The Hoddle of Coffee: Tottenham Hotspur news and links for Friday, December 30

good morning good morning. Your last hoddle of the year coming right up after this sweet tribute to Pele and Maradona from Napoli:

We’ve been through quite a lot this year, haven’t we? It seems like yesterday that Pardeep was still doing these hoddles!

I’m not much of a New Year’s person. Never have been. Never understood it.

I used to work the graveyard shift at work - from 7pm until 4am (sometimes later). So, naturally, there were a few years when I stayed well past midnight on New Year’s.

Only thing is - none of my friends wanted to! Lame!

So I began this little tradition of my own, and one that grew during the pandemic, of playing a record on New Year’s Eve. Typically a banger, and I try to time it perfectly when the clock strikes midnight on the new year.

Now, that record for two years was Abbey Road. Is there any better way to begin the year than with the medly on Side Two (though I really do enjoy Octopus’s Garden).

Last year I went with a different direction and played Grateful Dead’s Live at Olympia in 1972. Going from Jack Straw - Sugar Magnolia - Not Fade Away - GDTRFB - Not Fade Away - One More Saturday Night, with the clock hitting midnight on GDTRFB was also pretty freaking great.

I’m not sure if I’ll play anything on Saturday night. Maybe I will! If I’m back in Washington (ok, Arlington, but seriously guys it’s practically the same thing idk why you keep bringing it up).

If I do play a record on NYE, it’s gonna be a banger.

Fitzie’s track of the day: Rock Lobster, by The B-52s

And now for your links:

From 2016: Pele’s letter to his younger self, via the Players Tribune

The New York Times ($$) publishes a photo essay on the ‘Story of Pele’

A compilation of tributes to Pele

Alasdair Gold’s latest report on Spurs’ priorities for the January window