Sticky wicket at Spurs Lodge!

Tottenham Hotspur (Spurs) Football Club is located in North London. The club is also known as Spurs. Tottenham's home ground is White Hart Lane. The club motto is Audere est Facere (To dare is to do).

Clive Allen's reserve group got into the spirit of the Ashes as the sound of leather on willow echoed around Spurs Lodge on Tuesday afternoon.

Coach Clive had promised the lads a 'fun session' this week and after a gruelling morning's running, he came up with our very own version of Twenty20 cricket.

Clive and Academy goalkeeping coach Perry Suckling captained the sides with players batting in pairs for two overs per pair. The teams started on 50 runs and were deducted runs for every wicket lost.

It wasn't quite England v Australia but some hard hitting from Charlie Lee, Lee Barnard, Jamie O'Hara and a more cultured style from Charlie Daniels coupled with some tight bowling saw Clive's team home with 97 runs to Perry's 65.

The highlight, however, had to be the sight of Emil Halldfredsson (Iceland) and Reto Ziegler (Switzerland) coming to terms with their first ever games of cricket.

"The lads have worked very hard, they've done their running, physical and technical work very well," explained Clive.

"I told them it would be a session with a difference and something they weren't expecting. I brought in the bats, pads, a cricket ball, stumps and it was always going to be a match for real. The groundsman even kindly cut us a strip!

"It was a lot of fun, especially watching Emil and Reto getting to grips with it and it was as much social as anything. It was all about enjoying an afternoon's session.

"I did it when I was at Millwall under Mick McCarthy. I remember then some of the lads asking 'what are we doing?' and some had never played. I really enjoyed it though and I'm sure it was the same here."