DERBY TALK!

IT’S A FIXTURE THAT HAS DEFINED SEASONS AND ERAS AND HAS BROUGHT JOY AND PAIN FOR PLAYERS AND FANS ALIKE SINCE OUR FIRST MEETING IN THE OLD FIRST DIVISION AGAINST ‘WOOLWICH ARSENAL’ IN 1909. PAUL MILES SPOKE TO SEVEN SPURS LEGENDS – OVER 2,000 APPEARANCES FOR THE CLUB BETWEEN THEM - AND ASKED ONE QUESTION: WHAT EMOTIONS AND MEMORIES ARE STIRRED WHEN WE SAY THE WORD ‘ARSENAL’? HERE’S WHAT THEY HAD TO SAY...

- PAUL MILES

CLIFF JONES

Flying winger and Double-winner Cliff joined us in 1958 and made his debut against Arsenal on 22 February that year. He went on to make 378 appearances and is our fourth all-time goalscorer on 159, adding the FA Cup in 1962 and 1967 and the European Cup Winners’ Cup in 1963 to his double haul.

“Mention Arsenal and it brings huge emotions. When I arrived at Tottenham, my first game was against them at Highbury. Bill Nicholson (then first team coach to Jimmy Anderson) took me to one side and said ‘Cliff, there are lots of derbies in this country but this one is the biggest of the lot’.

“I’ll never forget my debut. I was doing my National Service at the time and I was stationed in St John’s Wood. Bill told me to meet at 1.30pm at Highbury. I travelled across by tube to Arsenal, arrived at the entrance to the famous Marble Halls at Highbury - but the commissionaire on the door didn’t recognise me and wouldn’t let me in! I said ‘but I’m playing today’ and he said ‘yes, I’ve heard that one before, son’ and left me standing there! All I could do was send a message in to Bill, he came out, pointed at me and said to the commissionaire ‘yes, that’s him, good to see you Cliff’ but he then looked down at his watch and declared ‘by the way, you’re late’.