Inside Hotspur Way: De Zerbi's Impact, New Signings & Club Culture (feat. Ben Haines)

34:36I mean, everyone knows watching that as a fan was just the most brutal thing. But then I think that was probably like one of the best experiences that I've ever had after the game, like going into interview Roberto and then him just putting his hand on my shoulder as I'm just about to start. And then I just go back to ask my first question and he put his hand up to sort of stop and he sort of just put his hand on my shoulder and went, what's wrong? and I was like what because I had no idea that he was gonna do that but he clearly I was wearing absolutely everything on my face and he was like what's wrong is that part of you where you're

35:16Jack:like oh god I'm gonna get in trouble here because he thinks I'm pissed off or something but actually he was just like we'll be okay like what did he then asked me like what did you make what did you make of the performance what do you think and you sort of asked me what I thought and then he was like I think I said something like it's just frustrating because I thought that we had enough tonight you know i thought we had enough she didn't fancy saying you're a fraud mate we brought you in for all this money you can't even win at stanford bridge he just literally he just put me so at ease and was so calm and i was like wow that is with the weight of the world at that point you know i really felt like at that point that must have been peak pressure to be able to just go just be in just very present in the room and just be like i'm gonna like just check in on this like here and just kind of like make sure everything's good i mean i know i i had no way to me i was just in that headspace of like right i need to make sure that i get the right questions in here ask the right things ensure that we kind of um i mean we unpack this this game and then neatly package things back up again so that we all know what the job is on on sunday against everton um and he just literally just absolutely floored me with that and i was like wow this guy his emotional intelligence is absolutely sensational, like so, so sharp.

36:37And yeah, I mean, everyone was already won over by him by that point, but it was just it. Yeah, my respect for him there just went through the roof. It was amazing.

36:46Jack:I mean, look, I'm not going to sit here and ask you to start digging out Thomas Frank or anything like that, but I am interested to know Ori Garchudo for that matter. But just from your perspective, it's just quite interesting to, I guess you've given us a glimpse at it there, but what was the shift in energy like when he first came through the door? I mean, did you feel a stark turnaround in like atmosphere and standards just from the conversations you were having with the players or people about the club? When Roberto started. Yeah, yeah, when Roberto first came in. At that point when it looked like Spurs were going to get relegated, I was certain we were gone by that point.

37:22My just thing with him is like he just has enormously broad shoulders. that he just is able to carry so much. I mean, you would have seen it in the media, right? But the way that he handled things in the media was exquisite. It was like a masterclass in terms of how to deal with pressure. At every point when people asked him things like, do you think it's going to affect you that everyone wants to see you go down? And then he would suddenly just pop up with, no that's amazing for us it's great that everyone wants us to go down because it shows that like it's us against everyone else and people should take that as a real compliment I was like how has he managed to turn this thing that most of us as fans almost wear as a bit of a on some on one hand like a bit of a badge of honor that everyone is it's kind of a thing isn't it with Spurs is that everyone wants to beat Spurs but equally it is difficult right when you're playing six games or maybe eight games every single season where you're someone's biggest fixture of the season, it does add an additional layer that other teams don't necessarily have.

38:34And he basically just got into all of us, as in just all of us fans, and managed to make us be like, yeah, let's get it. Like, okay, cool. People want to go after us, but we're going to sort of take that as a positive and go and make something happen here. And then now off the back of it, the credit that's in the bank for him with the entire fan base because of the fact that he took it all on his own shoulders it's just it's amazing and I definitely felt a I definitely felt a surge of of kind of okay we can do this you know definitely definitely felt for that but but I do I do also recognize totally that that was that was an enormous undertaking from him like a personal one from him to come in and just lift everyone you know and get a tune out of players that were maybe struggling and he had to be so selective with who who he played and and he just he for me the to go back to what i just said before the thing that was the most impressive is it just felt like he just put everything on his shoulders and just kind of carried us over the line and got us there i mean it's funny isn't

