Chelsea (Away) 19.05.2026

It was a horrible experience being there with our current predicament being rammed down our throat by the glory hunters at Chelsea, although, frankly, they haven’t had a glorious season and the other aspect of our defeat was it meant they got closer to European football next season, albeit not the Champions League where they exorbitant spending is intended to take them.

Spurs took to the field with De Zerbi’s most popular selection although the appearance of Randal Kolo Muani brought groans, but generally our support was fantastic, as opposed to the home sections, which were silent for long periods except for when they were moaning about their team’s slow play.

Tottenham kicked off and almost took an early lead.  Four minutes had gone when Pedro Porro looked to sweep the ball across from the right to meet Richarlison’s run into the box, but Hato cut it out, diverting off for a corner, when Sanchez had come out to intercept, but would have been left stranded it the ball hadn’t gone a couple of yards wide.  The match didn’t truly resemble a London derby, with some of the first ten minutes being played at walking pace.  Maybe the nerves on our part had an effect, but Chelsea had nothing to lose after their recent bad run, other than another game and the criticism from their own fans.

With 11 minutes on the clock, Spurs moved the ball from left to right and Porro’s cross was dived at by Tel at the far post, his header hitting the post before Sanchez got something on it to knock it out.  The corner went into the heart of the penalty box and hit Danso, but there was no Spurs player in the vicinity to latch onto it as it ran through to the keeper.  Unsurprisingly, Conor Gallagher was being booed with every touch, although the decision for him to move on came more from the club than him.

Just before the quarter hour, Porro’s pass in towards Richarlison was picked off and Chelsea moved up the pitch ending in Palmer having a 20 yard shot that Kinsky dived to his right to push away.  While the corner was defended well by Spurs, four minutes later they found themselves behind.  Fernandez was in space 25 yards out when Neto passed to him and he fired past Kinsky to the keeper’s right.  There was no closing down and the shot bent away from Kinsky into bottom right corner, but it is the repetitive failure of conceding of goals with no closing down that have led to too many goals coming from this sort of situation this season that has been so disappointing.  Kinsky had been slightly unsighted as Bentancur ran across the line of the shot and going a goal behind was a blow, but there was still time to get back to achieve the point we needed.

In the 28th minute Porro fouled Cucurella to pick up a yellow card.  The Chelsea left back was playing high up the wing and looking to exploit the space behind Porro, but the Blues defender played for the foul with the associated histrionics he performs.  From the resulting free-kick Fernandez hit the top of the bar at the near post and at this point things looked ominous.

The decisions kept going against Spurs, with Udogie adjudged to have fouled Acheampong when the Pensioners defender went to ground and laid on the ball before Destiny took possession of the ball as it came loose, with the prone defender holding his head, when there was no direct contact with that part of his body.  Palhinha was punished for a weak push on Acheampong, which was less of a foul than some of the pushes that were to come on Spurs players.  Delap was going around barging into yellow shirts like a Sunday league forward after a night on the town and even though he had a few fouls given against him, he wanted a free-kick every time the ball was taken off him.

Tottenham were winning the ball back well, but lacked the quality of final pass or the options to make more of the possession.  Santos put in a high tackle on Gallagher, but it was no use expecting Attwell to have noticed it.   Cucurella then started play acting, putting his hand over his mouth while exchanging words with Conor and getting a free-kick for it.  Weak refereeing is now becoming the standard PGMOL stance.  Just before half-time, van de Ven was shown yellow for taking down Delap as he went past him, but compared to some of the “challenges” let go, it was harsh.  The free-kick was played in under the bar from wide on the right, but Kinsky held it well and despite pressure from Santos, he kept it the right side of the goal-line.

Before the half-time whistle, Fofana asked for a booking and the only action the ref took was to push him away, although Gallagher needed to be careful for going in a little late, although he wasn’t doing it with force.  There was also time for Tottenham to lose the ball 20 yards out and it was worked to Palmer, but he dragged the ball wide of Kinsky’s right hand post.

When the match restarted, three minutes into the second half Fofana bundles Udogie over – no foul, even though it was worse than Palhinha’s in the first half that Chelsea got a free-kick for.  Then Palmer ties up his bootlaces and ref stops game, whereas when Djed did the same earlier in the season at Newcastle, the ref played on and we conceded.  Once more inconsistency reigns.

Spurs created a good chance to score when a great cross came in from the right wing and Richarlison was unmarked, but he got his 10 yard header all wrong, putting it yards wide, although the linesman’s flag went up for offside anyway.  After the 60 minute mark, Udogie was booked for sliding in on Santos without there appearing to be too much contact.  As Spurs went hunting the equaliser, they worked hard to win ball high up, played in to Richarlison, but a loose pass hands the ball back to Chelsea and although Tottenham regain possession, Delap drags Danso down round the neck.  Continual fouling ?  Foul conduct ?  Not according to Attwell who can’t be bothered to give a decision.

