA Cup fourth round tie against Tottenham Hotspur. Around 4,000 City supporters were to make their way down the M1 for this all Premier League encounter at the Lane.

I set off at around 9:30am and made the journey past Leicester where a convoy of coaches lined up on the slip road making their way onto the M1. I got as far as Toddington services before the one cup of coffee I had proved to be too much! As I walked out the services, the convoy of blue had caught up and were passing Toddington services. I continued the journey down the M1 before joining the M25 and coming off at Potters Bar and into Enfield. Enfield has been a useful place to park in the past when visiting north London teams for the direct train and the easy access to the M25. I parked on Willow Road in Enfield and walked down to the Enfield town centre eating at The George before getting the train to White Hart Lane. The train journey from Enfield Town to White Hart Lane takes no more than 10 minutes. Walking down High Road towards ‘The Lane’ was huge range of merchandise stalls with t-shirts featuring their star man, Harry Kane and Christian Eriksen to name a few items on sale. The majority of the land next to White Hart Lane has been fenced off ready to construct Tottenham’s new stadium. As the atmosphere continued to build up around the ground, a cup of tea for 90 pence outside proved to be too tempting. In front of the away turnstiles was a queuing barrier containing 10 – 15 stewards and a sniffer dog performing searches on all supporters going into the ground!

White Hart Lane is the home of Tottenham Hotspur and the stadium has a capacity of only 36,284.

The oldest stand is the East Stand which follows the West Stand which was renovated in the early 1980s. The West Stand took over 15 months to be completed with cost overruns having severe financial implications. This West Stand is parallel with Tottenham High Road and is connected to it by Bill Nicholson Way. The early 1990s saw the completion of the South Stand (on Park Lane) and the introduction of the first Jumbotron video screen, of which there are now two, one above each penalty area. The renovation of the Members' (North) Stand which is reached via Paxton Road was completed in 1998, leaving the ground in its present form. At the turn of the millennium, after falling behind in stadium capacity, talks began over the future of White Hart Lane. Over the years, many stadium designs and ideas were rumoured in the media. Most recently a move to Wembley Stadium was ruled out by the club, as was talks of moving to the Olympic Stadium following 2012 Olympic Games. Plans are afoot for Tottenham to move to a new stadium with an estimated capacity of 56,000, with the new stadium being built on the current site instead of moving from the borough of Haringey. This could potentially involve half the building of their new stadium before pulling down the North Stand in order to complete their new home whilst playing at their existing White Hart Lane.

During the first 20 minutes, a naive Liam Moore fouled in the penalty area giving referee Robert Madley no choice but to point to the spot. Even with City debutant Mark Schwarzer in goal, it didn’t stop Andros Townsend from converting giving Spurs the early lead. Credit to Leicester they continued to knock on Spurs door with numerous chances including the daft decision to book City’s big money sign Andrej Kramaric for an alleged dive in the penalty area. City’s persistence continued in the second half. Both Spurs and City had numerous opportunities. In the 73^rd minute, Nigel Pearson decided to substitute Kramaric and Vardy for Albrighton and Nugent which proved to change the game. Schlupp’s pass into the penalty area found Leonardo Ulloa who then fired home the equaliser, 1-1. City continued to pile on the pressure. In the final stages of the match, Danny Simpson crossed from the right; found Jeff Schlupp who volleyed on target, caught and then spilt by Vorm and crept over the line, 1-2. The travelling City supporters erupted in celebrations and even smoke bombs were set off! (How did they get passed the high level of security?).

At full time, a fairly short walk up High Road back to White Hart Lane railway station before being crammed into the Enfield bound train. Once the train arrived in Enfield, I was back at the car by 5:30pm followed by a fairly decent journey back towards the Midlands arriving home for 7:30pm.

A great away day overall which was made even better with a victory and now through to the next round of the FA Cup.

THE MAGIC OF THE FA CUP IS STILL ALIVE!

Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Cardiff City

An opportunity to watch Premiership football is always eagerly awaited and we ventured to north London looking forward to free flowing Tottenham take on relegation threatened Cardiff City.
Prior to going to White Hart Lane we made several stops at various non league grounds.
The first was The Hive, the new home of former league club Barnet. This turned out to be a difficult encounter. While Ross started taking a few shots of the outside of the stadium, I (Adrian) am then approached by a man of foreign descent wearing the dreadful high visibility yellow jacket. People that know me will know my opinion of stewards; well my opinion of so called security jobs worths is not much higher. Immediately he informs me that, I cannot park my car where it is and Ross cannot take pictures’. I asked why and I am told for security reasons!! What nonsense, I explain we are just taking pictures for a non commercial website and it is a hobby! “What's hobby” he says! I will say no more.

The only thing, I will say in the interest of balance is that The Hive is situated in Barnet’s training complex. Just maybe it is private property and only accessible to the general public on match days only. I would like to clarify this with Barnet FC.
From then without any problems, we visited Harrow Borough and then across Western Avenue and on the North Circular to Waltham Abbey, Cheshunt and finally Enfield Town.

We had lunch in The George in Enfield town centre after parking the car on a residential street in the town and following lunch we boarded the train from Enfield to White Hart Lane station, a journey of about 15 minutes.
Tottenham’s ground is actually not on White Hart Lane, but the main Tottenham High Road.

White Hart Lane is a side road off the High Road. Approx, the station is 10 minutes walk away from the stadium.
We arrived about 2 hours prior to kick off and leisurely walked round the ground taking pictures.

Our seats were in the North Stand Upper Tier behind the goal and offered an excellent view.

White Hart Lane is the home of Tottenham Hotspur and the stadium has a capacity of only 36,284.

The early 1990s saw the completion of the South Stand (on Park Lane) and the introduction of the first Jumbotron video screen, of which there are now two, one above each penalty area. The renovation of the Members' (North) Stand which is reached via Paxton Road was completed in 1998, leaving the ground in its present form. At the turn of the millennium, after falling behind in stadium capacity, talks began over the future of White Hart Lane. Over the years, many stadium designs and ideas were rumoured in the media. Most recently a move to Wembley Stadium was ruled out by the club, as was talks of moving to the Olympic Stadium following 2012 Olympic Games.

Plans are afoot for Tottenham to move to a new stadium with an estimated capacity of 56,000, with the new stadium being built on the current site instead of moving from the borough of Haringey. This could potentially involve half the building of their new stadium before pulling down the North Stand in order to complete their new home whilst playing at their existing White Hart Lane.

The game itself was a disappointment whether it was the exertions of a Europa League match on the Thursday or Cardiff’s 5 man defence, we will never know, but Spurs were certainly not at their best. The abiding memory though will be the goal. An excellent breakaway by Andros Townsend who fed the in-form Emmanuel Adebayor who turned provider for Spaniard Roberto Soldado who flicked home with great skill. The home side dominated possession but twice in the first half the Welsh side could have equalised. Caulker against his former club headed against the bar from a corner and teenage left back Declan John drew a save from Hugo Lloris.
In the second half, Spurs struggled to break down Cardiff and their play was often laboured. Chances were few and far between. Substitute Harry Kane forced a save from Marshall late on but the Cardiff keeper was not tested nearly enough.
As for Cardiff City, they have made the news a lot this season with their controversial owner Vincent Tan. He changed the manager in December replacing Malky Mackay with Norwegian Ollie Gunnar Solkjaer. So far the change has not seen an improvement. Cardiff City defended well but could have got something from the game if they had more quality in the last third. The fact they didn't suggests their love affair with England's top flight will last just the 12 months.
We made a swift getaway from the ground and got on the first train back to Enfield. We were on our way back towards the M25 within 30minutes of the final whistle. Our journey back north on the M1 was a slow one with heavy rain and a huge amount of traffic. Meant a stop-start hour and a bit mainly due to many Sunderland coaches leaving London after the League Cup Final which didn't help!

Despite a disappointing game, we enjoyed the trip; it was my first visit to White Hart Lane since 1991, for Ross his first visit.
Will we visit this ground again I wonder, already plans are afoot for a brand new state of the art stadium adjacent to their current home. The graphics make it look very smart; I hope they can keep that White Hart Lane atmosphere. It’s that atmosphere that makes it my most visited London club ground.