39:41Jack:because he arrived with that reputation for being quite fiery there was a lot of kind of you know apocalyptic predictions about what was going to happen with this fiery manager coming into Tottenham in this situation where they're languishing at the bottom of the league they can't seem to buy a draw let alone a win um yet really at all times he's come across as remarkably calm collected and focused as you say in most things that he's done I think the the only the only slight thing he did which was almost kind of tongue-in-cheek really anyway was that I think there was one reporter wasn't there that said that spurs were going to go down and in the last press conference he was like get him in here now get him in here now and you know this that was it was quite kind of funny but the other one the other thing i so i i um well i think i just misjudged him completely because i'd only ever seen him as a coach on the sidelines or see him in interviews yeah yeah so like i didn't know you obviously don't know anything more about a coach like that I didn't I didn't realize how unbelievably kind of socially smart he is and and how much he is able to to read the group and stuff like that but he um I feel quite strongly about the fact that I think he gets it was I don't think people um treat everyone the same when it comes to managers on the touchline I think he I think he maybe picked up a yellow card at the back end of last season and I was thinking I've seen every single manager do exactly the same thing that he's doing but I think at times people have almost seen him as this kind of like eccentric sort of big character on the touchline but every Premier League manager is like that now you know what is it Sil said in the Sopranos it's anti-Italian discrimination you know when they're at the Columbus parade such a good episode that one yeah yeah but but like jokes aside it kind of is that right and i've probably fallen into those sort of tropes myself that oh you know the kind of oh his italian is fiery throws his hands around and all that type of thing because look you know i know he didn't always help himself but i think we can say that christian romero as well i don't think was always judged very fairly to be honest by but by referees or by your nevels or people like that and there was a level there as well i think of it being like the dirty argy or whatever about it i mean again it's it's it's a bit different because i don't think christian mamero always helped himself to always portrayed himself in the best light at times but still to like the point you're making there about deservey there is there is a certain level of like confirmation bias there that comes with the territory right people don't this is the thing that i have to try and remind myself all the time when i'm doing any other sort of work around football is that people don't watch your club 99 % of people who are on broadcasts will not watch your club as closely as you do and there's no reason for them to right because we're so in spurs you and I it's kind of a huge part of our life and always has been you can't expect someone who is working across 10 premier league games in a weekend to give the same focus to to the game that your specific team is playing but then as a result it's kind of like a byproduct of that that i think it's really easy that just like opinions just start forming and then people echo them and parrot them without ever really necessarily diving into like wait do i actually believe this or is this something i've just osmosed from a podcast a show that i've watched it's been like a bit of commentary i think that's why for me i think that's why um do you think that commentators particularly analysts, co-coms almost need to remember at times that they have an enormous sway over what people will think of a player.

43:37Like they, if they, when commentators will, the same commentators will come out after a horrendous challenge and say, well, he's just not that type of player. They'll also be delighted to say of a player like Christian Romero, for example, well, you just knew he was going to do that. it's like well you if you watch every single like maybe there were times in his spurs career where there were like periods where discipline in terms of like receiving bookings and stuff wasn't great but it was also there was a period for about a year where he only picked up like three or four yellow cards you know and i remember the same tropes followed him all the way through that year

44:12Jack:so yeah well i mean just just while while we're here because it feels like a the appropriate point to say you know i have had some questions come in from the patrons and such charlie man just says so he says something along this theme which is you know do you get why spurs supporters feel that there is like a tangible say media skew against tottenham because fans half joke about banning gary neville and the like but like do you have a sense ben on how like the club genuinely feel about some of the things that were said last year you know gary neville came out on on national television and said that it would be a good thing for the premier league if tottenham got relegated that that can't have gone down very well at the club right i mean so i mean i don't i should definitely definitely point out i am absolutely not a not a club employee so i i don't know um i kind of don't have a good steer on what the the club would think and i definitely can't speak on behalf of the club on that kind of stuff all i would say do it do it do it do it i can say on on that kind of thing is and this is purely from my experience of working on broadcasts not for spurs but for broadcasters more generally is that every single person that you um see being as an being an analyst or a co-commentator or a pundit or or someone that's paid to come in and give their opinion is also a human being so they're not these people that live in a bubble for the entirety of the week and then come out and deliver a performance on a tv show and then go back into the bubble like we are all osmosing and taking in opinions and views all the time the chances are the people that you're watching on the weekend on any broadcaster are also living the same life that you're living of listening to podcasts they need to be researched so the chances are they're keeping tabs across other media they're watching the games in the week so in the same way that you or i would listen to a co-commentator on a champions league game all the people that are then working on the weekend are getting the same commentary that we're getting they're not getting some specific feed that they that is especially for them they're getting exactly the same coverage that we're getting so I think there is a like the when you get that feeling as a fan of like someone doing co-commentary on a game that that your club is playing in that person isn't they can try and be as objective as possible but the fact is if you're if you're someone that has grown up thinking you've spent 45 years of your life thinking like Spurs are the nearly team or spurs of the team that like are spursy or whatever you're not you don't you you don't just shake that you know that that colors and informs the way that you think about spurs just in the same way that for me i'll always whenever i think about spurs i'll always have a a slightly more skewed sense of the value that i see in spurs you know so i don't think it i don't think there's sorry i I know I just have to be very particular with this.

