What a crazy little place White Hart Lane has become. Despite Dan Levy and the board admitting they went and shopped Martin Jol’s job around Spain, they’ve since claimed they’re backing him to the hilt and there are no problems in paradise.
But the Daily Mail is reporting that “Tottenham boss Martin Jol has been axed by the board but they have kept his assistant Chris Houghton”, and all over the country quiet offices are being interrupted with the swoosh of people spitting out there coffee all over their computers in utter shock. But fret not, the Daily Mail is just having some good (dis)honest fun.
The real story is that Martin Jol is not on the Spurs version of the board game Monopoly, which – if there are any Spurs board game fans reading this – is due for release in the club shop on Monday (that’ll be the day after Jol gets sacked then). Even Paul Robinson has a slot (fittingly given Old Kent Road) for gawds sake!
While it is unlikely creating this game was item #1 on the Spurs board’s latest meeting agenda, approval for leaving the manager out of it will have had to have gotten approval from some pretty important people at the club. For all the bad PR and horrific undermining of Martin Jol’s position, it seems weird that deciding to leave him out of the club’s bloody board game seems like the biggest vote of no-confidence yet.