TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR
3 CHELSEA
4
   
(2) (1)
  Date : –  Sunday 8th December 2024
Kick off : –  16.30
  Competition : – Premier League
Venue : –   Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
  Crowd : –  61,186
  Referee : –  Anthony Taylor (Cheshire) Linesmen : – Mr. Gary Beswick; Mr. Adam Nunn
  Fourth official : – Lewis Smith
  VAR official : – Jarred Gillett VAR Assistant : –  Mark Scholes 
  Weather : –  Heavy rain before
  Spurs kicked off the first half attacking the Paxton Road end
  Playing time : –   90 + 12 minutes

 

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR CHELSEA
GOAL-SCORERS
      Solanke  04m 45s  (Asst Johnson)   Sancho  17m 00s  (Asst Cuccerella)
      Kulusevski  10m 26s  (Asst Porro)   Palmer (p)  60m 24s
      Son  90+5m 56s  (Asst Maddison)   Fernandez  72m 52s
         Palmer (p)  83m 15s
  CARDS
    Sarr (foul on Cucerella)  30   Lavia (foul on Kulusevski)  21
    Bissouma (foul on Caicedo)  59   Neto (foul on Udogie) 85
         Sanchez  (Time-wasting)  90+8
   
TEAM
20.   Fraser FORSTER 1.   Robert SANCHEZ 
     
23.   Pedro PORRO  3.   Marc CUCERELLA    (  40.   Renato VEIGA  90+1) 
17.   Cristian ROMERO  (  6.   Radu DRAGUSIN  15)  6.   Levi COLWILL
37.   Micky van de VEN  (  14.   Archie GRAY  79)  5.   Benoit BADIASHILE
13.   Destiny UDOGIE 25.   Moises CAICEDO
      
21.   Dejan KULUSEVSKI    (  10.   James MADDISON  79  )  8.   Enzo FERNANDEZ  (c) 
8.   Yves BISSOUMA    (  15.   Lucas BERGVALL 79)  45.   Romeo LAVIA   (  2.   Malo GUSTO  46) 
29.   Pape Matar SARR     
7.   Pedro NETO    (  11.   Noni MADUEKE  86)  
22.   Brennan JOHNSON    (  16.   Timo WERNER 53)  20.   Cole PALMER      (  14.   Joao FELIX  90+1)  
19.   Dominic SOLANKE  19.   Jadon SANCHO 
7.   Heung-Min SON  (c)     
15.   Nicolas JACKSON  (  18.   Christopher NKUNKU  76)  
Substitutes Substitutes
  40.   Brandon AUSTIN 12.   Filip JORGENSEN
  3.   Sergio REGUILON 4.   Tosin ADARABIOYO
  24.   Djed SPENCE 2.   Axel DIASI
  42.   Will LANKSHEAR 22.   Kiernan DEWSBURY-HALL

    = Assist        =  Goal scored       =  Own goal scored

Manager : – Ange Postecoglou Manager : –  Enzo Maresca
Kit Supplier : – Nike Kit Supplier : –  Nike
Shirt Sponsor : – AIA Shirt Sponsor : –  None
Shirt Sleeve Sponsor : –  Kraken Shirt Sleeve Sponsor : – Fever
Colours : –

Colours : – 
Worn with blue socks
Images of kits courtesy of the marvellous Colours of Football website

 

MATCH REPORT
  “It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish” as the old saying goes.  Well, Spurs started and finished well, but it was the second 45 minutes in between that was not so good and in that time Chelsea did enough to secure a 4-3 win, with Tottenham contributing to the defeat by conceding two penalties.  But that doesn’t tell the whole story.

Heavy rain before the game was always going to make it a fast surface and welcoming back Micky van de Ven and Cristian Romero, Spurs made an equally fast start.  Early pressing by Son caused Badiashile to make a panicky pass across the pitch 35 yards out and it went straight to Dejan Kulusevski.  The Swede ran the ball at the defence before sliding a pass to his right to Brennan Johnson, who took a touch before shooting and that allowed Cucerella to block it for a corner.  From an innocuous pass from Colwill, the obnoxious Cucerella slipped and presented the ball to Johnson on the right wing.  In contrast to the standard way we score goals, Brennan’s low ball into the six yard box, saw Solanke drop off thus committing Colwill to try to anticipate his movement and then Dom nipped across him to prod the ball past Sanchez to give Tottenham the lead in the fifth minute.  Taking our chances has been a problem recently, but making the most of the Spaniard’s error, Tottenham turned it into a goal.  However, we had scored first in this match at home last season and look how that ended.

