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DANIEL WYNNE - Preview of the Season 2001-2002

As the 2001-2002 season is about to get underway, there are many new things waiting for us.

The sponsors of the FA Premier League have changed.  Carling have made way for Barclaycard and the TV coverage is changing too.

The BBC’s Match of the Day flagship programme is reduced to only FA Cup games as the highlights package has been won by ITV. Traditionally ITV have trailed the Beeb by some way in their coverage but I have been privy to some of the exciting new features ITV have up their sleeve and they are keen to impress.

They have changed the face of Saturday evenings by putting their new highlights programme with the simple title of The Premiership, at the earlier time of 7.00pm. Rather than re showing the programme on a Sunday morning, ITV will show it again at 11.30pm on the Saturday night so that it can be seen before going to bed and after people return from a night out.

On a Monday night, a new programme called the Premiership Parliament will go out at 11.00pm.  Hosted by Gabby Yorath and Ally McCoist, the show will have a live studio audience and its main feature is the members of the Parliament, a fan panel with one supporter from each club for the season. All 20 fans will be present on day one (20^th August) and thereafter 8 fans per week will frequent the panel.

Sky have increased the number of live matches from 60 to 66 that will go out on their Sky Sports 1 and Sky Sports Extra channels whilst all Cable and Digital services will be showing 40 Premiership games on the new controversial pay per view service. Whether we like it or not, it is here and it won’t go away.

How will Spurs do this season? That of course is the golden question. We go into the season with an air of optimism not seen at White Hart Lane for some time. Hoddle is in place and itching to get underway. He wants to be judged on his achievements from this year and not the tail end of last year.

He has bought well in Poyet, Ziege, Bunjevcevic and Teddy makes a welcome return. The blend of experience and youth is plain to see but some fans still expected to see younger players brought in. We all know it is not easy to attract  players of European pedigree when we can not offer European football as an incentive to come to White Hart Lane, so qualification this season is a top priority.

We have the best keeper in the Permiership in Neil Sullivan and the acquisition of Kasey Keller gives us the back up we require following the departure of Ian Walker to Leicester.

Across the back, Bunjevcevic plays the game on the floor and will help our attacking options whilst keeping a firm eye on the defensive qualities. Carr and Ziege are amongst the best wing backs in the country. In the centre the versatile Gary Doherty, Ledley King, Chris Perry and Anthony Gardner offer some quality but perhaps we are still short of a quality centre half, and I say that with the greatest respect to each of those players.

We still require a flair midfielder. Poyet scored more goals from midfield last season than any other player and with him and Teddy behind the forwards the attacking side of the middle of the park looks attractive. As I said, with Freund, Sherwood and Leo we still lack a certain amount of flair which Anderton offers in too few games. If he can keep injury free, it will be like have a new player.

Up front Rebrov, Les and Iversen hold the key to the goals and there are also plenty of goals to come from other areas such as Poyet, Ziege, Carr, Anderton and Doherty.

Consitency is always one of our shortfalls, if we can polish off some of the “easier” teams in the way we raise our game against the bigger clubs, then we have a real chance of a top 6 finish.

There is a long way to go until May, and with the right support from us the fans we can all help make this a season to remember.

Come on you Spurs.