Spurs in History - 17th October

17th October, 1885

Spurs First Competitive Match.

Spurs 5 St Albans 2 (London Association Cup 1st Round)

Spurs played their first competitive match in the London Association Cup.  Prior to this, all of Spurs games had been friendlies.  Four hundred spectators attended the game against St Albans, a London-based business house.

The Spurs team included six of the club’s founder members but the goal scorers were not recorded. Spurs’ Cup success was short lived as they lost heavily in the next round to the Casuals, one of the biggest names in football’s early history.

Team:

Bumberry, Jull, Tyrell, Bull, Lovis, Casey, Buckle, Harston, Mason, Amos, Cottrell.

In 1894 Spurs played their first FA Cup tie against West Herts who later became Watford FC.

17th October, 1972

Jimmy Greaves' Testimonial Game

Spurs 2 Feyenoord 1

Jimmy Greaves was the first player to be given a testimonial game by Spurs.   In recognition of his great service to the club the club decided to reward him with this game.  Greaves had left Spurs in March, 1970 when he was transferred to West Ham United as part of the deal which saw Martin Peters move to Tottenham.   Greaves retired at the end of the 1970-71 season at the age of 31.

Greaves who, unknown to most, had been suffering from alcohol related problems, turned back the years to score for Spurs.  Such was his peformance that it was thought that he might be tempted out of retirement but it was only in non-League football that he was to appear.   Ray Evans scored Spurs' other goal in front of 45,799 spectators.