Cherries-Spurs

TigerBlog ordered a sausage roll, a ham-and-cheese pie and chips at the concession stand at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium Sunday afternoon, before the game between the Spurs and Bournemouth.

As he waited, he looked over at the gentleman next to him, who had ordered three beers. The concession worker took a plastic cup, placed it over a circle, pushed a button — and then the beer started to rise from the bottom of the cup. 

What the heck? How in the world did the beer stay in the cup afterwards? Wasn't there a hole in the bottom of it? How else would the beer come into the cup? 

Had it been any other stadium, TB would have looked into it. At Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, nah. It's just part of the mystique of the place.

TigerBlog has never been to a more beautiful stadium than the one in North London. His experience at the game Saturday also reinforced for him that there is nothing in sports that compares to a European soccer game.

Yes, he said that. Princeton head men's soccer coach Jim Barlow would have to smile at that. He and TB have gone back and forth for decades on the merits of soccer and lacrosse, and yet even TB has to admit that going to a big, big-time soccer game is crazy. He learned it when he went to the El Salvador-Costa Rica World Cup qualifier in 2008 when he was in Costa Rica with the men's lacrosse team, but it has really been reinforced for him in the last 15 months. 

The game Sunday was his first English Premier League game. His other experience in European professional soccer came on the men's lacrosse trip in the fall of 2022, when the team went to see a La Liga game between Villareal and Barcelona. 

He didn't really need to go to either game to have a pretty good sense of what the experience is like. It's crazy. You can tell that from television.

When you're in the stadium, though, it all goes to an entirely different level. It's a party from start to finish, with singing, cheering, dancing and rabid love for whoever your team is.

In this case, TB's team is Bournemouth, which is where Mrs. Blog was born and raised. When she was young, the Cherries, as the team is known, were a fourth-division club. Now they have reached the Premier League and managed to stay there for the last few years, and they came into the game Sunday with six wins and a tie in their last seven games, moving themselves into a tie for 10th with Chelsea.

Before TB left for England, Barlow told him that he would be able to help him get EPL tickets if there was a game he wanted to attend. And so it was that Barlow came through, starting TB down a path that led to two seats for the Cherries-Spurs game 17 rows off the field, behind the Bournemouth bench.

The day started with the 12:03 train into London from the small town of Ware, where TB and Mrs. Blog have been staying while dog-sitting a Whippet named Dougal. They (Dougal stayed home) took the 30-minute trip on the Hertford East line, which stops at stations with very English-sounding names like, among others, Broxbourne, Cheshunt, St. Margaret's, Rye House, Enfield Lock, Waltham Cross and Brimsdown.

When they got to the train platform, it was already pretty crowded, and everyone there was 1) headed to the game, 2) telling them not to cheer out loud for Bournemouth and 3), um, imbibing. On Spurs game days, the train adds a stop at Northumberland Park, in between Ponder's End and Tottenham Hale. The trains also add extra cars, or, as they say on the PA at the station, "formed of extra coaches."

It actually reminded TB of the way extra trains were added to Princeton for football games in the earliest days of Palmer Stadium.

TB and Mrs. Blog got off at Northumberland Park and made the 10-minute walk towards the stadium, which rises like a spaceship above the row homes and shops in the neighborhood. The old stadium, White Hart Lane, was torn down and the new stadium built on the same spot, opening in 2019. It is immaculate, beautiful, welcoming, accessible and just an incredible venue all around. It was built in a way so that when it rains — and it poured during the game Sunday — not a single fan in the stadium will get wet.

TB was wearing, shockingly, a Princeton sweatshirt and Princeton hat, and he was approached by a tall man with a thick English accent who said "Princeton?" When TB turned around, he saw a man who said his name was Robert Reed. 

When TB asked him if he was familiar with Princeton, Reed said he most certainly was. Why was that? Because he played basketball at, you won't believe it, Rider. Really. Rider. 

Did he say Rider? TB wasn't quite sure he heard him correctly. Yes. Rider. 

In fact, Reed had an 11-point, eight-rebound game against the Tigers in his senior year of 2003. He played for Don Harnum, an old TB friend who is now the Director of Athletics at Rider (and whose brother Mike played for Pete Carril at Princeton).

Is Reed, who now runs a sports hospitality company after a long pro career in Europe, a Spurs fan? He goes to every game, home and away, wherever the team plays. This includes all over Europe in addition to the EPL games. 

After talking to Reed for a few minutes, the walk to the stadium continued. As he was starting up the steps, he heard, again, "Princeton?" When he turned around, there were about eight people standing there. They were Americans who had come to the game. Where did they live? In Princeton. Literally in the town of Princeton. 

Wear your Princeton stuff and people will find you.

The crowd featured about 3,000 Bournemouth fans and 60,000 or so Spurs fans. They sang "When the Spurs go marching in," to the tune of "When The Saints Go Marching In," as the game began and they never stopped the party. 

In the end, it was a 3-1 Spurs win as the home side (as they say) continues to chase a spot in the UEFA Champions League. Bournemouth is comfortably out of the relegation zone, for now at least. 

TB will root for the Spurs moving forward in addition to the Cherries. 

And why not? They put on an incredible show at their incredible venue. 

And as for Jim Barlow? Thanks for arranging the tickets. 

And you've known TB since you were in high school. You could have said something about how much fun pro soccer is.