47:28No, no, yeah, of course. I do think that we sort of forget that actually pundits are fundamentally not objective, you know, that they can try and be objective, but we all have nuance inside of it. If you listen to Carragher on Monday Night Football, he is wonderful to listen to, but the guy played for Liverpool for as long as he did. He's always going to have his lens skewed by the fact that he played for Liverpool as long as he did and was around opinions of Liverpool for as long as he was. You know, so I don't think there is I don't think there is any argument to say that that people were truly objective when they looked at Spurs' situation last season.

48:13because from my point of view again I understand that I bring a Tottenham lens this but from my point of view by every single metric that you can measure performance in the Premier League whether you look at total points whether you look at seasons in the Premier League whether you look at average league finish whether you look at amount of days top of the Premier League table like any one of those metrics, Spurs are always there or thereabouts in kind of like the upper echelons of the Premier League, you know, like Spurs have consistently been one of the biggest sides. It would not have been a good thing for the Premier League to see a side as massive as Spurs go down.

48:58But again, that's me being subjective, you know, because I'm very aware there were 19 other clubs that were probably very keen to see a big giant fall. And that probably says something about the collective sort of psyche of the way that we view sport in Britain, right? Well,

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50:36Jack:You know what, we can start moving into this stuff in terms of like psyching everything from the club's perspective because you sort of, you touched on it earlier. Two of our biggest signings in the club's history, Sandro Tonali and Matis Fernandes, they both mentioned in their interviews at the start that the gaffers told them straight away his ambition is to win the league with Tottenham. And look, we can't pretend we haven't had a couple of very poor seasons domestically anyway these past couple of years. So I guess I'd just be interested to know, do you get the sense from your conversations with Roberto De Zerbi that he balances this, I guess this massive ambition that he has for the club and where it can go.

51:17Jack:Also with, shall we say, like a clear, grounded focus on the graft that's required to firstly improve on Tottenham's back-to-back 17th place finishes. Do you get where I'm coming from? Yeah, but I genuinely, when he says that he wants to win the Premier League, I genuinely believe that that's the trajectory that he wants to go on. and I see it when the players say it. They believe that that is what he wants to achieve. But other than Pochettino, that's the only time I've heard a Spurs manager say that. I've heard Spurs managers... I love it, mate. I love it because... It does the same for me. Give me all of it.

51:55Jack:As I was saying, I don't know how much you've watched of it, if you've watched any of it at all, but like Netflix's Mourinho documentary at the moment, they're showing you exactly where Chelsea were at. Yet they spent a lot of money, but still they were always the bridesmaid, if you liked. at this point, and Mourinho's first task was to come in and overhaul Sir Alex Ferguson's Manchester United and Arsenal wingers Arsenal. And his whole perspective was, you can win the league. You can win the league. If we all do what we have to do, if we do our jobs properly, we can win the league. And, you know, I was making this point the other day when I was speaking to Rosa, but, you know, people don't like it.

52:31Jack:People don't like me bringing this point up. But it's exactly what Mikel Arteta's done from the second he stepped in the door at Arsenal. Too much derision. Let's not forget, too much derision. He walked into Arsenal when they were fully in their Bantu era and he said, I'm going to win the Premier League and I'm going to win the Champions League here. And he did one of them last year and came very, very close to the other one. So there's something to be said for a gaffer saying that we can achieve whatever we want to achieve. Because the last time we had one that actually did that, that actually wore his heart on his sleeve and said, we can achieve whatever we want to achieve.

53:05Jack:we came close to winning the Premier League and we got to a Champions League final. Not only that, but I think it's mandatory. I think it's the only, from the little experience that I have of being around these guys, it's imperative that you have that level of self-belief. That there's not really any wiggle room to not have it. If you look at the way that Ange spoke, I know that it put a bit of a target on us by saying about the trophy in the second season thing. By genuinely... He wasn't just saying it. He was talking it into existence. He truly believed that it was going to happen. It wasn't a throwaway line.

