Today I'm going back 26 years to 1996 and Tottenham's home Premier League game against Southampton played at White Hart Lane in front of 26,320.
The programme cover stars for this particular issue are Tottenham's Chris Armstrong and Southampton's Jason Dodd, pictured in action from the Boxing Day goalless draw played at the Dell earlier in the season. Perhaps it was the curse of the programme covers but neither would appear in today's featured match. Armstrong struggled with injury during his time at Spurs and never seemed to be quite prolific enough but still managed to score 62 goals in 173 appearances across 7 seasons for the Lillywhites. Jason Dodd played the major part of his career for Southampton and was there for 16 years from 1989 until 2005 making 398 League appearances and scoring 9 goals from his full-back position.
One player who went on to have a long and reasonably successful lower league management career was Southampton substitute Paul Tisdale. Tisdale played for the Saints from 1991-1997 before appearing for a number of other clubs. In total he made only 55 English League appearances but he appears to have used his time with the reserves and on the bench wisely. He first came to prominence when managing Team Bath to four promotions and the First Round proper of the FA Cup in 2003. His success at Team Bath brought him to the attention of Non League Exeter City and he was appointed manager there in 2006. He secured Exeter's return to the Football League in 2008 and then achieved back-to-back promotions when finishing second in League 2 the following season. Tisdale eventually became one of the longest serving managers in English football, remaining at Exeter until 2018 when they failed in the Play-Off Final against Coventry City and his contract was not renewed. Since leaving Exeter, Tisdale's managerial career has been somewhat patchy and he is now to be found managing Stevenage in League 2. One little curiosity is that Tisdale's uncle is James Faulkner who played Randyll Tarly in Game of Thrones. It is not known if Tisdale is ever referred to by his uncle as "Father of Grecians".
The match was also notable for the appearance up front of Steve Slade making his full debut for Spurs, replacing the injured Chris Armstrong. I have no recollection of the player whatsoever but he made 23 League appearances for Tottenham without scoring a goal before moving on to QPR in 1996 where he was to remain until 2000 after which he had a very patchy Non-League career before finishing in 2006. Perhaps things might have been different for Slade had he converted an early chance in this game but he hit the post and the chance was gone. On such opportunities are careers sometimes built. The only goal of the game came in the 64th minute with Andy Sinton crossing for Jason Dozzell to head home the winner for Tottenham.
Spurs, managed by Gerry Francis, ended the season in 8th position in the Premiership (as it was known at the time), two points behind Arsenal who secured the last UEFA Cup qualifying place. Ironically Spurs finished on the same number of points as Everton who were only denied a UEFA Cup berth themselves as punishment by UEFA due to Premier League teams fielding under strength line-ups in their 1995 Intertoto competition! Southampton, managed by Dave Merrington, ended the season escaping the relegation places by the skin of their teeth on goal difference from relegated Manchester City.
CRB Match No. 1018
Comments
Post a Comment