It was a cold, damp night at Broadhall Way, (home to the mighty Stevenage Borough, and the Spurs Reserves) and if I'm honest the 0-5 scoreline was actually flattering to Tottenham. The site of Dean Richards back in a Spurs shirt, after being side-lined all season with an ear injury, was depressing enough, but not more so than the performance of the Spurs "reserve" team that our 8 million pound man was captaining.

With Spurs currently second in the Reserves League, I had every right to be optimistic in my hope to see a classy performance perhaps reflecting the form of our 1st team. What might have been a night to remember, with Spurs fielding for the first time their two new young recruits, Emil Hallfredsson and David Limbersky, turned out to be one to forget.

David Limbersky played on the right side of midfield, and what with the gaping hole in this position in the Spurs 1st team it was fingers crossed that he could be another young starlet, in the ilk of Reto Ziegler, who could quickly establish himself in the first team. However, Limbersky did not impress. He looked very light weight, had an air of Steffen Iverson about him, and didn't really show any signs of quality at all. Perhaps I was being a little over optimistic that we'd found our right side solution, and he may prove to be one for the future. But as we approach the half-way mark of the Jan transfer window, I'm getting a little concerned that we may not be bringing in the proven, quality right sided player that the team is screaming out for.

Emil Hallfredsson, looked like a ginger hard nut. A little more composed than his fellow debutant, he was strong and showed promise, but the team as a whole were so poor it would have been very difficult for any one player to shine.

Our back four consisted of Ifil, Richards, Defendi and Bunjevcevic - players which one would consider to be not so far from the first team - so to leak 5 goals (that could easily have been 6 or 7) was very embarrassing. A journalist spoke to Richards after the game, and rather unsurprisingly Deano was in sombre mood. Who can blame him after his 4th reserve game on the trot, losing by 5 goals at a Nationwide Conference ground in front of a handful of the moaning Spurs hardcore. With his contract due to expire this summer, who knows where Deano's future lies, though not on the Spurs wage bill will be a good start (then perhaps we can start paying our good players a decent amount).

The highlight of the game was a refreshing sight, that went some way to remind me that these footballers are just a bunch of blokes playing a game. Only one stand in the ground was occupied, so when the ball got kicked in to the terraces on any of the three other sides, the players would have to jump over the barrier and retreive the ball themselves - whilst trying not to slip over as they faced the challenge of walking on a wet concrete terrace in studded boots.

One for the fact fans: the Southampton players travel in a coach provided by a company called Angela's Holidays (classy stuff).