53:47It was a deep-rooted belief that he had the capability to do it with the club. And I think if you look around... I think I really like the definition of genius being the idea of holding two counterbalancing thoughts in equal weight you know the idea of like people you see with people that um most people can either be super kind of almost obsessive and compulsive but then maybe are not amazingly good at the emotional intelligence side or you see people that are incredibly creative and emotionally intelligent but then you'll see that they're not necessarily as orderly in their life and i think when you look at most premier league managers they are the golden mean in between those things they somehow managed to be incredible leaders of people and also at the same time obsessive to the point of like understanding the minutiae of every last detail they're so details oriented and i don't think that i i can't i think leicester were like the exception that proves the rule right leicester were a freak there was the chances of that happening again are so minimal and that the way in which they managed to win the league was something else but almost every other premier League winning season, it has been those people that have been able to go and be obsessed, absolutely obsessed and able to do both the emotional side and the very tangible kind of obsessive numbers, data, tactics.

55:20And I think there is no room to not be that in the modern era if you want to win, you know? So I'm so down with him saying like, that's the aim. When someone asked me the other day at the stadium, someone shouted out to me while we were just about to start the pre-match stuff. And it's like, Ben, where are we going to finish this year? And I'm like, well, the aim is to come first, right? There's no point in saying anything other than that. The aim is to come first. The aim is to go out and win. And that's what Roberto wants to do. And I think it's important for me. I've been thinking about this quite a lot recently.

55:51It's important for me to try and embody that. like when I'm going every single week going into the club I need to behave and think like the sort of person and the sort of interviewer or presenter that believes that the club that he's like a part of is going to try and win the league you know but do you think do you think

56:11Jack:we the fans podcasters whoever else has a role to play in this as well do you think you know that does and I'm not putting you in this position so Ben Ains tells everyone what to do but you know just speaking as a Spurs fan as well, you know, there's to, to get this winning mentality, do we finally have to sort of leave a bit of the self depreciating tropes stuff behind Spurs, Dr. Tottenham or this kind of crap? Yeah. I hadn't considered that before. That's a good question. I don't know. Cause I always, when I, look, you, I'm, would you blow some smoke up your backside here? But you know, I listened to your pod like all the time.

56:48Go on, just a little bit. I listen to your pod all the time and I love listening on the way home after a game, sit and listen to whatever you've made of the game and there's a reason that I love it there's a reason that I love listening to other fans talk about the shared experience of what it is to be a Spurs fan so there is clearly something going on there around shared experience and what we've experienced over the last however long as long as we've been supporting the club So I don't know that it's as easy as just being able to be like, I'll just snap out of whatever made me who I am previously.

57:24But I do think there's maybe a journey to go on. I've been thinking about this thing recently, which was, do you remember the period under Ange where it just became inevitable that we were going to score late goals?

57:38Jack:Yeah, Sheffield United and Kulisevsky wheeling away, right? Yeah, and we had a late one in Europe as well. and like it just sort of like I don't know there was just this feeling at the time where you're like I just feel like we're gonna find a way you know and you can't put your finger on what it is and you don't know why you just feel like we're gonna score in the last minute I felt that in 2019 though and I'm not just saying this I felt in 2019 I mean I did I felt that we were going to win the Champions League I really did I just kind of I guess I'd bought into Pochettino's universal energy stuff maybe not even on a level that I believed in the universal energy but if he believes in it and the players believe in it then I can believe that there is the capability that something mad can happen there and I even you know in the lead up to the final I even had mates that support Liverpool saying you feel like Liverpool this year which you know obviously didn't something yeah unfortunately it didn't turn out that way but I know exactly what you mean there's just there's a when you've watched enough football and I don't you know I don't mean to sort get too proper football man about it but when you've watched enough of it when you've kind of you can just feel that there's something sort of it's like we always say right it's like it's like Spurs fans will always say and every Spurs fan will know exactly what I mean when I say this is when you watch Tottenham within 10 minutes you will see which Tottenham have showed up today um if it's the Spurs that like in that 2019 like run out at Manchester City went up to the City of manchester stadium and we're like nah we're gonna beat you today we fancy this sonny runs up the end and like scores a like a thunder bastard right almost straight away and you're like yes this these letters showed up today today yeah i just you know it just that's what we want that's what we that's and that's just i don't know that's just i would say mate from where i'm sat from like from my perspective from the outside and all of this for whatever it means i wasn't sold on when he came in at all i was one of those detractors i was one of those people that didn't fancy the idea of it for him to turn us around in the way that he did for him to galvanize that what appeared to be broken squad of players who also let's not forget as well were threadbare in terms of like availability many of them were not fully fit the you know many of our key players were actually out injured so appreciate there was a lot of players there who were trying their best and going above and beyond and everything like that but still to galvanize that group of players in that way, I think is something.

