Spurs met West Ham on the Saturday before Christmas. A match which was the last meeting between the sides before the £200,000 record transfer of Peters to Spurs with Greaves going in the opposite direction. Click image to view highlights
Click headline to see News of the World match report
I was there - Spurs v West Ham December 20th 1969
Although neither a Spur nor a Hammer, I remember.... my first visit to White Hart Lane mostly because I went along with a Spurs supporting school friend, who was going to his first ever match. Needless to say, he was very disappointed with the result. Gutted even!
I think his disappointment was compounded by the fact that the match was effectively over after 15 minutes. Two goals down, the first a seemingly slow motion trickle that beat the great Pat Jennings, where I still think he should have done better. I didn't remember the second at all until I viewed the clip. To cap his misery, though, was the sight of his hero Jimmy Greaves missing a potentially game saving penalty only a few minutes after the Hammers' second goal. Like most myopic supporters he sought a few crumbs of comfort from the way that Jimmy had wrong footed the keeper. Suspect that was in Jimmy's alcoholic daze days.
After that action, there really wasn't any doubt in the result and the match petered out for a disappointing start to xmas festivities for Spurs' supporters. Note: the official attendance was given as 28k, poor even for the "saturday before xmas effect" - but I could have sworn there were more!