Seven minutes into the match, Romero held off Jackson and then dragged the ball back for Kulusevski to move it on to Bissouma, who was dragged down from behind by Fernandez.  Two incidents in that action proved crucial in the end.  Romero pulled a thigh muscle doing the drag-back and the referee, who was weak and inconsistent all game, allowed Fernandez’s cynical foul to go without a booking.  It is an indictment of the level of officiating in this country if Taylor is one of our top referees, even though he “likes to let things go” as all the pundits describe his style, he needs to clamp down on things that are designed to break up play.  Yes, it was just outside our box, but Chelsea had a lot of players forward and we could easily have caught them on the break, plus Fernandez knew what he was doing and this sort of foul needs to be stamped out of the game.

Dominic was tireless up front in his closing down and forced Sanchez to play the ball straight out for a throw-in under pressure.  Chelsea were rattled  and Palmer was going down easy to win free-kicks to try and release the press that Spurs were applying, Caiceido slamming one of them into Lavia’s head.  It worked again, when the ball was passed across the Chelsea back-line to the hapless Cucerella, who slipped once more.  Gifting the ball to Johnson, he played it inside to Pedro Porro, who moved it on to Kulusevski, on the right corner of the penalty area.  Dejan made a run across the 18 yard line, easy going past Colwill and Lavia to then stroke a shot just back the way he had come, low into Sanchez’s bottom left hand corner through Lavia’s legs.  It was a well placed shot that gave the keeper no chance.  The Chelsea left back was going mad as he had chosen inappropriate footwear for the conditions, but seemed to be looking to blame anyone but himself for that.

Just eleven minutes gone and 2-0 up, would we be able to manage the rest of the game to see out a win over the Pensioners.  Pressure brought another chance, as Sarr played the ball on the box to son and he pulled it back for Destiny Udogie, who shot across goal from ahead of the near post.  Son had made his run too early and was offside, but Chelsea were finding it difficult to cope.  Their task was made a little easier when Romero had to go off in the 14th minute with Radu Dragusin his replacement because in the visitor’s first attack on the re-organised defence, Sancho ran inside off the left wing to drift past Porro and Dragusin without a challenge and he fired a right foot shot between the diving Fraser Forster’s left hand and the far post as the clock ticked onto 17 minutes. 

Every time that Chelsea got a corner at the South Stand end, some idiots threw the material that they had been provided for the pre-match tifo display at the Chelsea players.  Sancho did react by throwing some back into the crowd, but mostly it just held up the game and then in the second half, wasted time when we were set to take corners or free-kicks, while it all had to be cleared off the pitch.  Sancho was not as accurate when he was freed in left side of the Spurs area and he skewed his cross over the bar.  When Tottenham cleared the ball, the ref failed to spot that Badiashile had both of his arms around Solanke and turned him round.   From that Neto got in space, taking the ball into the left side of the box before pulling it back for Palmer, who totally missed the ball with his attempted shot.  Porro passed the ball out to Dejan, just outside the D and Lavia put a leg across him to stop him getting upfield.  Amazingly, the ref pulled out a yellow card for a foul that wasn’t as bad as the one Fernandez committed earlier.  Consistency … it doesn’t feature in Taylor’s dictionary.  I think a lot of these “top” referees believe in their own press and think that whatever they do is right and PGMOL aren’t going to censure them in anyway, as it is a bit of a closed shop where no criticism of referees is ever heard.   

When Udogie pinched the ball off Jackson (who went down looking for a free-kick), he broke forward to take a return pass from Johnson, but all he could do was keep it in, although Colwill then played it straight to Brennan, whose cross cleared Sanchez.  Unfortunately, there was no white shirt there to capitalise and Caceido controlled it and cleared.  In the next wave of attack, Son took a pass to him and swept inside away from Caceido, finding Solanke and he returned the ball into Son’s run that saw him come inside to curl a shot towards the top left hand corner of the goal between Colwill and Badiashilde.  With Sanchez helpless, the ball whizzed a couple of feet over the angle. 