1:00:05Jack:And Jack Pitt, you know, not to name drop, but his whole thing when I had him on in postseason, he was saying that not enough is being made about how truly remarkable what Roberto De Zerbe has done here is. Truly, truly remarkable. Too many people are just seeing this as, well, Spurs were always going to turn it around. But they weren't. And that's coming from Jack, who's there every single week, who's in touch with Tottenham. I mean, he knew the direction of travel last year was something different. There was something bad going on and it could have been terrible. So for De Zerbi to essentially, you know, do like Spider-Man in front of the train, right?

1:00:43Jack:He's got the two webs and he's holding it. He's stopping Tottenham Hotspur from going off the end of the track and into the Hudson River or whatever it was. Is, you know, is something amazing. So the thought of going into a new season with this gaffer having been given the players that he wants, clearly being, you know, very clear in the standards that he expects from the players and, you know, certain players or whatever moving on, maybe not even as a result of that, but just in general, because of a cultural shift or his idea of how he wants his team to play. there's something about that that excites me and i i quite like the fact i've seen you know a lot of the big channels and stuff are doing their season predictions right now most of them are all saying tottenham will be it'll be good for tottenham to finish in the top nine top seven i think a couple of them have said we might finish in the top five or something but most of them have spurs around seventh to ninth i quite like spurs being considered in that way because i think we're going to surprise a lot of people this year mate i really do i'm very happy for spurs to be the the team that people kind of like write off you know is it like it's a it i think it suits us and i think um people are massively massively under appreciating what it what it means in the modern day to only have one game a week like how much that impacts player availability how much that impacts fitness levels how much that impacts freshness how much it impacts like the the guys that are playing with a little bit of a niggle if they're playing on a little bit because i mean any player will tell you that no one ever feels 100 match fit no one ever feels like good you're always having to manage something you know but managing something when you have a full week to recover in comparison to two days three days it will make such a huge impact and i also think the other thing to remember is that you um there are a lot of clubs that are starting from scratch with a manager and we've kind of done our start from scratch bit with Roberto we've done our kind of like everyone needs to buy in everyone needs to get up to speed we kind of had this wild couple of month period where we all had to learn real fast and like everyone had to like the fans had to learn what Roberto was going to be about he had to learn what Spurs were all about But because we did that and then had that massive surge of kind of that shared kind of surge of just kind of happy hormones after the Everton game, where everyone realised all together at the same time, like, that was massive.

1:03:24like in terms of the the garden of forking paths to have taken the right path at that time i think it's genuinely one of the biggest things that's happened in the club's history to get it right on that day i think it stands roberto and the team in the most unbelievable position because he hadn't he hadn't got to then get the fans brought in or players brought in or try and get everyone on side everyone's just ready to go you know it feels like that ahead of the weekend doesn't it everyone is just like let's get the premier league started like i can't wait to watch spurs again in a game that really means something you know after pre-season like let's get into it you know

1:04:05Jack:well if you've got a bit of time can i can i yeah yeah nice nice okay um i mean i'm just sort of interested to know you know you you chat to all these lads um what have your initial impressions been of of you know the the new boys around the training ground you know robertson van hecker Senesi, Fernandez, Tonali even Martin Dubravko, I'm not going to forget him as well. Yeah, let me do these let me whiz through these one by once Andy Robertson, we actually did a shoot, I think you were there at the time maybe? No we did a shoot with him while we were at 90 Min and he was a total joy to be around we did this kind of shoot with Nike and him and he was amazing and then he came on in his first day and just like absolutely floored me with a couple of lines just his humour is brilliant that he's a media dream um and liverpool fans will tell you that over and over and over i did quite enjoy them i sort of asked him straight away because i felt from the start i was like i'm not sure i'm in a position to call you robo like so i was like what would you like to be called like what what would you prefer that we refer to you at as in media because it's actually a really big thing a lot of a lot of you think for all of us when someone gets your name wrong it's so unbelievably jarring it's weird so i always make sure that i check with people what they would like to be called and he said robo straight away and then one of the first comments that i saw on um his first video that we did was like a liverpool fan said you're not allowed to call him robo you don't know him like that and i was like that tells you so much though about the impact that he left at liverpool that people still it's like us with sunny right when i see other people like go like talking about Sonny I'm like he's our Sonny he's not yours like what are you talking about you don't know him um I think just as a fan base we're so fiercely protective of him that you can't help it and I think Liverpool are saying with Andy Robertson he's brilliant really good to chat to I think um Van Hecker and Sanessi I'm so excited to watch like I just love they've just got such a lovely range of passing.

