Tottenham deserved so much more on Sunday
By Ryan Wrenn
What actually went wrong?
Many were thrown off right from the start due to surprisingly amorphous shape of his team. On paper it seemed like a by-now-conventional 3-4-2-1, with Eric Dier occupying a centre-back role alongside Toby Alderweireld and Jan Vertonghen.
Perhaps in response to Antonio Conte’s own switches in his Chelsea side — specifically moving David Luiz into midfield — Pochettino clearly felt he needed more muscle elsewhere. To that end, Dier pushed up into midfield, dropping wide and deep frequently cover the runs of a newly healthy Kieran Trippier at right-back.
Though it looked strange — Spurs shifts depending on the phase of play might appear to be disorganization to some — there was nothing new in this strategy. Late last season and over the summer pre-season matches, Dier and Trippier performed a king of tag team act on the right defensive flank.
In several important ways, this played to both players’ strengths and weaknesses. Dier, of course, is a physical complement to Victor Wanyama in midfield, and possesses both the tactical knowledge and practical experience to find the common thread between midfielder, centre-back and full-back.
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Trippier, meanwhile, is more an asset in attack than in defense, so any excuse to keep him up field only made sense. He was to be an outlet option for Spurs long balls in transition, after which his superior crossing skills could prove to be one avenue to the back of Chelsea’s net. Unfortunately for him and Spurs as a whole, he didn’t have the best day at the office and consequently threw Pochettino’s whole plan in a bad light.
Luiz’s presence in midfield inspired another criticism of Tottenham’s gameplan on the day. The Brazilian’s sole purpose was to keep Christian Eriksen occupied and out of the game, at least when the ball approached Chelsea’s third.
To a large extent this tactic worked. Eriksen’s shot count and shot assist count were far below average, even if he did still create some of the best chances of the game.
What Chelsea’s act of nullification exposed, according to the critique, was that Spurs lacked creativity without Eriksen. Which is true — many Spurs chances simply didn’t materialize as they normally would with Eriksen free to influence proceedings.
That criticism ignores the fact that Tottenham often create chances without Eriksen’s direct intervention. Kane and Dele often pepper the goal often enough to make something happen on their own — as does Heung-min Son.
The absence of the South Korean’s flair was palpable. In those prior matches where Dier rotated around midfield and defense, his presence freed up a midfield spot for another attacker in the form of Son.
With Son still recovering from injury and Spurs in desperate need of ball retention in the middle of Chelsea’s densely packed midfield, that extra spot fell to Mousa Dembélé. The Belgian performed exceptionally well, though he does not present the same goalscoring threat as Son.
Finally, some more sober critiques surrounded Pochettino’s response to the equalizing own-goal in the 82nd minute. Seeing as how Spurs were crashing against Chelsea’s defense time and time again, it might have made sense for Pochettino to use his last substitution to bring on a more defensive player, likely Harry Winks.
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By that point a draw would have been a fine result, but historically Pochettino rarely makes such concessions. The match was never going to unfold like that.
The final, most salient point here is simple: if Spurs play as well as they played here for every subsequent match at Wembley, they can expect far more wins than draws or losses. They played well against a team committed to nullifying them, and deserved at least a point for their efforts.