However as we all know it is a game of two halves.
It was not long before Sigurdsson reminded us again that he is a goalscoring midfielder. Fantastic play by the young Eriksen to confuse the Chelsea defence, he pulled two defenders across to the left of the box and Soldado was left loosely marked who in turn laid the ball into Sigurdsson who ghosted into the box and skipped past Terry and cooly slotted the ball past Cech.
We then saw some build up play starting again on the left hand side of Chelsea's half. The ball finds its way across to the right and Townsend plays a one two and bursts into the box, releasing Soldado who plays the ball across the goal beating Cech, but Paulinho was pulled back by Ivanovic who then manages to slide in ahead of Paulinho. If anyone can moan about players being on the pitch it is certainly us as Ivanovic illegally prevented a goal and should have walked (it may have been a small thing, but it was decisive in the overall out come).
At this point I think it is best to say that anyone that queries our build up play and not having the right man to create the chances has now officially been proved wrong! Not only is Eriksen the player that we have always needed, Townsend has proved that he can also install fear into any defense with his intelligent and rapid runs.
It was in the final part of the first half that Chelsea finally had a shot on goal, a long ball forward that Dawson heads up and to the edge of the box, Oscar unmarked unleashes a tame shot directly into Lloris's arms. This was certainly the one time in the first half that Chelsea were given any time to create anything for themselves (so full credit to the lads).
A great end to the half then saw Walker with a sublime back heel to release Townsend down the right, he draws two defenders toward him on the right of the box and allows Paulinho to ghost into the box completely unmarked and able to shoot, but he hits the outside of Cech's left hand post.
All in all a super first half. Chelsea looked unprepared if anything and their defense was pulled wide open by the intelligent runs and play of mainly Eriksen and Townsend. In my opinion we deserved to be 2-0 up and Chelsea deserved to be a man down. However it was not the case and at 1-0 we looked good.
Early into the second half and Chelsea came bursting out of the block. Torres was released on the right hand side and was allowed far too easily to skip past Naughton (who has not been a suitable replacement for the injured Rose), in space in the box Torres crossed, but Oscar was unable to direct the ball at goal.
It is a suitable time to mention that Mata had been brought on at half time and this completely changed Chelsea's dynamics (so not such a "special" idea to leave him on the bench for the first half)!
Another talking point just after the 50th minute as Torres attempts to get past Vertonghen and after failing trips the defender clearly. Vertonghen does approach Torres after coming to his feet, however Torres then raises his hand to Vertonghen and clearly scratches Vertonghen around the face. This unfairly resulted in just a yellow card for Torres. According to the letter of the law for raising his hands alone Torres should have walked, but for the deliberate trip (completely unnecessary) and raising his hands the player gets a ridiculous yellow? Again if anyone can complain it is not that Jan was playing it is that Torres feels it is acceptable to trip a player than scratch him around the face when confronted by the victim of his childish actions. For me 1-0 and Chelsea 2 men down is how this should have been at this point, but obviously it shows that JM can even have a referee paid for in the game today (there are question marks over whether Torres will get further action on his behaviour so this highlights that he should have walked at this point in the game). Chelsea moaned about Suarez biting Ivanovic, but this behaviour is just as unacceptable and still I do not hear JM apologise for his players behavior. In all honesty JM and Torres should feel lucky that Vertonghen did not retaliate and strike the player (at least it shows the mentality of our team compared to theirs).
It then became Torres that was fueled on by this incident and outwitted Dawson to run the ball into the box, but was closed quickly by our sweeper keeper, who came out quick and diverted a shot out for a corner.
There was a further incident involving Torres and Vertonghen. This time Torres was pulled up for a foul and stupidly argued with the ref, but still no punishment. You could see that Torres’s mind games were taking toll on the usually calm player.
Shortly after Vertonghen then blazed into the path of Ramires and made a blatant and unnecessarily harsh challenge on the midfielder and was rightly booked. It seems that Torres had been ordered to single out Jan and wind him up to the point where he makes a stupid mistake. A yellow card was rightly issued, however in typical Chelsea style they argued that Vertonghen was the last man, even though there were several players level at the time of the tackle and clearly tracking back.
It was from the resulting free kick that Mata took and passed deep and high into the box (which seemed to catch the defence out compeltely) and Terry rose unchallenged to head down to Lloris's bottom right corner. There was nothing that the keeper could have done to save this, Vertonghen and Dawson both allowed the defender to slip past them. For me this is poor concentration and the defenders should have remained focused throughout (especially against Terry, who is difficult to mark in the box). Its a show of habits there (I thought we were past this?).
As the game began to draw toward the final 10 Torres broke from his marker on the left and put a through ball for Schurrle to run onto (he looked offside at the time, but it could have gone either way), but again Lloris was very quick to the player and blocked the shot with the resulting the ricochet falling to Walker to clear.
What then followed was insanity. A ball looped forward and allowed to bounce as Torres chased and then jumped arm first at Vertonghen. Again from the replays on MOTD my thoughts were confirmed and Torres launched himself at the Vertonghen and did not look at the ball at all! Another disgraceful display from the once great forward. Interestingly upon his walk off of the pitch JM did not seem angry with the player at all, so you have to ask whether these are the tactics that were employed by the manager?
With a few minutes left and Chelsea finally 1 man down we pushed on for the winning goal. Again Sigurdsson was the outlet playing a one two with Dawson, he turned and hit a fearsome shot from the edge of the box, only to narrowly miss the top right corner.
Although Chelsea had improved dramatically in the second half it was at the cost of Sportsmanship and Professionalism. Ivanovic was lucky to be on the pitch for the second half as was Torres who was itching to cause injury to Vertonghen for the whole of the second half. For these reasons JM should feel lucky that he got anything from the game with Tottenham doing exceptionally well throughout and should have walked away with all three points.
There is one thing that truly disgusted me and it was JM's support of Torres and simply directs all blame onto Vertonghen. He is blinded by his own arrogance and fails to see that Torres tripped Vertonghen unnecessarily and then does not comment that Torres raised his hand to Vertonghen and worse makes contact!
I was excited to have JM back in the Premier League, but his reactions from today shows why we were actually better off with him out of the league (he also demonstrated again why he was not regarded highly in Italy or Spain). Again though it demonstrates our managers professionalism and he chose not to concentrate on the truly poor behavior of Chelsea, which saw them essentially steal two points from us.
Looking at the game before the start a 1-1 is good result, however Chelsea did not deserve their point, but again it's the game, it's over we must move on.
COYS!!!!!
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