1:06:11They're both the types of players. Do you know what? I think Sanessi reminds me a little bit of, with the left foot of Betongan, just in terms of how composed he looks and how everything looks very calm. Everything looks very kind of like tranquil, which I really, really like. And Van Hecker's passing as well is a joke. They've both been really good. JP was really nice. Mateus Fernandes I am so excited to watch him play for Spurs in the Premier League watching his range of passing and the way that he dictates games and particularly that fizzed, faded pass that he hits just wonderful, like such a wonderful player and you forget that he's super young he was a very very friendly guy and really definitely came in.

1:07:05Jack:I was kind of out of the loop. I've been out of the loop on new players, upcoming talents and stuff for quite some time. And I can remember I was either like, hate watching a West Ham game or they were playing against us or something. But I remember seeing Fernandes sort of just, you know, basically bossing the midfield for West Ham, nipping balls all over the shop, all that type of thing. And just sort of thinking like, who the hell is this kid? Who is he? This player is absolutely unbelievable. And why is he at West Ham? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. So when we first started getting linked, I thought, unbelievable, but not a chance.

1:07:37Jack:Surely he's destined for like a Madrid or something like that. And so for us to be like there in with the money, making it happen, it's just everything you want. Good week, that, wasn't it? Oh, man, it was just the best. And like you, I'm just, I'm absolutely, I'm buzzing about seeing him play, but I'm buzzing about seeing the partnership that he's going to have with Sandra tonight because they both just... Who do you think is the third midfielder in that? in your mind when you draw up the team what do your where does your brain go are we talking like in general are we talking against Brentford so let's do both in general probably matters against Brentford Connor Gallagher because I like I I've got a massive soft spot for Connor Gallagher I know it's not like an out and out number 10 in terms of creativity but you know when we were talking about those intangible things that can get a stadium rocking i think sometimes a player like him the way that he presses and the way that he works i mean there was a game at the back end of the last he might even been against edderton to be fair or might have been against brighton i can't remember but he just charged down the goalkeeper at one point pressed the goalkeeper and if there's one thing that our fan base loves like it's it's a player just giving absolutely everything for every last every last ball every last tackle every 50 50 kind of like do quite like conor gallagher in in the 10 and that midfield just being impossible to to outrun and then having creativity in the he's got he's got goals in him as well he's got goals like that's something that's you know as he's shown already in pre-season so i mean look the the gaffer seems to really like him and i think you know that's quite a lot of my sort of thinking now is that if i hear that does erby says he likes or wants something or whatever i just kind of think you know just to your point and i know you're not saying in like a snarky way or anything but it's like ultimately me 99 of us at follow top of them have no idea whatsoever is actually going on what's happening in training the relationships that players have with one another the relationships that the manager has with different players the what what a manager actually wants from a particular game because I think it's also worth remembering like you know not far off fingers crossed we've got Kulisevsky coming back another massive player hopefully around Christmas time we're going to have Xavi Siemens back you know there's a lot of options there and I think one of our kind of like mentality shifts maybe as fans perhaps and perhaps as a club as well is that we need to get more accustomed to having lots of options lots of good players I still think sometimes we get a bit swept up in well we have 11 really good players and if we get more than that then they're not going to be happy and you know we shouldn't add we've already got this amount of midfielders so we shouldn't buy any more midfielders or whatever it's just like just leave the people who are like making the decisions sometimes well yeah do it just kind of like take a that's that's one thing i've been trying to do quite a lot i think last season was a bit of a learning curve in that you like can only affect what you could affect right i think that maybe that's an inbuilt thing with with us in terms of just the last however long in that it's a little bit like um i don't know like when you were a kid and your parents were like right you can have one toy you know and then so then you would be like okay well in that case the toy that i get has got to be the best thing ever otherwise i would have made a terrible decision and like we need to kind of get used to being the kid whose parents like actually like get get the ones that you want you know like it's such a different way of thinking about thinking about it all because yeah you can have the turtles and the ghostbusters you know yeah exactly and if you want you can have thunderbirds as well but i think that's that's probably the i think that's just again you spoke about it earlier on it's just a it's just a new way of thinking about things and it's difficult when you're as as a fan base you're so used to certain things that you just kind of like change just takes a little while to kind of reconcile with I guess.

