EPL Talk » Ledley King

What A Difference A Year Makes At White Hart Lane

Paul Bestall — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 13:01:34 +0000

With the season starting slightly earlier this year due to the World Cup, most teams in the Premiership have played 8 league games already. Last season, the 8th round of matches was played two weeks later, on the weekend of October 18th/19th. By the end of it, Tottenham were staring up at every other team in the league with a lowly 2 points. A 2-1 loss against Stoke City at the Britannia Stadium had left Spurs trailing Newcastle by 4 points and Stoke and Fulham by 5.

A club in disarray, the fans in despair, the players lacking leadership on or off the pitch, things were not looking good. Not since 1988* had Tottenham propped up the table, ironically on Halloween. That season was to shadow a remarkable turn around in events at White Hart Lane as the week continued to get worse as Udinese beat Spurs on the Thursday 2-0 with a implosion in the last 15 minutes. Juande Ramos cut a depressed figure on the touchline in Udine, a man completely at a loss to explain what was happening or it seemed able to arrest the decline.

Daniel Levy’s reign as chairman had seen plenty of ups and downs during the course of the 7 years that had led to this point. Ramos was supposed to be the marquee managerial signing to move Spurs onwards from the work of the underrated and under appreciated Martin Jol. It was fast becoming a disaster of epic proportions as the club lurched from crisis to crisis. After 5 managers in that time, Levy was under enormous pressure to finally deliver, yet here they were, bottom of the league, winless, shapeless and facing relegation.

After the defeat in Italy, Ramos made the usual “We can play our way out of trouble” statements, but they rang hollow in the ears of the Spurs fans. Other than a well deserved point at Stamford Bridge, there had been nothing to cling to in the way of optimism. No-one else could see where the win was going to come from, the team looked beyond help. On Saturday, October 25th as the fans prepared for another inevitable defeat the next day against Bolton, things couldn’t get much worse.

As Match of the Day finished, I flicked over to Sky Sports News, just to see if perhaps anything at all had happened. As the image flicked on, the newsfeed at the bottom of the screen suddenly went in to to overdrive. “Tottenham have sacked Juande Ramos, Gus Poyet and Daniel Comolli with immediate effect…..Harry Redknapp has been confirmed as the new manager of Spurs …. Discussion with Redknapp next on Sky Sports News.” Then the adverts kicked in. Damn it!

I’d had a drink, who wouldn’t when you’re team was bottom of the league and playing like Worksop Town. I rewound the pictures and watched it again. Yep, still said the same. I shot to the PC, went on the BBC football site. It was the top story, Breaking News. The I checked the Guardian, yep, same there. It was true. I ran to the bedroom and woke my better half up, she told me to stop winding her up. I insisted it was true, and probably to simply placate me, she got up and went downstairs with me to see for herself.

Chelsea fans don’t believe a lot, though living with a Spurs fan means you get used to false dawns on a seasonal basis. Sitting down, SSN burst in to life once more, BOOOOOOOOOM went the special effects, WHOOOOOOOOOOSH went the graphics and then it was confirmed by the presenters clearly excited that people would actually be watching for once late on a Saturday night. Redknapp was indeed the new manager of Spurs. I let out a hearty cheer! My other half wasn’t impressed at all, ” Oh no, I’ve always really liked Harry. What has he done that for!” Time for another drink I decided, my despair transformed in minutes to optimism! Ah the joy’s of football eh!

As managerial announcements go, for me, its quite possibly one of the oddest I’ve ever come across, late on a Saturday night, less than 24 hours before a team is due to play a match. I bet every newspaper editor was cursing Levy throughout the United Kingdom. Yet, in the 38 League games Redknapp has managed Spurs in now, his record reads Played 38, Won 19, Drawn 8 Lost 11.With this season’s excellent start, Redknapp has assured that for the first time in 4 seasons, Spurs are not playing catch up after a slow start. 16 points from 8 games is Tottenham’s best ever start to a Premiership season.

