Chelsea FC and Tottenham Hotspur played their part in a wildly entertaining 2-2 draw that saw Leicester City be handed the Premier League title.
A hard fought match saw a lot of the old that Chelsea FC fans love and a lot of this year’s common mistakes they hate as well.
First things first, congratulations Leicester City for winning the most romantic Premier League title since the league’s inception, this campaign will certainly be talked about for generations to come. Now to the business…
Chelsea-Tottenham is a derby of the first order. Derby’s are always important matches because they are given weight and validity by their history. Chelsea have always hated their neighbours and the feeling has always been mutual.
In recent history the range of reasons for these sentiments have stretched from the fact that both are major London clubs to the fact that Chelsea’s Champions League winning campaign in 2012 put the North Londoners out of the competition even though they had reached fourth place that year.
Guus Hiddink, knowing the importance of these matches, took a rather conservative approach in his starting lineup. Chelsea saw the returns of both John Terry and Gary Cahill to the center of their defence supplemented by Cesar Azpilicueta and Branislav Ivanovic on the left and right respectively.
The conservatism remained moving further up the pitch with both Nemanja Matic and John Obi Mikel making starts in the pivot of Chelsea’s starting formation with the experienced trio of Cesc Fabregas, Pedro and Willian in the attacking trident behind Diego Costa.
The match had many of the makings of a classic bore draw with the atmosphere lending something to the unsteady opening until Harry Kane broke the deadlock with a chip in the 35th minute. That goal was his 25th so far this season.
After that Tottenham only grew in confidence. They moved the ball around with pace and precision with Christian Eriksen doing his best imitation of his often compared compatriot Dennis Bergkamp. Then in the 44th minute he laid a perfectly-placed pass for Son Heung-Min who, in turn, placed it with perfect weight beneath the outstretched Asmir Begovic.
Maybe there was something in the water during half-time but when the teams took the field for the second period it appeared that Chelsea were doing their best imitation of their 2014/2015 version. They played with muscle, precision and most importantly some will to win.
Eventually the chaos erupted in a goal during a melee in box where Gary Cahill lost Jan Vertonghen who appeared to be asleep for Chelsea’s first goal. It wasn’t long after this we saw the emergence of the Artist-Formerly-Known-as-Eden-Hazard from the bench. He tore the left side of Tottenham’s defense to shreds and they were never really able to handle him. Kyle Walker, one of nine Spurs players to receive a booking during the match, was lucky not to be sent off for a number of tackles on Hazard before his substitution.
Apt enough, Hazard added some weight to his words from this week that Chelsea didn’t want Tottenham to win the title when he scored in the 83rd minute. The build up was sublime, the finish even better and the look on Hazard’s face was one of pure joy. At this point the frustration in the match appeared to boil over as Tottenham sensed their chances of winning their first title since 1961 slip away.
Eventually, when the gargantuan six minutes of injury time ended, the game shamefully descended into a fracas in front of the tunnel. Mauricio Pochettino tried his best to keep his young Spurs players from earning any bans but that seems unlikely judging by the images on the pitch.
A 2-2 tie may have been the most fair result to come out of this result as neither team really deserved to win it. Tottenham jumped out to an early lead but perhaps because of their lack of experience were unable to hold the lead.
Chelsea as they have countless times this season played an incredibly poor first half and gave themselves a mountain to climb in the second. The most important thing about this game is perhaps that it was the pumpkin carriage that carried Leicester’s Cinderella to the title this year.
Next: John Terry still holding out hope for Chelsea FC extension
Thus there is only one thing left to say: congratulations Leicester City.