Gone in Ten Seconds.

Last night I was tasked to watch Man U v Tottenham for Mothermouse but missed the first twenty minutes. The last seventy, in fact the last eighty-nine and fifty seconds of Tottenham- glorious and Man U- pathetic would have been inexplicable without those first few seconds. Imagine a boxer vainly attempting to reassemble his brain cells after an uppercut in the first round. The fear, the confusion was palpable, the exotic spice of supremacy intoxicating: Tottenham never better, Man U, hopefully, never worse. Tottenham’s ten-second goal somehow created an instant localised zeitgeist that Jones’s glorious own goal merely confirmed. This, as with most things recently, reminded me of Brexit, the whole country v Europe, stunned by something unexpected that happened so soon after kick-off all parties never really recovered from it. May/Lukaku, lolloping round aimlessly as Kane/Barnier confidently escaped every tackle. We’re playing a shit game because neither Leave nor Remain thought we’d even be playing this fixture. Sure we’re passing and running about but somehow unsure where the goal is. And somehow like Man U we’re banking on an American Glazer special relationship buyout and hoping we can afford Thierry Henry’s transfer fee to be our new manager. So as we forgo the Premiership for League 1 remember this unholy alliance between the League of (rich white) Gentlemen and redundant Yorkshire miners may have scored from the kick off but there’s still eighty nine minutes and fifty seconds yet to play. A couple of goals and late pen should do it.