Formation and early years (1882–1908) middle row fourth left,
Bobby Buckle bottom row second left. Originally named
Hotspur Football Club, the club was formed on 5 September 1882 by a group of schoolboys led by
Bobby Buckle. They were members of the Hotspur Cricket Club and the football club was formed to play sports during the winter months. A year later the boys sought help with the club from John Ripsher, the Bible class teacher at
All Hallows Church, who became the first president of the club and its treasurer. Ripsher helped and supported the boys through the club's formative years, reorganised and found premises for the club. In April 1884 the club was renamed "Tottenham Hotspur Football Club" to avoid confusion with another London club named
Hotspur, whose post had been mistakenly delivered to North London. Nicknames for the club include "Spurs" and "the Lilywhites". Initially, the
North London side played games between themselves and
friendly matches against other local clubs. The first recorded match took place on 30 September 1882 against a local team named the Radicals, which Hotspur lost 2–0. The team entered their first cup competition in the London Association Cup, and won 5–2 in their first competitive match on 17 October 1885 against a company's works team called St Albans. The club's fixtures began to attract the interest of the local community and attendances at its home matches increased. In 1892, they played for the first time in a league, the short-lived
Southern Alliance. (unseen) scoring the third goal for Tottenham Hotspur in the
1901 FA Cup Final replay against
Sheffield United The club turned professional on 20 December 1895 and, in the summer of 1896, was admitted to Division One of the
Southern League (the third tier at the time). On 2 March 1898, the club also became a limited company, the Tottenham Hotspur Football and Athletic Company. Soon after,
Frank Brettell became the first ever manager of Spurs, and he signed
John Cameron, who took over as player-manager when Brettell left a year later. Cameron would have a significant impact on Spurs, helping the club win its first trophy, the
Southern League title in the
1899–1900 season. The following year Spurs won the
1901 FA Cup by beating
Sheffield United 3–1 in a
replay of the final, after the first game ended in a 2–2 draw. In doing so they became the only
non-League club to achieve the feat since the formation of
The Football League in 1888.
Early decades in the Football League (1908–1958) In 1908, the club was elected into the
Football League Second Division and won promotion to the
First Division in their first season, finishing runners-up. In 1912,
Peter McWilliam became manager; Tottenham finished bottom of the league at the end of the
1914–15 season when football was suspended due to the
First World War. Spurs were relegated to the Second Division on the resumption of league football after the war, but quickly returned to the First Division as Second Division champions of the
1919–20 season. displaying the cup to fans on
Tottenham High Road after the 1921 final On 23 April 1921, McWilliam guided Spurs to their second FA Cup win, beating
Wolverhampton Wanderers 1–0 in the
final. After coming second to
Liverpool in the league in
1922, they would finish mid-table in the next five seasons, being relegated in the
1927–28 season after McWilliam left. For most of the 1930s and 1940s, Spurs languished in the Second Division, apart from a brief return to the top flight in the
1933–34 and
1934–35 seasons. Former Spurs player
Arthur Rowe became manager in 1949. Rowe developed a style of play, known as "
push and run", that proved to be successful in his early years as manager. He took the team back to the First Division after finishing top of the Second Division in the
1949–50 season. In his second season in charge, Tottenham won their first ever top-tier league championship title when they finished top of the First Division for the
1950–51 season. Rowe resigned in April 1955 due to a stress-induced illness from managing the club. Before he left, he signed one of Spurs' most celebrated players,
Danny Blanchflower, who won the
FWA Footballer of the Year twice while at Tottenham.
Bill Nicholson and the glory years (1958–1974) ,
Dave Mackay,
Bill Brown,
Bobby Smith,
Cliff Jones among others in the team with
Bill Nicholson as manager
Bill Nicholson took over as manager in October 1958. He became the club's most successful manager, guiding the team to major trophy success three seasons in a row in the early 1960s: the
Double in
1961, the FA Cup in 1962 and the
Cup Winners' Cup in
1963. with the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup trophy in 1963 The
1960–61 season started with a run of 11 wins, followed by a draw and another four wins, at that time the best ever start by any club in the top flight of English football. The title was won on 17 April 1961 when they beat the eventual runner-up
Sheffield Wednesday at home 2–1, with three more games still to play. The Double was achieved when Spurs won 2–0 against
Leicester City in the
final of the
1960–61 FA Cup. It was the first Double of the 20th century, and the first since
Aston Villa achieved the feat in
1897. The next year Spurs won their consecutive FA Cup after beating
Burnley in the
1962 FA Cup final. On 15 May 1963, Tottenham became the first British team to win a European trophy by winning the
1962–63 European Cup Winners' Cup when they beat
Atlético Madrid 5–1 in the
final. Spurs also became the first British team to win two different European trophies when they won the
1971–72 UEFA Cup with a rebuilt team that included
Martin Chivers,
Pat Jennings, and
Steve Perryman. They had also won the
FA Cup in 1967, two
League Cups (in
1971 and
1973), as well as a second place league finish (
1962–63) and runners-up in the
1973–74 UEFA Cup. In total, Nicholson won eight major trophies in his 16 years at the club as manager.