1:11:38Jack:I guess one of the things I sort of just wanted to move on to because I hate to speak to you not talk about this at all the club has you know we can see it in the way in which we're announcing transfers the way in which we're announcing extensions all that type of thing there's a huge emphasis on togetherness family reconnecting I mean there's obviously like you know and I don't even need to ask you this because it's quite clear that there's a conscious effort to heal and strengthen the relationship between the you know the club and the stands which has been quite strained the past couple of years um one of the things that we've seen quite recently is you know a whole load of photos and videos across social media of the first team squad and the club legends having lunch or dinner together yeah it was lunch yeah yeah can you tell us a bit more about that how it all came together and just any yeah any anecdotes from the day what it was like in the room so Hey, Chicago.

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1:13:19Jack:Food deserves Pepsi. Grab a Pepsi Zero Sugar today. This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Shave ice by the beach. a trip to the state fair, and a throwback flick at the local drive-in. They're more than just items to check off the summer bucket list. They're also opportunities to earn 2 % daily cash back when you use your Apple Card with Apple Pay. Apply for Apple Card now and use In Minutes with Apple Pay. Subject to credit approval, Apple Card is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch. Terms and more at applecard.com. Yeah, I mean, that was a... You're right. Like the whole, there is a, there's a collective kind of understanding, I think, that from the fans, from, I guess, the team and all of us around that everyone wants to just be more united.

1:14:13And just, I think that that realisation last year was like, hang on, we've got to do this all together. like we we actually have to if you're going to be successful in any there's just no way that you do it with without the unity between absolutely everyone and i think we probably had i think you'd agree with this right is that in the past you've probably just had too many things that as a fan base like as a fan myself i think we can end up getting that divided over over the most bizarre things i know that's just part of being chronically online i know that's just we're just we're all online way too much to the point where you can split hairs over the most ludicrous things and die on hills that just no one even cares about 24 hours later but there has been a shift i think in terms of just everyone wanting to be close together and you know i did that interview with at the end of last season um and he said a lot of those things in in that but then at the end he was like judge based on what we do you know like actually see what we do and let's talk again kind of thing and um and i think we can all agree that at the moment like in terms of like people's actions everyone's actions are embodying that togetherness really there has been a real concerted effort to make sure that we're doing all of the right things we're showing people how much that we care and every the the legends lunch was just a small part of that it's about like connecting with history it's about a big thing for me is about so this was very much a roberto thing of wanting to make sure that that the players understand that they who the giants they basically stand on the shoulders of like who was paved the way that meant that they can now have the experience that they do at Tottenham Hotspur and what a privilege it is to play for Spurs and so there was a few of us that basically went about kind of helping to to make it happen and it was just the most joyful day like it was the most wonderful day a few of us went for dinner the night before so michael dawson jermaine defoe uh stevie perryman um alan nielsen eric torsvert um michael vaughn fernando lorrente who's still just staggeringly good looking it's frightening sort of best not to kind of like be anywhere near that guy um uh and and yeah it was just fine wine fine wine in this case oh mate oh stunning but yeah it just when you put a group of people like that in a room together i maybe it really didn't appreciate the the the fact that they have all played for spurs you know usually when you're worrying the best example i guess give this is like kind of planning a wedding right you're putting together table plans and stuff and you're hoping that everyone will get on and then once you get to the wedding if if like they're good people everyone just has the most unbelievable shared energy and it was really similar to that just seeing this group of people that had this shared connection of the fact that they wore that shirt and they went out and and like sort of embodied what it was to be spurs in their era it means that they all kind of have this understanding of each other and they all greet each other like family watching them all hug each other and people like people in their 70s hugging people in their sort of late 30s and and people just sharing stories and we made this video for for them to watch and it was kind of like maybe 30 40 minutes of just all of their greatest moments and seeing them sit there and like tell stories with each other of who'd done what or what they were thinking at the time or cheering each other on or like applauding like Eric Torso at Saves for example or we showed Pat Jennings his goal that he scored like it just it It was the most wonderful thing.

1:18:14And then getting to see the players obviously have the experience of just having these conversations as well. Just on a personal level as a fan, I think that's super important. It's really reassuring to know that they understand. Because for me, some of the players in that room were like people. Glenn Hoddle to me, it's like, geez, that's Glenn Hoddle. I still think that, you know, when I see him. That's Glenn Hoddle. And it's really important to me that the first team understand how amazing that is. you know that that they are sitting in the presence of someone that for us was was he was like god to to a lot of spurs fans you know so yeah no super special day and and i think just a really good example as well of of how how there is a there is a sea change there people like there is a real effort to make everyone feel welcome and and together i'm not sure who it was i think

1:19:03Jack:it was alan nelson that said it's quite funny you're saying that you know it's good to chat to everyone and it feels that like when we were talking about all our stories suddenly everyone's shots were actually 10 yards further back and all that sort of thing you know you've just reminded me actually i really had a really funny message from him right after just sort of being very kind about the day but it was like any chance you could send me that video of my goals it's so jokes because you like they can stop playing but you can't take it out of them They're still the same guys, you know, it's just lovely.

