Excuses, excuses

"We were dominating before Ade's red card. If he wasn't sent off we would have won the match."

Since when does going down to 10 men excuse a team of capitulating so laughably?

Arsenal 1-2 Leeds - 2001
Leeds went down to 9 men early in the 2nd half yet were able to hold on to their lead and come out of Highbury with 3 points.

Liverpool 1-2 Arsenal - 2001
At 0-0 Arsenal had Van Bronkhorst sent off and ended up winning 2-1 at the league leaders and bookies' title favorites on a ground where they had not scored in 6 previous visits and had not won in 9.

PSG 1-2 Rennes - Saturday
Rennes had a man sent off in the 21st minutes with the score at 1-1, they managed to take the lead before having another man sent off in the 51st minute, yet managed to pull off a victory in Paris.

Barcelona 2-2 Chelsea - Last season
Chelsea were 1-0 down when John Terry was sent off, and after going 2 behind, a Chelsea team with Bosingwa at CB and Ramires at RB managed not only to keep Barca out but score 2 goals at the Nou Camp.

Wigan 2-2 Arsenal - 2010
Arsenal were leading 2-1 when N'Zogbia (Wigan's best player) was sent off, they still managed to earn a draw with only 10 minutes left to play.

West Brom 1-2 Man City - Last month
City were down to 10 men midway through the 1st half and went behind midway through the 2nd half, yet were still able to turn the match around and come out with 3 points.

Spurs 0-0 Arsenal - 2009
An Arsenal team missing Fabregas, that was leaking goals left right and center, and had Adebayor go off injured 1 minute before Eboue was sent off in the 37th minute, managed to hold on and keep a clean sheet against a Spurs team that was buzzing over the return of savior Robbie Keane as well as the signing of the next Makelele, Wilson Palacios.

Chelsea 1-1 Barcelona - 2009
Down to 10 men at Stamford Bridge and losing 1-0, Barca were still able to come back and score a late equaliser to take them through to the CL Final.

Chelsea 4-1 West Ham - 2006
Spurs fans can really relate to this one. West Ham took the lead on 10 minutes and then had a man sent off on 17 minutes. Oh wait a minute, it was Chelsea who had a man sent off on 17 minutes, not West Ham. Anyway, they went on to turn the match around and crush their London rivals 4-1 with just 10 men.

Spurs 3-4 Man City - 2004
I think we all remember this one. Spurs 3-0 up and a man up at half time, yet City managed to turn the 2nd half around and score 4 goals with just 10 men.

I'm sure there are plenty more scenarios like the one above, but these are just matches I can think of off the top of my head where teams have not collapsed like Spurs ALWAYS seem to do when a decision goes their way.

No club feels sorry for themselves more than Spurs do. Doesn't matter who is manager, Martin Jol, Harry Redknapp, Glen Hoddle, AVB, even if Guardiola took over Spurs would still have the same defeatist attitude they have had for pretty much 50 years.

They can hide behind a red card all they want, the reality is that of the last 19 North London derbies, the team that has scored first has only gone on to win the match 6 times. Spurs scored first and were playing well after 15 mins, just like they did the season before, just like Arsenal did the season before that, and remind me who won those respective matches again?

And don't even mention injuries, a quick glance at physioroom shows that Arsenal have 4 key players injured, just like Spurs do, and have more first team players injured than Spurs do, yet we are meant to believe that a full strength Arsenal team defeated Spurs' reserves?

The reality is no matter how bad Arsenal become, Spurs will never have the bottle to finally cement themselves in the top club in North London. They can make as many excuses as they want, release all the DVDs they want, claim that they dominate matches that they get hammered in all they want, but at the end of the day, we all know it is just classic Spurs. Forever in our shadow.