Burkinshaw to Venables (1974–1992) and
Ricardo Villa holding the FA Cup trophy won in
1981 Spurs went into a period of decline after the successes of the early 1970s, and Nicholson resigned after a poor start to the
1974–75 season. The team was then relegated at the end of the
1976–77 season with
Keith Burkinshaw as manager. Burkinshaw quickly returned the club to the top flight, building a team that included
Glenn Hoddle as well as two Argentinians,
Osvaldo Ardiles and
Ricardo Villa, which was unusual as players from outside the
British Isles were rare at that time. The team that Burkinshaw rebuilt went on to win the FA Cup in
1981 and
1982 and the
UEFA Cup in
1984. playing against Tottenham in the
European Cup Winners' Cup in 1981. Notable Spurs players of the early 1980s include
Steve Perryman,
Osvaldo Ardiles, and
Glenn Hoddle. The 1980s was a period of change that began with a new phase of redevelopment at White Hart Lane, as well as a change of directors.
Irving Scholar took over the club and moved it in a more commercial direction, the beginning of the transformation of English football clubs into commercial enterprises. Debt at the club would again lead to a change in the boardroom, and
Terry Venables teamed up with businessman
Alan Sugar in June 1991 to take control of Tottenham Hotspur
plc. Venables, who had become manager in 1987, signed players such as
Paul Gascoigne and
Gary Lineker. Under Venables, Spurs won the
1990–91 FA Cup, making them the first club to win eight FA Cups.
Premier League football (1992–present) Tottenham was one of the five clubs that pushed for the founding of the
Premier League, created with the approval of
The Football Association, replacing the
Football League First Division as the highest division of English football. In February 2001,
Sugar sold his shareholding in Spurs to
ENIC Sports plc, run by
Joe Lewis and
Daniel Levy, and stepped down as chairman. Lewis and Levy would eventually own 85% of the club, with Levy responsible for the running of the club. Despite a succession of managers and players such as
Teddy Sheringham,
Jürgen Klinsmann and
David Ginola, for a long period in the Premier League until the late 2000s, Spurs finished mid-table most seasons with few trophies won. They won the
League Cup in 1999 under
George Graham, and again in
2008 under
Juande Ramos. Performance improved under
Harry Redknapp with players such as
Gareth Bale and
Luka Modrić, and the club finished in the top five in the early 2010s. ,
Dele Alli,
Son Heung-min,
Christian Eriksen,
Victor Wanyama, and
Jan Vertonghen After Redknapp left,
Mauricio Pochettino was appointed head coach, who was in the role between 2014 and 2019. Under Pochettino, with new stars such as academy graduate
Harry Kane and Korean import
Son Heung-min, Tottenham solidified their position as part of an emerging group of clubs known as the
Big Six. Spurs finished second in the
2016–17 season, their highest league finish since the
1962–63 season, and advanced to the
UEFA Champions League final in
2019, the club's first, where they ultimately lost to
Liverpool 2–0. The club's home games during the last few seasons of Pochettino's tenure were played at
Wembley Stadium while the new
Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was constructed. Pochettino was dismissed after a poor start to the
2019–20 season and was replaced by
José Mourinho, who was head coach from November 2019 to April 2021. His successor,
Nuno Espírito Santo, lasted just four months. The next manager,
Antonio Conte, guided Spurs to fourth during the
2021–22 season and back to a Champions League place. After exiting both the Champions League and FA Cup, he departed the club by mutual agreement in March 2023. In February 2023,
Harry Kane displaced
Jimmy Greaves as the club's all-time record goalscorer before leaving Spurs at the end of the season for
Bayern Munich.
Ange Postecoglou took over as head coach on 1 July 2023 and the club qualified for the
2024–25 UEFA Europa League after a fifth-place finish in the
Premier League. ==Stadiums==