Tottenham are (still) top of the league. Thats six days now, however, from the reaction of a sizable majority of fans Greg Allen Jersey and supposedly expert pundits, youd have thought that wed been top for six months. Weve won three games on the bounce and now were Champions League material. Forget your Chelseas and your Man Us with Terry and Rooney, were super Tottenham and weve got King Ledley and big fat Tom Huddlestone. The title beckons.You get the 2009/2010 Champions t-shirts printed up, Ill book the open top busPerhaps I am being slightly pe simistic. After all, last season we had (shudder) two points from eight games. Harry has revitalized the team and the crowd, and now both believe bigger and better things could be just round the corner. If our first two games were anything to go by, it appeared that was the case. We looked hungry against Liverpool, but the real feast came against Hull when we ripped their defence to shreds, winning 5-1 with Defoe bagging a hat-trick. Predictably, confidence going into Sundays game with West Ham was high.The West Ham fans have long been banging on about how this game is their cup final. The Hammers like nothing better (other than giving a good kicking to a bunch of Millwall fans) than a Premeirship win against us, and have given us a few good battles over the year. They were in typically bullish mood on Sunday and started well, giving off an early indication that they would be the first team to challenge our first place position.A derby win- almost as good as giving the Millwall fans a kickingIve never really rated Carlton Cole but the forward made me sit up and take notice in the opening exchanges. He was deployed as a target man by Hammers bo s Zola and relished in the role. It cant be easy when youre opponent for every header is Ledley King, one of the best defenders in the country, but Cole won the majority of airborne pa ses and gave both King and Ba song problems. The sheer size and strength of Cole troubled the Tottenham centre back partership and Cole demonstrated this when he crashed into Carlo Cudicini early on, knocking the ball into the Spurs net. Rather predictably however a foul was given, but the encounter served to remind Cudicini of Coles danger in the box.Cole had a few good chances to score in the first half, his best being a one on one with Carlo Cudicini. However the striker failed to open the scoring, instead rolling the ball well wide with a tame effort. At the other end Ledley King went closest for Tottenham, rising up above the West Ham defence to head a swinging Luka Modric cro s. He then watched in anguish as his looping header rattled the West Ham cro sbar. The teams were locked at 0-0 as they headed in for half time, and everyone knew it would take something special to separate the teams.Step forward Carlton Cole.Whos the better number twelve? Neither are good at spotting the ball, thats for sure.Cole had mi sed some opportunities to put West Ham one up before half-time, but gave the homeside the lead in emphatic fashion. Using the outside of his boot to give himself a bit of space, Cole turned Wilson Palacios and rocketed in a stunning shot from outside the area. Cudicini never stood a chance. 1-0 West Ham.At this point Carlton Cole was the sole object of Upton Parks affection and with Fabio Capello watching from the stands, things looked good for Cole. Capello looked to be liking what he saw but Defoe was the prior favorite to partner Wayne Rooney in Englands next game and Cole still had some work to do to cement an England place. So, in an effort to impre s the Italian, Cole attempted to play a simple back pa s to his defenders, with the Tottenham forwards lurking near by. Simple- right?Wrong. A white shirt intercepted the ball and then smacked it past Robert Green to equalise. Worst still for Cole, the goalscorer was Jermain Defoe, Coles England rival. It was a hard task, but just minutes after impre sing everyone in the stadium, Cole managed to lose their appreciation and affection. Well played boy.Its looking likely that either Defoe or Cole will wear this shirt next summerFrom this point forwards Tottenham sensed blood. Spurs pushed forward in search of a winner, and it came from the boot of Aaron Lennon. The young winger picked up a Corluka pa s and dribbled to the edge of the box where he shot acro s goal. His low, rasping shot beat Robert Green and gave Spurs the lead, the match, and the invaluable three points.Manager Reaction.Gianfranco Zola:Carlton made a mistake but the first goal was his creation. He is an intelligent guy, I think this will make him better in the futute.Its very annoying, you cant make mistakes in Premier League football and you especially cant make mistakes against Tottenham. However we will learn from this.Harry Redknapp:Yeah, it was a great win. Its never easy to come back from a goal down and especially not against West Ham, I thought they played well today.We were fortunate with our first- Carlton Cole was fantastic and scored a great goal but it was a sloppy backpa s to Jermain who finished well. Aaron (Lennon) then popped up with a spectacular winner. A good win.My man of the match.In my opinion its Carlton Cole. No, Im not rubbing salt into the wound but I thought Cole was great today and this is coming from a person who previously hated him. He was the only West Ham player to give our defense some serious problems and his goal was fantastic. Yes the backpa s was awful but Cole will probably learn from that and I think hed be a good partner for Defoe at the World Cup if Rooney is injured or deployed in an attacking midfield role. Aaron Lennon was probably Tottenhams best player and it was nice to see the young winger get a good Tyler Clippard Jersey goal. Luka Modric also had another good game.Its totally irrelevant to this game, but just for your information this is the 200th post on . Feel free to leave your heartfelt me sages of congratulations at the bottom and I hope that either myself or Juandeful will soon be leving a similar footnote on the 300th post.
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