quite a young side, it might be a bit of a wake-up call,” explained
Peter. “But we just went out there and battered teams! It was
unbelievable. There was literally no fear at all. We just went at
teams. The Twente game was a prime example – we went out
and attacked them. We played really well.”
Having dominated the first half, that opening goal was
key – and it was the first of many Crouch-van der Vaart
combinations we’d see that season.
“It was brilliant with Rafa,” said Crouchy.
“I remember the first day in training I was
knocking balls down to him and he was
following me around wherever I was going
on the pitch! He was always a step ahead
of the defenders, wherever I’d put the
ball, he’d be there, he always read it
and it worked really well.”
After four points from our
opening two games, we then
headed to Italy for our biggest
game of the group against
defending champions Inter Milan
at the San Siro.
Hopes were high, but it all came crashing down
in a disastrous first half. We were already 1-0 down
when goalkeeper Heurelho Gomes was sent off in the
12th minute and that turned into 4-0 by half-time. Inter's
goalscorers underlined their quality – Javier Zanetti,
Samuel Eto'o and Dejan Stankovic – alongside the likes
of Julio Cesar, Lucio, Maicon and Wesley Schneider.
But then Gareth Bale happened...
We'd already seen what he was capable of but the
Welshman lit up the world stage that night with a second
half hat-trick, not just bringing respectability to the scoreline, but
leaving the home side fearing that our 10 men might just nick a
point as we pulled it back to 4-3 with a couple of minutes to play.
"Beforehand, everything had been rosy in the Champions
League, we were flying. I don't know, maybe a few of us
froze that night, perhaps a touch of the fear factor took
over,” said Peter.
"But in the second half, we went out and played without
fear again, as we had done previously, and Gareth
terrorised them. It was one of the most incredible
performances I've ever seen from a player away
from home. Gareth was such a young player at the
time, that was his breakthrough season really.
He was on fire. The world stood up and took
notice that night."
Despite the second half display, we
were still smarting at having lost the
game, but we made amends against
Inter at the Lane a fortnight later and
again, it was Bale who did the damage.
Time and again he surged past
Maicon down the left, carving open
the Italian’s defence and creating havoc as well as
chances. Rafa fired us ahead on 18 minutes and Crouchy
converted the second after one of Bale’s bursts on
the hour. Eto’o responded for Inter on 80 minutes
but it was our night as Bale took off again to present
the clinching third goal on a plate for Pavlyucheko a
minute from time. As glory, glory nights go, it was right
up there with the best of them.
“For me, that game was the one because it was a
complete, 90-minute performance where we totallyTOTTENHAMHOTSPUR.COM(^55)
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Peter converts an inch-perfect
Gareth Bale cross against Inter