Chelsea were going through the Spurs players and twice Badiashilde pushed through Dominic when winning headers, but when Dom took the ball past him on the ground, all the defender could do was pull him back.  He wasn’t alone in playing with his hands, as it was the only way Chelsea could cope with the energy Spurs were playing with, but the ref seemed happy to allow them to do so.  Cucerella was having a nightmare, so he was pulling Johnson when he was in possession tight to the line, but Brennan slipped it to Porro, whose drag-back returned the ball leaving the Chelsea left-back floundering.  The cross came in via a deflection to Dejan who ran onto it and got past a defender before the whistle blew for handball, although it seemed to be above the short-sleeve of the shirt.  Jackson then went down wanting a free-kick, when he was the one holding onto Radu, showing how shameless he was in his cheating.  Cucerella then went down like he had been shot when Pape Matar Sarr got to him late, but the Chelsea man was holding a part of his leg that Pape didn’t touch.  It was a yellow card challenge, but compared to what was to come later, just showed what a disgracefully poor performance the referee had.  The referee allowed Spurs to play on after Colwill took Solanke’s ankles on the halfway line, but there was no real advantage and going by the booking he gave Sarr, it was clear that he should go back and issue a yellow card to Colwill when the ball went dead.  But no, he didn’t and not content with that the thro should have gone to Spurs, as it came off Cucerella’s toe and they took it quickly that led to Palmer having a lot of space 30 yards out so he ran forward and shot from outside the box, with Forster making a good low save to keep the ball out with his left hand as the shot looked to sneak inside his left hand post.  The ball only went as far as Neto who chopped the ball onto his left foot and looked for the same part of the goal with a shot similar to Kulusevski’s goal, but Fraser stuck out a big left boot to prevent it beating him.

Son had been having to play passes up to him very quickly as Caceido was racing in from behind every time, just after the half hour, he touched one inside to Sarr and under pressure from Lavia, laid the ball off and then was hit studs first halfway up his shin by Caceido, who then went down to make it look like he had been fouled.  Dark arts it might have been but the VAR would surely look at it.  That they did, but an equally useless official at the end of a live feed – Australian Jarred Gillett – decided that there was not sufficient force in the challenge to warrant a red card.  The useless official on the pitch decided that there wasn’t sufficient force for even a yellow.  What a joke.  The game had changed form the blood and thunder of derby matches of the past, but in today’s terms that was a foul that endangered the player’s safety and for no action at all to be taken, other than a free-kick, shows the depths to which officiating has fallen.  Previous bookings (and those to come) were nothing compared to this.

Luckily, Sarr was able to carry on and took a pass down the line to win a corner off Badiashile.  When Son bent it into the near post Pape won a header and the ball glanced off the top of the bar and over.  The goal-kick was tried to be played out of defence, but Sanchez received the goal-kick and played the ball straight to Sarr.  He knocked the ball forward, Solanke left it as Son ran beyond him, taking it to the line before pulling it back to Dom inside the six-yard box.  He just wasn’t able to sort out his feet and got a left foot to it, with little power and Sanchez was able to smother it. 

Most bounces of the ball were going Chelsea’s way, but we were guilty of turning possession over cheaply.  When Palmer got space inside the left of the area, his ball across was well cut out by van de Ven and Tottenham were wary of making tackles on the Chelsea midfielder in the box as they were aware of his ability to win decisions from weak referees.  Dragusin twice made great blocks when Jackson shot.  From the second corner, Cucerella was being snide (no surprise there) by backing into one of our outfield players or barging into Forster before the ball arrived.  When he has to kick a football, he’s not so good, curling a shot way over from 18 yards out.  In added time, Dejan challenged Lavia as he received the ball 25 yards from his goal and he went down with an elbow to the head.  There was the VAR wait and they decided that there was no excessive force.  Kulu’s arm was high and although that is sometimes how he runs, he could have seen red, although letting Caceido’s brutal tackle go, it would have caused uproar.

Sandro’s appearance at half-time is always welcome and of course, they showed his goal at Stamford Bridge.  Chelsea brought on Gusto for Lavia, which brought a formation change, with Caceido moving into midfield.  The first incident of the half was Forster clearing the ball and Jackson knocking him over after it had gone, with Fraser making a fine save to his left when Sancho played a one-two with Cucerella havig to push the ball wide, but it was recycled and a dinked ball in for Palmer brought another save by Forster, as he closed him  down quickly.  When Kulusevski shrugged off achallenge inside the Spurs half ran away, Johnson suddenly stopped his run outside him and went infield, but slowed down and Dejan’s cross with the outside of his left foot was seized by Sanchez, moved quickly to the other end and Fernandez shot a foot wide.  Brennan had gone down and left the field with Timo Werner coming on for him.

