Tottenham 3-4 Chelsea: Blues complete sensational comeback
Tottenham 3-4 Chelsea: Blues complete sensational comeback. Once again Tottenham Hotspur found themselves on the wrong end of a seven-goal thriller on Sunday afternoon, after bottling a 2-0 lead to fall to a 4-3 defeat at home to Chelsea.
Spurs went 2-0 up inside the opening 12 minutes after two costly errors from the visitors, but had their stranglehold of the contest wrestled away. A combination of Tottenham’s collective incompetence and Chelsea’s rediscovered composure and firing power saw the visitors rattle in four goals.
Son Heung-min’s late strike wasn’t enough to stage a comeback as it was too little too late for a Spurs side who find themselves in the bottom half of the table. While Chelsea on the other hand, have closed the gap behind Liverpool to just four points.
How the game unfolded:
Right from kick-off, there was a frenzied edge to this London derby. Beyond the utter chaos which unfolded on the pitch, the crowd had a crazed glint, heaving paper missiles from the stands as soon as any blue shirt came within ten yards of the pitch’s perimeter.
Marc Cucurella had an afternoon to remember as he found himself in the wrong end for the buildup to Tottenham’s quick-fire double. Brennan Johnson gobbled up the first loose ball while Chelsea’s left-back was left sniffing the turf, firing a cross into the box for Dominic Solanke to tap in.
Within a matter of minutes, Dejan Kulusevski made it 2-0 from another inadvertent Cucurella slip. The Swede tiptoed along the top of the box, delaying just long enough before reversing his shot beyond Robert Sanchez’s helpless dive.
Jadon Sancho halved the deficit inside the opening 17 minutes with a brilliant and superb strike from the edge of the box, but the drama kept on pouring out of every orifice of this game.
Tottenham had the better of a chaotic opening 45 minutes, but Chelsea roared back after the break. Establishing a stranglehold of possession in the opposition half, Moises Caicedo won a penalty on the hour mark. The energetic midfielder benefitted from Yves Bissouma’s reckless lunge, earning a spot-kick of which Cole Palmer expertly converted.
The reinvigorated Enzo Fernandez fired Chelsea in front for the first time on Sunday, walking onto a deflected Palmer shot which he blasted beyond Fraser Forster.
Spurs kept on surging forward at every given opportunity, desperate to rectify another second-half implosion. However, the hosts only opened themselves up to the counter-attack.
Pape Sarr was caught chasing one such break when he hacked at Palmer in the box for Chelsea’s second penalty of the game. Palmer brushed himself down to dispatch the spot kick with a wonderfully cheeky panenka.
Son however reduced the arrears in the sixth minute of stoppage time, but couldn’t help his side avoid their seventh defeat of the league season already.
