Andros Townsend to hit.
After sixteen years, fifty league games, three whole goals, numerous loan deals, and even more shots ballooning into the crowd Andros Townsend has moved on to Newcastle for 12 million quid.
For a, up to now one club man, Andros Townsend has played twice as many games for other teams as he has for the club he joined as an 8 year old. With the fixture list giving him the chance for revenge on the final day of the season.
Some wonder why some of us are quite happy to see the back of Andros, he’s one of our own after all.
Well, when you’re a one trick pony, it sort of helps if that trick comes off and I mean off more than a three in fifty chance. Because that’s what Townsend ended up as. As soon as he got the ball you knew what was coming, he’s goona cut inside and either smash the ball over the goal or hit the ‘keeper with an easy save.
Every time a winner.
Well a winner if you figured he’d do it, not so him actually doing it. Three times in fifty league outings for the club. Add to that a whole four league assists.
Why this grates so much is because of the knowledge that he could have been far, far better than that. After all those loan deals, nine in five years, he finally tied down a first team spot in 2013/14, with the help of a great game in the Europa League away to Dinamo Tbilisi.
A winger’s job is to lay on goals a score some too. In that game he played like a proper winger. He opened the scoring and then assisted for a further two goals, showcasing the art of wing play. Firstly standing up a cross perfectly for Paulinho to head in the second on the night and then getting to the byline and cutting the ball back, again perfectly, for Soldado for the third.
It was a man of the match performance that promised good things.
Then a couple of things happened that probably caused the situation to change. Secondly Andre Villas-Boas was dismissed as Spurs manager, replaced by the dimwit Sherwood and his “fackin’ run around a bit” tactical nous. But before that was probably the real turning point, his England call up.
Again a man of the match performance, against Moldova, in a World Cup qualifier, where he scored the third goal of the 4-1 victory. A screamer. And well, it was downhill from there.
From a player who had shown he had everything you want from a winger he became that one trick pony.
Daniel Levy wanted £14m, he got £12m which is pretty good business as the fact he’s landed at Newcastle shows. Not exactly gone to a rival, though they are Spurs bogey team of late they’re doing so at the other end of the table and well relegation fodder is all that wanted him.
Pochettino obviously didn’t want him, so there was no point keeping him and so getting that amount for an unwanted player is good business.
One wonders who’ll get tired of that trick first at Newcastle his new team mates or the fans – better buy a hard hat Nige. What is probably certain is that one trick will come off in the last game of the season, which is of course against Spurs and will no doubt cost us in some way more expensive than £12 million.