Club Profile
Tottenham Hotspur
Tottenham Hotspur are a club with a proud and trophy-filled history, a large following, a shiny new stadium, and a reputation for just screwing things up-at least until 2025.
LOCATION: The North London neighborhood of Tottenham
CONTACT: tottenhamhotspur.com, 0344 499 5000, #THFC
NICKNAMES: Spurs or (far less often) the Lilywhites. Please don’t say “the” Spurs or Tottenham Hotspurs. It’s Tottenham (TOTT-num) or Spurs.
History
If you want to compare English soccer clubs to American football teams for perspective, may we suggest the Dallas Cowboys. They were kings of the world a few decades ago, remain very popular today, are famous for wearing white at home, and have an amazing stadium, and didn’t win anything for a long time.
They were founded in Tottenham, a North London neighborhood, in 1882 and took their nickname from Sir Henry Percy, nicknamed Harry Hotspur, who lived around there. Harry, a character in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, was also said to be fond of fighting cocks, so in 1910 a player made a nine-foot statue of a cockerel. It stood on top of their old stadium, White Hart Lane, from then on and now adorns the new place. You can go visit it on a special stadium tour.
Spurs, along with Manchester United, were the only club to win trophies in each decade from the 1950s through 2010. Their glory days were the early 1960s, when they became the first club to win the League and FA Cups (“doing the double”) in the same year in the 20th century. That was 1960-61. They won the FA Cup again in 1962, then the UEFA Cup (now the Europa League) in 1962, becoming the first English club to win a European trophy.
Their last trophy for 17 years was the 2008 League Cup, but their last League title was 1961, and their last FA Cup was 1991. For many years since then, they have failed to get it done, and they finished behind Arsenal in the league for decades until 2016-17. Gunners fans enjoyed taunting them with shirts and stickers reading “Mind the Gap.” Arsenal fans also created an annual holiday, St. Totteringham’s Day—the day when it’s confirmed Spurs will finish behind Arsenal again. In fact, when you have things going your way and it falls apart for some reason, that’s said to be very “Spursy.”
At the moment, Spurs are in a kind of second tier within the Premier League. Tottenham, after making the 2019 Champions League final (which they lost to Liverpool), they spent the 2022 season in the new Europa Conference League, a rung below the Europa League—and dropped out of that when they had to forfeit their last group game due to a Covid outbreak. In 2022 they ended the season in fourth, satisfyingly one spot ahead of Arsenal, and reached the Champions League Round of 16 before falling to AC Milan. Unfortunately, Spurs ended the 2022–23 season in eighth and failed to qualify for Europe for the first time since the 2009–10 season.
Last season, during a terrible league season that saw them finish 17th and lose 22 league games, they won the Europa League, beating Manchester United in the final in Bilbao, Spain. So out of nowhere, this season they are in the Champions League! But then they fired their coach anyway.
An interesting tidbit of history is that for years Spurs were the favored club of Jews in London. This was originally because there were many Jews in their neighborhood; in the 1930s, it was estimated about one-third of their supporters were Jewish. (Opposing fans used to taunt them during Saturday games with chants of “Does Your Rabbi Know You’re Here?”) You will still hear chants of “Yid Army” and “Yiddo” that date from the 1970s and ’80s when Tottenham supporters turned this insult back on their tormentors. But this is becoming somewhat controversial and the club is suggesting “the Y-word” should go away.
2024–25 SEASON: 17th in Premier League, 4th Round FA Cup, semifinals League Cup, Europa League Champions
2025–26 SEASON: Premier League (top flight since 1978), UEFA Champions League
Rivalries
Arsenal, whom they have played more than 200 times in the North London derby, are the huge rival. The rivalry started when Arsenal moved to North London after Spurs were already well established there, then got voted into the Football League ahead of them. They also hate any other London club, Chelsea in particular.
Women's Team
Tottenham Hotspur FC Women are in the Women’s Super League. Home games are at Brisbane Road, home ground of Leyton Orient FC, but occasionally at Tottenham Stadium.
Songs
The biggest is “When the Spurs Go Marching In.” You might also hear “Glory Glory Tottenham Hotspur” and “Being a Yid” — a word the club wishes everyone would move on from.
Stadium
The new, 62,850-seat, $1 billion Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was late, over budget, and Spurs had to endure a longer than planned exile at Wembley. But it was worth it, as the place is simply astonishing. There is no way it will ever live up to White Hart Lane for atmosphere, but that one only had 36,000 seats, and Spurs needed to grow. The new one is right next to where the old one was.
The main interior feature is the 17,500-seat, single-tier South Stand, where they seat the loud Spurs folks; there are also bars between the rows for (they hope) the eventual “safe standing” experience. Behind that is a five-story glass enclosure with a food court and a large public space. There is also a microbrewery, completely insane hospitality options with heated seats and USB ports, and a climbing wall on the outside of the stadium. They also host NFL games, and that means having two pitches. Seriously. While the artificial NFL surface is in use, the grass soccer pitch divides into pieces and slides underground into a controlled growing environment.
The entire complex, by the way, is cashless.
TOURS: A self-guided tour with a “multimedia” device costs £27 for adults. They also have a “Dare Walk”—the club’s motto is “To Dare Is to Do”—that includes a walk outside the upper levels of the stadium and onto a glass walkway some 150 feet above the pitch, where you can visit the legendary golden cockerel that was on top of the old stadium for decades.
Book all of that (well ahead) at experience.tottenhamhotspur.com.
Going to a Game at Tottenham
GETTING THERE: All of the transit in the immediate area was swept up in the stadium redevelopment, but this much didn’t change: the closest rail station is White Hart Lane on the Overground line, just a couple of minutes away. You can get there from Liverpool Street Station. The closest Tube station is Seven Sisters on the Piccadilly line. From there it’s a half-hour walk, so it’s better to grab a bus (route 149, 259, 279, or 349), which will get you most of the way there. They will be quite crowded, though.
PUBS: If you can get into The Bricklayers on the high road, that’s the place to be. It is a classic supporters pub. Just a little north is Coach and Horses, another Spurs pub but with more outdoor seating and, if the weather is nice, grilled meat on the menu. Right across the street from the stadium are the Corner Pin and No. 8 Tottenham, formerly the Bell and Hare, with another beer garden. There’s a pretty good beer selection inside the stadium, including from the local Beavertown Brewery.
Also look nearby for the Bill Nicholson, a Spurs pub from back in the White Hart Lane days.
GRUB: The food options in the immediate area consist mainly of lots of jerk chicken and pizza and kebab places all up and down the high road. Gina’s, with an African/Caribbean menu, looked and smelled tasty.
Tottenham Hotspur Tickets
Even with this new stadium, tickets are tough. Like most clubs, Spurs have a membership and loyalty scheme, and like most big clubs, a membership is virtually required for each ticket you want, and even with one, you will probably have to deal with the members’ resale area. Adult memberships started last season at £48. Groundhopper Guides has regular tickets as well as hospitality options for all Spurs home games.
Photo Gallery
Videos
From our Groundhopping Community: Pregame at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
Tottenham at Wembley Stadium Pregame
Tottenham 2-2 Everton 12 May 2019 -- Everton Take the Lead
