da prosport bet： Lasagna-gate is a hideous name but it evokes some hideous bad luck.
da cassino： Whatever happened in the Tottenham Hotspur hotel – specifically the kitchen – the night before they faced West Ham United in the crunch-est of crunch Premier League final days for the north London side is still slightly unclear, but one thing we know for certain is that it cost Spurs a Champions League spot in a fashion that conspiracy theorists are sure to love.
Not only did Martin Jol’s team miss out on fourth spot, but they lost it to Arsenal after being beaten by West Ham; and the Premier League refused to allow the final game of the season to be postponed consequence-free.
But the next season there was more drama, as the Premier League’s mid-noughties period continued to serve up the kind of high-octane soap opera feel that Sky Sports were able to hype up beyond all recognition.
One of those thrilling moments saw Spurs enact revenge. The drama started almost three-quarters of a season earlier, and it didn’t even end with the final whistle, when Tottenham thought they’d sent their London rivals into the Championship.
Before the season started, arguably the most strange and shocking double transfer in the history of the Premier League took place, as Carlos Tevez and Javier Mascherano rocked up at West Ham United in odd circumstances. In the end, it would lead to bitterness and rancour from Sheffield United, as well as lawsuits and court cases, but at first West Ham were far from world-beaters, even with Tevez in the team.
Indeed, if you go back to March 4th 2007, just before West Ham’s home game that Sunday afternoon, the Hammers found themselves rock bottom of the Premier League and 10 points from safety. They looked dead and buried in the most emphatic way possible: they needed a miracle with ten games to play. At the very least, they needed something from their game that day: a London derby at home to Tottenham Hotspur, the very team, the very venue, the very next season after Lasagna-gate.
What happened next is an underrated period of Premier League greatness. Taken in context, it is a story of theatrical proportions, but it’s the context that made the atmosphere feverish, and that’s something no amount of highlights can convey. You had to be there.
A desperate West Ham took the lead, too, through that bastion of Hammerhood Mark Noble. In fact, they doubled when Carlos Tevez, quite easily the best player in a poor team, produced a moment of quality from a free-kick.
But the Irons weren’t relegation fodder for nothing, they were bottom of the pile for a reason, even if they were only in last place because of a rare positive result for West Ham: Watford had grabbed a point against Charlton the day before in a battle between the other two teams in the relegation zone. A Jermain Defoe penalty was the insulting start of a painful Spurs comeback, but if that wasn’t enough of a slap in the face, it was a Teemu Tainio goal which brought the White Hart Lane club level, a volleyed finish from an Aaron Lennon backheel assist.
The Jermain Defoe transfer from West Ham to Tottenham was painful for the Hammers fans, mostly because of the way the England striker acted in refusing to sign a new contract. He was sold to a rival, but with Bobby Zamora going in the other direction. Perhaps it’s fitting that it was Defoe’s penalty which sparked Spurs into a second half comeback, but it’s also apt that Carlos Tevez free-kick from the right hand side of the pitch was met by the head of substitute Zamora with only five minutes of normal time remaining. It was a goal that looked like a winner, and one to take the Hammers back to seven points from safety. But it wasn’t even close to being the winner.
Dimitar Berbatov equalised just moments later from a free kick right on the edge of the area, dinking a delicate strike over the wall and into the goal in a way that only the Bulgarian could have. It was a body blow to a Hammers team who knew they really needed to win. They spent stoppage time flooding the Spurs box in an attempt to nick a winner, leaving only Paul Konchesky back to defend.
Somehow, that proved to be a mistake. An attack broke down on the edge of the Spurs box, and Jermain Defoe was set free, running at Konchesky and forcing him backwards towards his own box. When Defoe finally got a strike away, he was joined by three Spurs players on the edge of the box. One was an unlikely hero, Paul Stalteri.
As Defoe’s shot was parried by Rob Green in the West Ham goal, it trickled tamely just feet away from the former England goalkeeper and the onrushing Stalteri had the easiest of finishes into an open goal. And that was to prove the winner.
It was cruel. A defeat at home to your bitterest rivals is one thing. To suffer a 4-3 defeat in the last minute is something else. But to endure that when you’re ten points adrift of safety and firmly rooted to the bottom of the table is tough to take. They must have felt that relegation was inevitable with nine games to go and Arsenal, Chelsea, Everton and Manchester United still to play.
It wasn’t though. As Tevez proved with his first half free-kick, he had the quality that the rest of his side lacked. It was his inspiration that saw the Hammers win seven of those nine remaining games, losing the other two and drawing none. Indeed, the Irons had only five draws all season, but not one of them came after January.
If you’re going to lose so heartbreakingly to a rival, and find yourself so far away from safety with so few games remaining, there’s only one upside you can take. In that situation, there’s no longer expectation or pressure, only the release that comes from giving up all hope. Maybe that’s how the Hammers stayed up after sinking so low and being put there by such a heavy blow from a rival.
Maybe, looking back, it was a rare moment where both teams were able to take something from the emotional nature of the game. Spurs, the revenge they wanted for the season previous. And West Ham the freedom to win seven of their final nine games and claw their way to safety.
Of all the hideous bad luck involved that season, it was West Ham’s that sparked them back to life.