Emmanuel Petit, the former Arsenal star, couldn’t contain his laughter when he heard about a particularly embarrassing moment from Tottenham’s 2019 UEFA Champions League final campaign. Petit, who was speaking on talkSPORT, was reacting to an excerpt from Hugo Lloris’ autobiography, where the ex-Tottenham captain shared a story that made him question his club’s mentality.
Lloris described how, just days before the final against Liverpool, Spurs’ chairman Daniel Levy had gathered the players to announce that they would receive luxury aviator watches from a sponsor as a reward for simply making it to the final. The watches, however, were engraved with the words “Champions League Finalist 2019,” which Lloris found odd and somewhat demotivating. He couldn’t understand why they were receiving this recognition before the match, rather than celebrating their victory after potentially winning the trophy.
Petit, himself a World Cup winner, couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He pointed out that when he received watches as part of France’s winning campaigns in the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000, they were only given to the players after the victories. To Petit, the decision to give Tottenham players a “finalist” watch before the match highlighted the club’s long-standing issue with a lack of winning mentality. “Who gives a watch before the final and says ‘you’re a finalist,’ not ‘the winner’?” Petit remarked, calling it a “terrible mistake.” He stressed that such gestures are fine only after the players have won, not before, suggesting that this premature token of recognition was a sign of Tottenham’s inability to win major titles.
The conversation took an even more ironic turn as Tottenham’s Europa League match against Galatasaray was being played during the talkSPORT broadcast. Spurs had just conceded their first goal in that match, leading to even more laughter from the hosts—Petit, who played for Arsenal, Darren Bent, an Arsenal fan, and Jason Cundy, a former Chelsea player. The fact that Tottenham was losing again after such a discussion about their mentality only added to the humor.
In his autobiography, Lloris mentioned that had Spurs won the Champions League final, the players would have gladly returned the “finalist” watches and asked for them to be engraved with “Winner” instead. That final, played in Madrid, had been Tottenham’s big chance to win a major trophy and surpass their north London rivals, Arsenal, in terms of continental success. However, despite reaching the final in dramatic fashion—thanks to Lucas Moura’s unforgettable hat-trick in the semifinal against Ajax—Spurs fell short against Liverpool. They conceded an early penalty to Mohamed Salah and were later undone by Divock Origi’s late goal, sealing a 2-0 victory for Liverpool.
Ex-footballer Troy Deeney also weighed in on the watch incident, expressing his surprise that Lloris had kept this story quiet for so long before revealing it in his book. Deeney wondered why Lloris didn’t speak up at the time, especially as he was the captain. He questioned the mentality of the Spurs players, noting that if he had been in Lloris’ shoes, he would have confronted the owner, Daniel Levy, right away. According to Deeney, giving out the watches before the final was a sign that the club didn’t believe they could actually win the competition. He argued that if the club had any belief in their success, such a gesture would have been delayed until after the final result was known.
The conversation about Tottenham’s mentality was also a chance for Petit to reflect on the longstanding issues at the club. Spurs have not won a major trophy since their League Cup victory in 2008, and they have not claimed a league title since 1961. For many football fans, the term “Spursy” has become synonymous with the club’s inability to win when it matters most. In Petit’s view, this has always been clear: “We knew we were better than them,” he said, recalling his own playing days when Arsenal routinely triumphed over their rivals. Petit believes that the core issue at Tottenham lies in a mindset that doesn’t know how to win.
