The Hoddle of Coffee: Tottenham Hotspur news and links for Monday, October 21

Hi, everyone!

Think I might just be sharing that sad songs playlist we made a few weeks ago after every game the Tottenham men’s team doesn’t win.

Ramble of the Day

On average, sports movies tend to be a little bit hollow when it comes to their storytelling. There’s always a larger story trying to be told as they aim to find as much inspiration as they can. Sometimes, it works better than others, but there tend to be a few really great sports movies and then a bunch of fine sports movies, regardless of sport.

You do have to give a bit of credit to the people who make boxing movies, though, because they seem to be a bit separate from the overall sports movie collection. I come with this observation after watching Creed II a few months ago, and reflecting on the many others I’ve seen. (The number keeps growing as I ramble because I keep remembering more.)

I don’t watch boxing and there’s only so much I know about it otherwise, but there seems to be a certain amount of realistic drama that very easily fits into a boxing film. It’s possible that the sport’s real life encouragement of drama allows it, but the many good boxing movies feel very personal in a very cinematic way. (It might also help that interesting filmmakers like to make boxing movies, from Clint Eastwood to Ryan Coogler.)

You can take something like The Fighter and make the argument easily because it’s based on the real lives of Micky Ward and Dicky Eklund. A lot of the fictional boxing movies, from the Rocky and Creed movies to Million Dollar Baby, though, really focus on the intertwining of professional and personal for the athlete. That’s a recipe for a pretty good sports movie, and the more complicated, the better. Some of the films I’m citing focus less on the inspirational aspects of sports (the Creed series does this more than the Rocky series does) than the average sports movie, but isn’t missing a lot of the other elements. The extra storylines don’t feel tacked on, and they’re also just more stylistically interesting. (Again, that might be down to interesting filmmakers making boxing movies.)

This is probably connected to a conversation about how boxing movies are a particular type of prestige drama, but I think I’ve droned on enough about the topic for now.

tl;dr: I think boxing movies tend to be better than the average sports movie.

Links of the Day

The FA Cup match between Haringey Borough and Yeovil was abandoned after Haringey players were racially abused by opposing fans.

Sampdoria’s Ronaldo Vieira was racially abused by Roma fans during the teams’ meeting on Sunday.

Hearts is investigating reports that Rangers’ Alfredo Morelos was racially abused during a match on Sunday.

Bayern’s Nicklas Süle tore his ACL and is expected to miss the majority of the season.

Krasimir Balakov has resigned as the Bulgaria coach, days after his side lost 6-0 to England and he claimed not to hear racist abuse directed towards England players.

Today’s longer read: Tom Williams on Memphis Depay, Jurgan Locadia, and footballers who rap for Bleacher Report