A loose pass from Kolo Muani set Chelsea off going forward, Neto’s cross from the right is squared back along the six yard line by Fernandez beyond the far post with a cushioned volley and Santos was free to side-foot home with 67 minutes gone.  It looked like there was no coming back from this.  Two goals down and not looking too threatening going forward it all looked like it would be down to the Everton match to try to survive.

De Zerbi had been planning a triple substitution when the goal was scored and before kick off, so Spence, Maddison and Sarr for Kolo Muani, Udogie and Palhinha at the restart.  Chelsea were looking to add to their score and Neto had space to run forward and got through Spence’s challenge to fire shot in to near post from a narrow angle, but Kinsky got down to it to beat it out.  Spurs were doing their best to try and get back into the game and Pape played a ball in to the near post and Gallagher got there to turn it on target but Sanchez was right behind it.  However, with 16 minutes left, the ball was moved out to the right and Tel played it on to Porro in the box.  Pedro made a reverse pass to Sarr, whose backheel finds Richarlison in loads of space at the back post to side-foot into an empty net.  Game on !

What we got now was a lesson in the dark arts and another we knew about lax refereeing.  Chelsea made a substitution at the kick off, but then Palmer faffed around with the ball without Attwell making him get on with it, wasting more time.  Why are referees unable to allow the substitution to be managed by the fourth official (goodness knows they don’t have much to do), while he ensures that the game is ready to start quickly when the change has been made ?  They talk about wanting to speed the game up, but more often than not they are the ones who eat up time talking to people at corners and free-kicks, waiting for VAR decisions and being unable to communicate with their colleagues.  And they always wait until late in the game to book players for time-wasting, with Hato’s name getting put into the book with ten minutes of the 90 left for just that. 

With six minutes of normal time left, Maddison swapped passes with Richi and as the midfielder was about to shoot from left of the six yard box, Hato slid in to block his shot.  As the corner was waiting to be taken it looked like there was a yellow card for Richi, for what nobody but Attwell knew, but it actually turned out that it was for Cucurella, because Micky had been thrown to the floor by the despicable 3 and then VAR said it wasn’t a penalty because the ball wasn’t in play.  Violent conduct doesn’t require the ball to be in play and without the ball being able to be contested, this sort of mauling needs to be punished more harshly.  When it was taken, the keeper dropped the ball onto Richi’s head but got the chance to grab the ball as it bounced off the Spurs striker.

The controversy kept coming with a long ball played forward by Chelsea and Delap takes a good look at Djed before smashing him across the face with his forearm.  Yellow card.  If it had been Romero, you know what colour it would have been.  If VAR looked at it as closely as Delap looked at Spence, then it would have been clear that it was intentional and worthy of more severe action.  As for the referee, he was very good at making sure throw-ins were taken at the right place.  Oh, and the linesman probably didn’t have an opinion to offer.

For all Chelsea’s gamesmanship only seven minutes were to be added, with the home side tiring after their FA Cup final defeat four days before.  Substitute Essugio made no effort to get the ball as he pushed Micky over as he ran away from him.  Halfway through added time Madison lined up a free-kick five yards outside the box, but put it over the bar and it looked as though our last chance had gone.

A deep Bentancur cross picked out Tel inside the penalty area on the right, but he headed it straight off rather than putting it back across goal.  then, in the last minute, Spurs ran ball out through Micky, it goes through Maddison and Porro to Tel and with players in the box, his cross is straight to the keeper.  Another loss in a season of too many defeats and this one puts the pressure on the final day of the season.  This was a match that perhaps we could have got something out of with a bit more quality, as Chelsea flagged towards the end of the match but coming back from 0-2 was too much to cope with.

It was obvious Chelsea couldn’t last as they were time-wasting even before we scored.  However, the movement off the ball was missing once more and that prevented any sort of sustained pressure on the Chelsea defence.  Richarlison wasn’t holding the ball when we tried to play out and that allowed Chelsea to have the ball too easily.  And as usual, we allow a goal from outside the box, which has become a less than endearing trait we have developed this season.

With only a point needed against Everton, I sincerely hope that we don’t play for the draw.  Tottenham need to be about 3-0 ahead before we go into the final minute of added time for any sort of security of the desired result can enter our minds.  Relegation would be an unthinkable reality, but if that is what happens, it is our own fault for putting the club in this position and our own fault from not taking the opportunity that is in our own hands to save ourselves.  Let’s hope that we can do one thing right this season.

• Richarlison’s goal was Tottenham’s 2,000th in the Premier League.