Sonny was running at the Chelsea defenders and from a throw-in in the South-East corner, he showed great footwork to go past Gusto and Caceido, but the ball was hacked away.  Forster pushed away a Gusto shot diving to his left after a short corner, Solanke then made a block to keep out a shot.  Just before the hour, Bissouma lost the ball on the touchline in front of the East Stand and Neto was away, after the ball was worked over to the other side of the pitch,  Neto played the ball into the box for Caciedo to run onto and Yves made a rash tackle that the Chelsea player went over and won a penalty.   Bissouma was booked for it and that means he will have a one match suspension.  Palmer scored from the spot to make it 2-2.

When Chelsea won a free-kick, they wanted a booking for Udogie as he stepped on Neto’s hand.  However, it was only as a result of Palmer pushing Destiny in the first place.  There was uproar amongst the blue shirts when Solanke turned a ball forward and Udogie was well offside, but left the ball for Son to gather.  He was well onside and his run took him beyond the last Chelsea defender.  He was in on Sanchez from the left wing and shot low but wide of the far post.  The Chelsea players are obviously unaware of the laws of the game, as was the referee who failed to book Fernandez for the second time in the match when he took Sarr down from behind, much like Lavia did when he was booked.   Taylor got suckered into Colwill going down when he went for the ball with Solanke and went to ground holding his head.  It was clear that there was no foul nor did the contact occur on his head, but like Kane’s disallowed goal at Stamford Bridge when Thiago Silva went down like he had been hit by a bus, the decision went against us.

Finally a free-kick was given to Spurs for Badiashile’s aggressive shirt-pulling on Dejan and Porro swung a cross in from just outside the right corner of the box for Micky van de Ven to win the header, but he didn’t meet it full on and it glanced wide for a goal-kick.  From that Chelsea went forward and Palmer’s shot from the right was blocked by van de Ven, once more they enjoyed a favourable bounce as it dropped for Fernandez twelve yards out and he lashed it with his left foot past Forster diving to his right to put them ahead for the first time in the match.  The re-start was delayed even further than their celebrations as Palmer and Sancho had pulled the corner flag out. 

Jackson was again shamefully play-acting when he ran into van de Ven and went down holding his head, so Taylor of course had to stop the game.  He got up and he was fine, so no concussion tests or having to leave the field and of course, no booking for not really being injured.  Porro had to be quick across to Sancho to block a shot as Chelsea had their tails up now.  In a repeat of last season, Micky van de Ven went down and had his hamstrings stretched by the physio before leaving the pitch, but at least he walked off.  With this the last opportunity to make substitutions, Archie Gray replaced Micky and Lucas Bergvall on for Bissouma, with Kulusevski going off and James Maddison coming on.  When Son failed to win the ball after a corner that went too long, Chelsea broke away and when Palmer got the ball in the box, the standing off him went out of the window as Sarr knocked the Chelsea midfielder over and a penalty was given.  Pape was silly to charged into the back of him, but Palmer went down holding his ankle, which wasn’t where he was contacted.  It was a strange contradiction to usual refereeing protocol, Taylor awarded a penalty for a push on Palmer by Sarr when he had been letting the same offence outside the box go unpunished all match.  Anyway, he got up and scored from the spot to make it 4-2. 

Immediately from the restart, Neto flew into a tackle on Udogie that got nowhere hear the ball and he was substituted straight away, having received a yellow card for the foul.   A Colwill slip left the ball for Werner and he fed Solanke ahead of him, but his shot was blocked just inside the area.  When former Spurs youngster Noni Madueke ran at Archie Gray, he stayed with the Chelsea substitute and blocked his shot winning a goal-kick in doing so.  At the other end, Maddison showed quick feet to make a yard to bend a shot with his left foot over the angle of post and bar.  Three minutes into the seven added, Werner played a cute ball into the box for Son, who was blocked by Sanchez at close range, before Caceido ran straight into Porro as he darted between two other blue shirts and won a free-kick just outside the D, but Caceido didn’t receive any further punishment.  The Porro free-kick was blocked and flew into the air, but Pedro was alert to it and struck a bobbling right-foot volley that Sanchez got a touch to to give Spurs a corner.  Madders took it short to Lucas, who returned the ball to our number 10, who shimmied past Felix and pulled the ball back from the dead-ball line in front of Son and his side-footed shot off his right boot went through a group of players and it was checked to make sure it didn’t touch anyone on the way, but a goal was awarded.