No Spurs fan thinks that we’ll win the League, or finish in the top 4, but after the year of hell that was the Ramos era, it’s a whole lot better. The oddity of Ramos’ tenure, Spurs won the League Cup, their first trophy in 9 seasons and a 5-1 victory against Arsenal, yet it will always be viewed as a dreadful year. Two shots of sunlight do not make a summer, but at least Harry’s got Spurs fans smiling again.

There is still plenty of work to do at Tottenham, the centre half issue needs resolving due the injuries King and Woodgate now have. The midfield have to learn to be able to play without Modric against big teams and not let Palacios do all the running, Keane needs to keep performing as he did against Burnley and Hull City. Defoe needs keep running and not get downhearted and the players outside the first 11 need to knuckle down and try and force themselves into Redknapps plans rather than whining to the media. Then maybe a top six place wouldn’t be out of the question, anything else would be a bonus.

*Spurs became the first team to be bottom of the First Division on Halloween in 1988 and not be relegated, actually finishing 6th as Gascoigne and Waddle combined to drag them up the table. The following season saw Spurs finish 3rd with Lineker joining the team as Waddle went to Marseille.

Can Ledley King Keep Going?

Paul Bestall — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 21:48:52 +0000

The sight of Ledley King pulling up when Didier Drogba was running towards the Tottenham goal in Sunday’s London derby left me with a resigned feeling of deja vu. Even on one leg, a training regime of swimming twice a week and the frailties of the midfield formation that wasn’t working, King was keeping Drogba quiet. That was the key turning point of the match for me, regardless of the legitimacy of the penalty claim.

Since King fractured his metatarsal in a Premier League back in April 2006, missing the World Cup, he has had no luck with injuries at all. Yet it’s nothing new, in the 9 seasons since he became a first team mainstay, King has played in over 30 league games in only two seasons, 2001-02 and 2004-05. Tottenham fans still regard him as one of the best of the last 20 years to play at the Lane and his staus as club captain from 2005 to 2009 recognises his contribution, on and off the field of play.

The chronic knee injury which now plagues him was caused ironically, in a training ground clash during the summer of 2006. Since then King has managed to play in only 52 League games from a possible 120 matches. It seems a cruel twist of fate that King could have been a consistently recognised player for his country, as the spat between Capello and Redknapp earlier this year showed.

As much as his injury problems have affected his playing career, Capello rightly recognises King as one of England’s best 3 centre halves and a fantastic defensive midfielder at both club and international level. What makes King’s continued appearances more astounding is the fact that his knee is inoperable. His problem is he has no cartilage in the affected knee, so he plays games with bone rubbing on bone.

At 28, it’s an incredible risk to put himself through so much on a weekly basis simply to play football. Why does he do it? After each game the knee swells up, making it impossible for him to play more than once every 6 or 7 days. The stress that must be putting on his body must be incredible. The trouble is, because he now can’t train, other area’s of his body are beginning to show signs of wear and tear. The injury to his right hamstring on Sunday seemed to just happen. He wasn’t in full flow, he wasn’t stretching, it simply went on him.

I can honestly say that King is one of my favorite players and one of the best centre halves that we’ve had at Tottenham since I actually knew anything about the game. Yes, I still rate Campbell and yet King perhaps harks back to early time in what drives him to keep going. I see so much of Gary Mabbutt’s attitude in the way King puts his health on the line for the shirt, the fans and the club.I find it astounding, I really do that he cares enough to keep going like he does.

Mabbutt, if you were unaware, is a diabetic and had to inject himself four times a day, check his blood sugar levels before, during and after games and always keep his insulin kit with him at all times. To think he played over 600 professional matches and appeared 16 times for England gives you some idea of the spirit that drove Mabbutt onward.Despite being diagnosed at 17, he continued to play, train and work diabetes in to his football routine and got to the top level of his sport regardless of how easy it could have been to give up.

