Tottenham: 'Spursy' taunts won't hurt anymore after Europa League triumph, say players | OneFootball

The club had become an easy target through their 17-year trophy drought

Guglielmo Vicario and Micky van de Ven said Tottenham will no longer be the butt of any jokes after their Europa League triumph.

Van de Ven and Vicario both played key roles as Spurs sat back in the second half. The Dutchman pulled off an acrobatic goalline clearance to deny Rasmus Hojlund and preserve Spurs’ fragile lead in the second half, while Vicario made a string of key saves, getting down quickly to deny Alejandro Garnacho with a quarter of an hour remaining.

The club’s extended trophy drought and near misses in the hunt for silverware left them on the wrong end of countless jokes, the word ‘Spursy’ coming to be synonymous with sporting blunders. For Vicario, though, those digs no longer have any basis.

The Italian said: “When you win something, you are recognised as a champion for something, all the jokes, all the things about being Spursy and all this kind of stuff, now, I don’t know. Maybe we stop that.”

Van de Ven concurred with his keeper, but admitted he expected the jibes to continue.

Asked if he expected the jokes to stop, he said: “Probably they will continue, but I don’t care anymore.

“We proved them wrong and won a trophy, so they can say whatever they want. We lifted the trophy today, and that is the most important for us, the fans, and for the club.

Despite speaking mere hours after full-time, both men were already shifting their focus to next season’s Champions League, which Spurs automatically qualify for having won the Europa League.

Vicario said to qualify way “a massive achievement. It is where this club has to stay and we believe that, so we are going to enjoy the Champions League next season.”

Van de Ven, though, was more concerned with the night’s festivities, saying he was yet to consider next season’s campaign: “To be honest, now we just want to celebrate and enjoy this moment.

“Of course, we want to build on [this success]. We want to do something special also next year. Every year you want to be successful and every year you want to achieve something, but I really haven’t thought about it to be honest.”

Tottenham will return to the Champions League for the first time since 2022-23, when they were knocked out in the round of 16 by AC Milan, losing 1-0 on aggregate.