Tottenham vs Chelsea
Fresh from matching Arsenal's 13 game winning streak, a record that has existed for 14 years now, Antonio Conte's men could not dig deep enough to match the outright record for consecutive wins in the Premier league, a record also held by Arsenal for wins stretching from February to August, 2002. During Chelsea's 13 game winning streak, only one team realistically looked liked beating Chelsea and it was fitting they got to did it now.
Tottenham matched Chelsea's formation from defense till midfield, varying in attack with a 2-man attack instead of Chelsea's 3. This was probably the winning hand from Pochettino, why match 3 attackers with 3 central defenders when you could play with a 5-man midfield with he advantage of a number 10. Chelsea's 3-4-3 has always given them well spread coverage of the entire pitch when facing other formations, evident when Chelsea counter by switching play far into another flank to an unmarked free man, usually Marcos Alonso or Victor Moses. Tottenham's 3-5-2 effectively killed that edge and playing Wanyama, Dembele and Eriksen is a formulae for a midfield of steel, guile and creativity.
Pochettino might have gotten the formation right and with able personnel to boot, but one thing gave him the edge. Poch has instilled into Tottenham a high energy, high pressure style with a knack for punishing opponent's mistakes and early fouls on budding breakaways. This normally comes to play when he plays a high profile team as the creative onus is on Tottenham when they play lesser teams. Tottenham's 'high octane's style gave them possession and verve in the game but there was an obvious glut of clear cut chances, testament to Antonio Conte's impressive drilling of the Chelsea defense. Apropos to that, Harry Kane had a thoroughly rotten game, outrun, outscored and outplayed by his striking partner (for the game) Dele Alli, Harry Kane wasn't doing enough for Tottenham to elicit a breakthrough.
Tottenham for large seats of the first half totally skipped the midfield, playing a bit of traditional English football, punting the ball forward from a center back to attacking players majorly Kyle Walker. Poch probably did this as that sort of football, most other than not, gets the team to lose the ball only in attacking regions. This played to Tottenham's strength giving them the propensity to Harry and hassle Chelsea for the ball high up the pitch. This is the main reason why many of Chelsea's attacks started very deep and didn't get very far as winning the ball high up is Tottenham's forte.
The 2 goals had to have some spectators with a jinxed feeling, the same passing combinations, the same side of the pitch, the same defending players involved, the same scorer and the same assister. For the first goal, two Chelsea defenders could have done better, right before Eriksen crossed the ball on receiving it from Walker, David Luis stepped away from Harry Kane to mark no one in particular. This doesn't directly affect the goal but on viewing the goal again, Eriksen could have picked up Kane far more easily than Dele Alli with his cross. That was careless defending. Victor Moses was the main culprit for the goal anyways, his inability to move in tandem with Azpilicueta and Luiz to keep an otherwise correct offside trap had him playing Harry Kane, Danny Rose and Dele Alli onside without the chance of his marking anyone of them.
The second goal was more of the same, Walker to Eriksen, Eriksen to Alli but this time Azpilicueta keeping both Alli and Rose inside without any odds of proper marking. Matic also lazied around this time, glaringly failing to pick up or close down Eriksen.
Chelsea took charge after the second goal but Tottenham looked solid throughout. This was a tactical masterpiece by Mauricio Pochettino, taking advantage of Chelsea's light midfield and lack of planning as to who marks the number 10 of the opposing team.
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