4-3 with two minutes of added time left.  Werner played a left footed diagonal ball into the box that went over the defenders and was just too far ahead of Dragusin and Son.  And that was the last thing of note that happened before the match came to a close.

Being architects of our own downfall is something that is becoming commonplace.  Managing the difficult periods in matches is the issue that needs to be addressed.  And these will usually come at some point in a game, because teams will more often than not raise their game and impose themselves.  Much like we have had great success in the post-half-time break period when we often get one goal and another comes shortly after, so we blow teams away and they can’t stem the flow of the game in our favour.  Being able to hold onto the ball and not to give it away frustrates the other side and allows you to run them around.  We have players who are confident on the ball, perhaps more now than ever before, but the nerves seem to get to them and straightforward passes are suddenly over or under hit.  And that was what Ange meant by players being desperate for a win.  There is a time when calm heads are necessary.

Having said that, two penalties conceded with unnecessary challenges when we had been so circumspect when the ball was in our box was particularly disappointing.  We don’t need to be handing opponents gifts like that and even free-kicks all around the pitch, the visiting players were more than happy to go to ground whether injured or not, ably assisted by a weak referee, who was unable to tell which was which. 

To tell the truth, we never got going in the second half until the last five minutes.  Dropping too deep and lacking the intensity of the pressing of the first half, Chelsea’s changes at the interval also made them more solid.  It was asking a lot of Gray and Bergvall when they came on, but they acquitted themselves very well, with some good running and accurate passing.  Dragusin did well when he came on and in all of the games since he replaced Vicario, Fraser Forster kept the score down once more.  Solanke led the line well, but the spurned opportunities our players had cost us again.

Away from the on field incidents, fights broke out in Tottenham sections among people who are old enough to know better and haven’t moved on from the 1980s.  Some of these incidents included away fans in hospitality areas, which the club are not willing to deal with and only push any responsibility onto Spurs fans not to get involved.  This element of the Chelsea support then prevented Spurs fans having access to Northumberland Park station while they marched the away support to the station and gave them priority getting onto the trains.  How many grounds fail to keep troublesome away fans (and even sometimes those who don’t fall into that category) long after the game ?  Not many and in this instance, the Sunday service meant that it took ages for the Chelsea fans to get through the station, all the time winding up Spurs fans in the queue opposite.

So, all round a dreadful day out.  Heavy rain in the lead up to the match, a disappointing outcome and then hanging around when you just want to get home with the only bright spot being that by that time the rain had stopped.

The Polyphant

 

MATCH NOTES
 
  • Dejan Kulusevski’s goal was Tottenham’s 300th against Chelsea in all competitions.

 

OTHER RESULTS
  Everton P Liverpool P
  Aston Villa 1 South Coast Big Club 0
  Brentford 4 Newcash United 2
  Crystal Palace 2 Mancashter City 2
  Mancashter United 2 Nottingham Forest 3
  Ipswich Town 1 AFC Bournemouth
2
  Leicester City 2 Brighton & Hove Albion 2
  Woolwich Wanderers 1 Fulham 1
  West Ham United London 2 Wolverhampton Wanderers 1


Premier League Table 2024-25

Played Won Drawn Lost For Against Points Goal difference
1 Liverpool 14 11 2 1 29 11 35 +18
2 Chelsea 15 9 4 2 35 18 31 +17
3 Woolwich Wanderers 15 8 5 2 29 25 29 +14
4 Mancashter City 15 8 3 4 27 21 27 +6
5 Nottingham Forest 15 7 4 4 19 18 25 +1
6 Aston Villa 15 7 4 4 23 23 25 0
7 Brighton & Hove Albion 15 6 6 3 25 22
24 +3
8 AFC Bournemouth 15 7 3 5 23 20 24 +3
9 Brentford 15 7 2 6 31 28 23 +3
10 Fulham 15 6 5 4 22 20 23 +2
11 Tottenham Hotspur 15 6 2 7 31 19 20 +12
12 Newcash United 15 5 5 5 19 21 20 -2
13 Mancashter United 15 5 4 6 19 18 19 +1
14 West Ham United London 14 5 3 7 20 28 18 -8
15 Everton 14 3 5 6 14 21 14 -7
16 Leicester City 15 3 5 7 21 30 14 -9
17 Crystal Palace 15 2 7 6 14 20 13 -6
18 Ipswich Town 15 1 6
8 14 27 9 -13
19 Wolverhampton Wanderers 14 2 3 10 23 38 9 -15
20 South Coast Big Club 15 1 2 12 11 31 5 -20