Tottenham Hotspur has had a below-par 2024-25 campaign so far, collecting 23 points from 16 Premier League games, which places them at a paltry 10th place in the table. The club needs positive results thick and fast if it wants to salvage the season. However, they have already suffered a new setback, facing backlash regarding their recent Squid Game promotion announcements. The Spurs fans are questioning the club’s decisions and priorities while the rival fans are taking cheeky digs aiming the commercial announcement.
Tottenham has recently announced its partnership with Netflix, and in lieu of that deal, the club will be promoting the launch of the second season of the hit Korean series, Squid Game. As such, a number of activation events have been planned to give the fans inside the stadium the “Squid Game experience,” like people clad in the notorious Squid Game guards costumes will be seen inside the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium during the Premier League matches of Liverpool and Wolverhampton Wanderers on the 22nd and 29th of December, respectively. Other than that, a trailer for the 2nd season will be shown at half-time, and a giant blimp of the eerie Young-hee doll, which featured during the ‘Green Light, Red Light’ game in the first season of the show, will be outside the Tottenham Stadium. Other than that, the club will be releasing other exclusive content based on Squid Game, with the Men’s and Women’s teams players reportedly participating in Squid Game-like challenges.
The news of the promotion has received mixed reviews from the fans, with some of them okay with it, while others are quite enraged at the club management for prioritizing commercial aspects of the club rather than focusing on the main thing, the game of football. One Spurs expressed his/her frustrations over the announcements, “If only the focus on the field was as good as that off it.”
With big games like the EFL Cup tie against Manchester United and a big league match against Liverpool coming up, fans wanted the focus to be solely on the training and match preparation, without the distractions of pop culture entertainment promotions, especially with injuries not making it easy for the North London club. Micky Van de Ven, Cristian Romero and Guglielmo Vicario are all sidelined, and the availability of left-back Destiny Udogie is also uncertain as he had to be taken off in the 27th minute against Southampton on Monday.
Other Spurs fans were bland about the announcements, with some noting that it would help the commercial side and bring in more funds for the club to spend. One of them tweeted, “If it gives us extra money to spend. I’m all for it.” Another fan agreed with the club’s decision, “Do you think that adding revenue streams to the club is a bad thing?”
They were in support of such kinds of deals happening as it would place the club on a better footing financially and help them stay clear of FFP violations. But then again, a few of them made vocal their grievances that even though the club made money out of the deal, the owner would anyway not invest the capital into the club or bolster the transfer budget for the upcoming January or summer windows, so what’s the point. One of them wrote, “This stuff is good. It generates money. The problem is these lot don’t spend that money.” Another fan spoke about the importance of investment, “This would be fine to do if the fans felt like the club were maximising investment in the first team. Marketing and raising the club profile is great but only if that ultimately leads to a better football team.”
In fact, the Spurs fans even have a peaceful protest rally planned against club Chairman, Daniel Levy ahead of the Liverpool game on Sunday.
Star defender Cristian Romero himself complained a few days ago about the lack of spending by the board and that they should be strengthening the squad like Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester City do. He even went on to mention the club has to do something different other than sacking the players and coaching staff, like they have done in the recent past, and hold the actual culprits accountable.
Meanwhile, the rival fans are seeing the funny side of the Squid Game promotion announcements. Some of them mocked how Tottenham and the Squid Game are quite similar in that both involve playing games in the hopes of an elusive success. A Chelsea fan tweeted, “This is like the equivalent of Spurs in a competition for a trophy. Just waiting to be eliminated.”
It will definitely be an exciting affair, as the fans will be treated to a never-before stadium experience, although many passionate Tottenham fans would be focused on just their team’s performance and gunning for a win against both Manchester United and Liverpool. More importantly, a defeat against either side, especially against Liverpool would undoubtedly make the Squid Game stunt backfire.
