Spurs on this day - no 31 in an occasional series

By Dave P
January 22 2005

Another trawl through the archives today as we have not played Palace on the 22nd January and a change from the normal format as most of the games we have played on 22nd January have been at home.

Another trawl through the archives today as we have not played Palace on the 22nd January and a change from the normal format as most of the games we have played on 22nd January have been at home. Those that were away don't make particularly pleasant reading.

The first league game between Spurs and Crystal Palace took place on 23rd August 1969 at Selhurst Park in front of 39,494 supporters. Spurs won 2-0 with goals from Jimmy Pearce and Martin Chivers. The return Fixture was also 2-0 to Spurs, the game being played at White Hart Lane on 26th December and the goals were scored by Alan Mullery and Steve Perryman.

In late 1980 we played Palace four times. the two league games between the clubs resulted in 13 goals. At Selhurst on 19th August we won 4-3 with goals from Steve Archibald, Glen Hoddle and two from Garth Crooks. At white hart lane in 12th November we won 4-2 with goals from Archibald and a Garth Crooks Hat-trick. In-between these two games we were drawn ay home against Palace in the third round of the league cup. This match (on 24th September) ended 0-0 and so it went to a replay at Selhurst Park on 30th September. We won this match 3-1 with goals from Ricky Villa, Glen Hoddle and Garth Crooks.

The first time we played Palace at their ground was on 9th February 1907 in a Southern League game in front of a crowd of 8000. We won this game 1-0 with a goal from A. Pickett. We had won the home game in october, 3-0. We then played them the following season in the Southern League losing at home 1-2 and winning 2-0 away. After that, apart from Cup games and Wartime league matches we did not play them in a league game until 1969.

Enough of Palace (for now) - lets look at a Wartime fixture played in 1944 when we travelled to Aldershot on 22nd January and won 1-0. I have no record of the scorer that day but as was often the case during wartime it could have been a guest player. During that season, when we won the Football League South we featured no less than 15 guest players, some of whom may well have turned out for Aldershot as well. During the Wars we played Aldershot 13 times, winning ten of them and as far as I am aware we have never played Aldershot in any normal competitive fixture (league or cup).

Whilst on the subject of Wartime football the 1940/41 season was unique. 34 teams competed in the Regional League South and fixtures were a bit haphazard to say the least. Some teams like Coventry and Swansea played as few as ten games whilst Stoke city played 36 and Watford played 35. The final league positions were decided solely on Goal Average. The winners of the Regional League South were funnily enough Crystal Palace who played 27 games, finishing as wimnners in 16 and drawing 4. They scored 86 goals and conceded 44 giving them a goal average of 1.954. Tottenham finished that season in 10th place having played 23 games, winning 9 and drawing 5, scoring 53 and conceding 41 which gave us an average of 1.292. Coventry (who as I mentioned only played 10 games) finished third with an average of 1.75 having scored 28 goals and conceded 16.

Now could you imagine the Premier League being decided purely on Goal Average. I thought I would see how it would affect last seasons standings and the Top 6 would have been the same as would the bottom four. but mid table would have been very different with Man City finishing in 7th instead of 16th, and Tottenham would have been fifth from bottom in 16th.

I think we'll stick to the normal points system and goal difference and lets see if Spurs can do their goal difference a few favours today.