Tottenham 3-4 Chelsea: Superb Cole Palmer scores twice from the penalty spot as Blues move within four points of Liverpool… with pressure mounting on Ange Postecoglou after Spurs throw away a two-goal lead in thrilling London derby

Even when Chelsea lost, it felt like they were going to win. Even when Tottenham won, it felt as if they would ultimately be overwhelmed, both by the growing power of their opponents and by their own creeping and almost unavoidable shortcomings. In the end, it all happened before we even got to the final fifteen minutes of the game.

And that tells us everything you need to know about these two teams. Chelsea can win the Premier League title. Not next season or the season after, as their own manager Enzo Maresca has suggested. No, they can do it this season. They’re good enough. The team is deep enough. Since the opening day of the season, they have only lost once, at Liverpool. They’re ready.

Chelsea gave Spurs a two-goal lead here and still overshot them. Had Chelsea defender Marc Cucurella not turned up in his slippers and given Tottenham their advantage, Maresca’s team could have seriously embarrassed their rivals. In some ways, they did.

As for the Spurs, it appears they are on the verge of drowning because they have failed to correct fundamental flaws. Ange Postecoglou’s team are thrillers, but also as soft as snow. They have no structure or strength in midfield and they lose too many games thanks to the football, leaving them wide open as soon as they lose possession.

They sit in the bottom half of a very open Premier League this morning and that can no longer be considered a bad position. Tottenham are there because they deserve it and when the TV cameras focused on chairman Daniel Levy in the second half, he seemed deep in the kind of thought that often acts as a precursor to a curled finger in his manager’s direction.

Last year’s match between these two teams was unforgettable. Chelsea won 4-1 against Tottenham’s nine-man line-up. This one achieved that within 20 minutes and only became more fascinating from then on.

By then, Spurs were 2-1 up and had lost their best defender – Cristian Romero – to injury again. This was his first game back after a month on the sidelines. For Chelsea, their full-back Cucurella had twice lost his footing in handing goals to Tottenham and looked almost out of his mind before changing his boots.

At times it felt like a basketball game. Up and down, up and down. Strangely, Chelsea looked the better side for much of the first half and that proved ominous. Trailing by two goals inside eleven minutes, they ended the half on the front foot.

Cole Palmer had missed a sitter to make it 2-2 – yes, really – while Moises Caicedo should have been sent off for a high challenge on Pape Sarr. Strangely enough, he didn’t even get a yellow card and the VAR approved it.

Add to that the flood of paper cups and the rest that ended up at the feet of Chelsea players every time the Chelsea players went to take a corner, and you get the picture of a hectic and sometimes rather incomprehensible first half that was all the better for it. viewing was. before it.

Spurs had started the day with a smile as Romero and Micky van de Ven returned from injury to reform as Postecoglou’s first central defensive partnership. It wouldn’t last long. Romero was struck by a thigh injury after turning a little too quickly in his own penalty area early on and Van de Ven also had to leave before time.

Chelsea, meanwhile, had done what Chelsea does today. Seven changes from the midweek battering of Southampton. What they didn’t expect – having lost just once in the league since the opening day – was to be down by two in eleven minutes.

Perhaps they had spent too long in Southampton during the week. Russell Martin’s team are constantly giving away goals and perhaps Maresca’s players had picked up the virus.

Cucurella’s first slip came in the fifth minute at the other end. Brennan Johnson took possession and sent a low cross for Dominic Solanke to finish well after cleverly putting a late dart over and in front of his marker Levi Colwill. It was beautiful center play.

It was a shock for Chelsea and worse was to follow. Cucurella was down again six minutes later in an almost identical position. This time Johnson fed Dejan Kulusevski and he cut inside across the top of the box and beat Robert Sanchez with a low left-foot shot into the goalkeeper’s left corner.

Spurs got off to a rollicking start, with Chelsea’s left back shivering on his back near the touchline as he put on his new boots. How does a modern football player enter the field with the wrong shoes? Heaven knows, but his miscalculation cost Chelsea dearly.

Romero’s injury has certainly set Spurs back a bit. His partnership with the fast, ball-playing Van de Ven is crucial for Tottenham. Radu Dragusin, the Romanian, was his replacement. He would be busy because Chelsea’s response was impressive and real.

Jadon Sancho’s goal was crucial for the recovery. The ball was decisively struck from twenty yards via the far post and came quickly, in the 18th minute. Three minutes later, Enzo Fernandez crossed low from the left and Palmer only had to cross the ball in from eight yards. Somehow the English player didn’t make contact and the ball hit his standing foot.

There was a complete lack of structure to the game and a pace that was quite hypnotic. The midfield was like a wasteland, just a space for attacking players to run into. Tottenham carried a threat – helped by Sánchez’s continued willingness to pass the ball to them from his own play – and Heung Min Son turned one shot over on half-time before setting up Solanke from the byline. This time he couldn’t find any strength. Sarr headed onto the crossbar from a corner kick.

On the other hand, Chelsea was just as hungry and creative. Spurs keeper Fraser Forster saved low with his left hand from Palmer and then fended off a follow-up from Fernandez. Early in the second half, a clever move from Cucurella brought Sancho close to goal and Forster made another brilliant save.

Another Spurs injury didn’t help them. Johnson went off in the 50th minute with what appeared to be a muscle injury and was replaced by Timo Werner, once of Chelsea. It didn’t take long before Werner’s old club were on level terms. Such was Chelsea’s territorial dominance at this stage of the match that Cucurella was able to spend much of his time as an overload on the left. Spurs struggled numerically to cope and it was on this side that Chelsea equalized.

It was Sancho who cleverly drew Tottenham’s defenders into the left corner of the penalty area and when he slipped into Caicedo, Yves Bissouma’s challenge would have felled a plane tree. Palmer grabbed the penalty and smashed it to Forster’s right. They now had half an hour to find a winner.

As it turned out, they had to wrap it all up by the time we reached the 82nd minute. Son squandered one Tottenham chance – running left to miss across goal – but that was their only real chance in the second half until a late, futile rally.

Fernandes scored goal number three in the 74th minute. Palmer’s running, dizzying run from right to left across the pitch proved too much for the Spurs defense and when his shot spun in the air off a defender, Fernandes collected the falling ball and smashed it into the corner from 14 yards. It was a thrilling finish that sealed the match.

The direction had long disappeared from the home team’s football and now the hope disappeared too. Sarr’s barge into the back of Palmer at the other end was as callous as Bissouma’s earlier clatter of Caicedo. But by now Tottenham’s thoughts were in disarray, and when Palmer beat Forster with a glorious Panenka penalty, the boos began to rain from the home sections of this beautiful stadium.

This was a match that had started twice with Cucurella on his back. It ended with Tottenham on their knees. Son scored at the death – the side came in from eight yards in the 97th minute – but all that did was make it look close. It wasn’t. Not really.