NORMAN GILLER'S SPURS ODYSSEY BLOG No 478
Submitted by Norman Giller

As if tomorrow's momentous match against Manchester City is not enough to worry about, I now hit you with the dreaded tie-breaker selection test to find the 2024 Spurs Odyssey Quiz League champion.

I reckon there are about 60 of you jockeying for first place in the race. Circumstances dictate that I have to be lenient with the numbers that take part in this final decider, because computer problems in mid-season meant I was unable to receive or respond to everybody's entries.

I have decided in fairness to make it that anybody who has gathered more than 80 points over the season is in the running for the title. You all start this decider on level points.

So, friends, I have come up with a brutal tie break challenge that will have you wanting to hang me from the nearest goalpost as you become a Tottenham selector rather than supporter. Or even worse, force me to sit through a repeat of the Eurovision Song Contest! (A geezer wearing a dress won it this year, so anything is possible).

Just to remind you, the previous SOQL champions - featured left to right in the heading above - have been:

Graham Eyre (New South Wales, Australia) 2019
David Guthrie (Wokingham) 2015, 2018 and then put out to grass after his hat-trick of victories in 2023)
Glenn Scarcliffe (Hampstead) 2016
Edward Benson (New York) 2017
Emily Hadjinicolaou (Reigate) 2020
Peter Lawton (Israel) 2021
David Matthews (Cheshunt) 2022

The competition continues to have an international flavour, with contestants firing in their occasional answers from far and wide, including the United States, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Holland, South Africa, Singapore, Hungary, Hawaii, Israel, Cyprus and Vietnam!

As regulars will know, this is when we fall out, because it is really only my opinion that matters in this tiebreak decider. You become manager for the day to play the selecting game, and all you have to do is just try to agree with my choices to take the renowned SOQL title. Easy!

Please address any complaints or protests to the Spurs Odyssey Ombudsman (which is also me, and I will ignore you ... a bit like Daniel Levy cocking a deaf 'un to the 'Levy Out' chants).

Remember, this is all just for fun while feeding your appetite for all things Tottenham Hotspur. And it gives this old hack the weekly opportunity to bore for Britain. Thanks for listening.

Included among the usual suspects in the running for the title this year are former champions Peter Lawton, Graham Eyre, and - yet again - our 2020 champion Emily Hadjinicolaou, BSc FIA, from Reigate in Surrey.

Brain box actuary Emily has taken over the Tottenham-supporting baton from her father, who used to follow Spurs in the 1950s from his homeland of Cyprus. She has not got a single question wrong in the ten years of the competition but has only once matched my tie-breaking selection.

Emily has a female rival this year in Sue Webb, a life-long Spurs supporter from Hoddesdon, but based in Cambridge. A long-time journalist, Sue does not allow the fact that she is now wheelchair-bound prevent her getting to watch her beloved Tottenham Hotspur wherever and whenever they play.

She knows the club history inside out and is fiercely loyal to the players and management in the minefield of explosive and contentious opinions that the social media platform has become.

Cambridge University educated Peter Lawton, who took over the title from Queen Emily, has a shelf in his Israeli home groaning with the weight of Tottenham history books, which is fitting for somebody who used to stand on the Shelf at the dear old White Hart Lane ground. That is light years away from the new stadium that belongs to tomorrow's world.

Clubs like Real Madrid and Manchester United are following the Levy lead in making their grounds multi-event centres. The days of a ground being built solely for football are over and those keyboard warriors out there who couldn't organise a loft extension need to take a less blinkered view of Tottenham's plans.

Our 2022 champion David Matthews is a 70-year-old retired City stockmarket trader born into a Spurs-loving family in Shoreditch, and now living in the heart of Spurs territory in Cheshunt. He has written on London history and is a crime novelist but, like all of us, unable to solve the mystery of Tottenham's infuriating inconsistency.

Spurs Odyssey web master Paul H. Smith and I would like to thank all those who regularly compete in our weekly challenge. Without you, I'd be talking to myself (true, nothing new).

Talking of Paul, I am sure you all realise this is a labour of love for our guru. It would be generous and thoughtful if you could make a small donation in the PayPal collection box at the top of this page as a gesture of thanks for all his efforts to keep us informed and entertained. I just wish some of the players could show his commitment and enthusiasm.

This year's prizes for the champion will be signed copies of three of my Tottenham-themed books, but most important of all, the winner will collect a framed certificate announcing the winner as 2024 SOQL champion.

To try to separate you all and come up with the 2024 champion we arrive at the dreaded tiebreak teaser. Are you sitting comfortably? You soon won't be ...

We are seeking a United Nations Tottenham team. Name a Spurs side with 11 different nationalities, and each one must have represented Tottenham in Premier League matches. Select your side in 4-2-4 formation, including a goalkeeper. The major rule is you must not have more than one player from each country, then add five substitutes (including a goalkeeper) who are from five different nations to those on the pitch. All your selections must have have played in the Premier League for Tottenham.

You get three points for every selection that agrees with mine, and a bonus point for naming the same team captain as me. That's a possible 49 points in total. The contestant with most points takes the crown. If more than one agrees with me - and also choice of skipper - then we would have another tie-breaker if their points tally is equal.

Summary: 16 players, 16 countries and all had to play Premier League football for Tottenham. And name a skipper.

The strict deadline for your entry is midnight this Friday, May 17. Email your selections, please, to soqleague@gmail.com. Give your name, age, your occupation, the district where you live and how long you've supported Spurs.

I am the sole adjudicator and will not enter into correspondence with anybody who wants to dispute my selection (megalomaniac, moi?).

Enjoy!

I will announce the winner and 2024 champion in my next Spurs Odyssey blog ... hopefully when we are celebrating a fourth-place finish in the Premier League race.

You can read Paul H. Smith's eyewitness account of Tottenham's eventual triumph over Burnley HERE. Micky van de Ven is quickly taking on legendary status. I wonder if he will make it into your United Nations team?

Last week's question, No 34: Which Tooting-born striker won 13 England caps, started his career with Ipswich and who was the Tottenham manager who sold him to Sunderland?

Yes, Darren Bent and Harry (not Sandra) Redknapp. COYS!

See you back here on Monday for the naming of the SOQL champion 2024. But first, it's Man City and the WHOLE of North London urging a Tottenham victory!

Ps: Commiserations to Tottenham on their thumping defeat by Manchester United in yesterday's women's FA Cup final. The best team won. Back to the drawing board.

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