The Hoddle of Coffee: Tottenham Hotspur news and links for Monday, December 23

Hello, all!

Just want to state for the record that I really, really like the lead image today.

Ramble of the Day

“Okay, tomorrow’s Hoddle is going to be the ‘apologies to my sisters’ Hoddle. Are you happy?”

I said that to my sisters right before getting today’s Hoddle started, and my younger sister was the one to say she was. This time, it was prompted by me not bringing up something she said while I was retelling my story of the Ajax second leg in Friday’s Hoddle. Like I mentioned, she was with me that day, but I didn’t mention the fact that she’d said on several occasions after Lucas Moura’s second goal, “If you believe it, it will happen.” I told her I was going through the moment quickly; “One line?” was her response.

As I was asking her to fact check that first paragraph, though, she told me I didn’t have to do this ramble. “It’s too late!,” I exclaimed; the thing is, we’d had a similar version of this conversation a few times. I either attributed something incorrectly to one sister instead of the other, or I just skipped over something entirely. Maybe the plan originally was to do a funny set of corrections, newspaper style. By the time I got started on this one, though, I was in formal apology territory.

There were other points I had to make, but I got engrossed in a Netflix Christmas movie (more on that, perhaps, in a future ramble). I’m certainly not rewriting now; I’ve put in hundreds of words of effort — on a Sunday night, no less, the time of week where I want to put in the least effort. Still, let’s consider this unorganized ramble one big correction because I can’t remember all of the corrections I’d need to make.

tl;dr: Is this how you follow the internet apology template? I doubt it, considering I did it while watching a Netflix Christmas movie.

Links of the Day

Former Tottenham midfielder Martin Peters has died aged 76 after a battle with Alzheimer’s disease.
Supplemental reading: The Guardian’s obituary of the World Cup winner

Four people have been arrested in relation to an Algerian match fixing scandal.

Aston Villa’s John McGinn will miss up to three months with an ankle injury.

Macclesfield Town will likely receive more sanctions from after postponing its weekend match against Plymouth.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino has suggested having the women’s World Cup take place every two years instead of every four years.

Today’s longer read: David Conn reports on Sheffield Wednesday’s financial accounts and its inactive corporate partners for The Guardian