Whilst King’s condition is nowhere near as serious, it gives some idea of the mental strength that he must summon every time he steps out on a pitch for Spurs. I just hope that he can keep going without causing himself permanent injury in later life. At the end of the day, it’s only football and Ledley already has a place in the hearts of the Tottenham faithful.

Ledley King & Wilson Palacios: Two Very Different Footballers

Paul Bestall — Mon, 11 May 2009 21:26:26 +0000

Too often, players will often blame off field problems for a lack of discipline, form or fitness, it becoming something of a Teflon shield to protect them from criticism off fans and players. It’s a catch all term to cover all kinds of issues, from drinking (Too numerous to mention) , drugs (Adrian Mutu) , gambling addiction (Michael Owen) to having a persecution complex even though you do yourself no favours at all (Joey Barton).

Yet, one player over recent months has put all this “off field problems” scenario in perspective, Tottenhams Wilson Palacios. Here is a man that for the last 18 months has played with enormous pressure over himself and his family every day, since his younger brother, Edwin, was kidnapped in October 2007 from the Palacios family home. Palacios has been a man in such rich form for both Wigan and Tottenham it would be hard to think anything was wrong with the likeable Honduran. A ransom of $500,000 dollars was paid as requested by the kidnappers but Edwin has never been seen again. Honduran Police were given details of a grave in the North of the country and uncovered a grave which they believe has the remains of Edwin Palacios.

Yet, even when he found out, Palacios still wasn’t one for histrionics. He received the news at 1am at the team hotel before Spurs’ game against Everton and instead of immediately notifying his team mates or manager, he packed his bags and calmly waited for Redknapp to get up a 7am. Apparently, according to Redknapp, he didn’t want to trouble him with a “personal matter” and was astounded.

“The lad had heard from his family at one in the morning what had happened, and his brothers, I believe, have identified the body,” he said.”He sat around the hotel lobby with his case packed until 7am because he didn’t want to wake me.”I’m amazed with him. But we organised for him to be driven back to London so he could get a flight home.”

Palacios has been given compassionate leave and will not play for Tottenham again this season, but football is a triviality in such matters. Compare that scenario with Tottenhams club captain, Ledley King, a hero to the White Hart Lane faithful and well known for not being able to train or play in midweek due to a knee issue that has blighted him since 2006.

Spurs fans will now be surprised to discover that King’s knee may not be up to training, but it’s certainly able to carry him drunkenly around London in the early hours of Sunday Morning and even that it can stand up to having a scuffle with a doorman of a celebrity nightclub. Fans that have sent him support as he tries to battle his chronic injury that blights him now have to take stock of the situation. Club captain decides that getting legless can have no impact on his fitness at all? Really? What a stupid man.

Is King so desperate to go out with his hangers on that he doesn’t give a monkeys if he drunkenly falls over, damages his knee and rules himself out? Is he so selfish that he can’t cope without alcohol? Here’s a man that most Spurs fans would run through a wall for and this is how he treats them. What a prat. He’s apologised, but it’s an empty gesture, especially when compared with Palacios’ behaviour and strength of character. King needs to take a long hard look at his team mate and get a grip on reality and get his priorities in order.

Palacios has shown courage, determination and strength throughout his families ordeal. Remember that next time Joey Barton whines about people calling him names or a footballer can’t cope without getting drunk on a Saturday night.

Premier League Footballers On All-Star Injury Fantasy Team

The Gaffer — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:00:26 +0000

We thought it’d be fun to pick our all-star injury football team featuring those Premier League players that always seem to be injured. Thanks to the EPL Talk readers who participated in last weekend’s EPL Talk Chat for the idea.

Chris Kirkland
Gary Neville
Mikael Silvestre
Jonathan Woodgate
Ledley King
Owen Hargreaves
Kieron Dyer
Tim Cahill
Craig Bellamy
Michael Owen
Louis Saha

Subs:
Andy Johnson
Mark Viduka
Valeri Bojinov
Emile Heskey
Didier Drogba

What current players are missing that should be featured in this squad? Click the comments link below and let us know.