1:19:38Jack:I mean, mate, I guess just sort of before I get to some of the listener questions, you've sort of touched on it there. It's just quite interesting to know is like, you know, I know you as, you know, first and foremost as my mate, somebody who I worked with who was also a Spurs fan and we could talk about Spurs and grumble about the Liverpool fans in the office and all that type of thing, right? So as somebody like who, you know, grew up going to matches with your dad, loving the club collecting all the merlin stickers the little remember the little corinthian maybe this is him before your time the little corinthian figures yeah yeah yeah i mean what's what's it mean to you mate to be like actually like you know one of the sort of you know you're spearheading a lot of the club's official media now right you're playing that sort of central role in telling a lot of tottenham's story or around the story of like the 90 minutes every every way it's just like honestly it's just I'm so totally aware that it is the best job in the world like it's just the best that I it is never ever ever lost on me that I get to do the coolest thing that most people would would give anything to do so I would like try and never ever grumble about like anything that I ever have to do at work because I've got nothing to grumble about it is just brilliant and enormous fun even when it's not fun even last season at times when it was particularly difficult i would sit with uh rob the club commentator who you've had on before who is sorry i just want to say very quickly in case you can see me smirking it's because charlotte just sent me a message to ask if i was crying

1:21:18very good she knows us really well yeah yeah

1:21:24Jack:sorry i just because it's all video all pods of video now so i don't know what you think i'm like smirking it like a really sincere story you're telling us rob and i um rob and i just had this lovely conversation at the back end of the season where we were just like even when it's hot like was difficult. You have to appreciate that you're Spurs were the centre of the footballing universe last season. They just were. It doesn't matter what anyone else said. At the end of the season Arsenal had done whatever they'd done and on the final day of the season the centre of the football world was Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and that is the most ludicrous privilege to be in the eye of that tiny all over the world everyone's that's watching football that weekend the chances are most the biggest story that weekend was Tottenham Hotspur so even when it's even when it's tough it's still the best thing ever and I like it just is never ever lost on me that is that is just the coolest job and um yeah I still it still gases my dad up you know I love the fact that my dad still gets excited when at the end of the season I go and take him down a box of kit from from the year that like I've just worn and then I'll see my dad that I'll go up to see my mum and dad a couple of weeks later and it'll be like full kit wanker full around the house wandering around in the entire the entirety of the Spurs merch that I've given him for like a couple of weeks ago and he'll he'll wear it on on kind of repeat and we'll go out for dinner and if you're wearing like a five years old Spurs polo shirt that I've given him which is really lovely so the fact that I'm able to do it for like the club that he sort of supported as well my granddad supported my granddad's supported is is wicked and yeah I'd said it to Flav before but I'm always the main thing for me is that I'm always always super super aware that in all of the content that we do like I I don't like this thing in modern media that people are told that they have to be like at the center of it like that you have to make it about you because from my opinion it's only ever my job to provide a platform for the people that that matter to to talk and to get across whatever they want to get across and like that's that's why what i was saying to you earlier on when we're doing the interviews post-match for after the the kind of season that we'd had for me it's just about under the most pressurized circumstances can you still make sure that you give fans like what they need at that that time so yeah I'm I pinch myself all the time still it's it's the best job I mean mate that's awesome and it's probably what you know everybody wants to hear and I think that comes across in all of your work anyway it's it's always been very authentic and very genuine and I think that's you know it's been it's been very helpful and I'm not just saying that I'm not just like blowing smoke up your ass because you're my mate like it's been very it's been it's been a it's been a great sort of presence your presence in the club the last few years because i know it's been difficult i can only imagine how difficult it's been but i just i know your candor i know how hard you work to platform like good stories and to talk to people in the right way and everything and i think you've you've absolutely smashed that mate so it was you know it was even even the highs of seeing you post bill bow was amazing and then you know sort of the lows after like the chelsea game but But hopefully this year we're going to have a lot more to enjoy.

1:24:52Jack:So what I'm going to do now, so for anybody listening to this, I do have some listener questions in, but I'm going to cut this pod here and then I'll release a second pod maybe the day after where Ben answers everybody's questions. So, yeah, thanks for this part of the conversation, Ben. And then, yeah, everybody else, if you've enjoyed this, come and check the rest of it tomorrow.

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