Tottenham On Tour: Pirates Scuppered!

A game with plenty of everything. A Walt Disney sponsored penalty and Scotch Mist.

All in all, a decent performance from Tottenham. Admittedly against Animaniacs in Newcastle training shirts, but these are the friendlies...

Cerny was superb. Needless to say the penalty was a nonsense and he expertly dealt with 'go number one' and 'go number two'. The initial foul by Chimbonda was appalling and he needs to get that kind of rubbish out his system before the season starts.

Jenas. Dannyboy is clearly delighted and largely, so are we all. He made a couple of duff passes, but the rest of his distribution great his touch sublime.

He is absolutely at his best deep midfield spraying the ball wide or slotting through breathtaking midfield bypassing balls. The latter are wonderfully effective, when snapped up by the forward line they cause the opposing defense real headaches. Suddenly the attack is on. Short passing is a waste of his talent.

My only concern on Jenas as captain is his leadership. We collectively 'went missing' for some of the second half and I don't yet know that he is the man to take the Lillywhites by the scruff of the neck and liven them up.

Elsewhere Bent's goal was classy, intelligent fare. Defoe was crying for a ball he could untangle.

Huddlestone needs time and space or can look cumbersome, their lot offered him neither, clambering about him like some sportswear clad remake of Gulliver's Travels.

The friendly status of this tie gives Kaboul some diplomatic immunity in relation to his small schoolboy errors, but his last third contributions were terrific. His free kick was exceptional. He will scare the monkey out of the Premiership if he can deliver this class of set piece play.

Taarabt appears to be in from a mold similar to that of Ronaldo. I genuinely don't have issue with that. At one stage he actually beat three players and then shielded the ball from four! His willingness to run at 'em and shoot is gripping stuff to watch. The only concern... here it comes.... is that he knows when to go for glory and when to share the wealth.

Pleased to see Stalteri increasingly looking the part, but Chimbonda and Gardner must both lose the 'professional foul' cobblers form their repertoires at once. It's great to see some backbone in the squad, but we're not Chavs, so let's fight fair.

Plenty of positives... Bring on the next lot then, says I.

*Here's some highlights c/o ryethfc*