Chelsea drew 0-0 with Tottenham Hotspur at White Hart Lane on Sunday afternoon, with chances for either side few and far between.
There was a lot on this game, seeing as the hosts are in fine form, the Blues are steadily finding their feet and the fact that it was a London derby. However, the game never really lived up to expectation and subsequently, the 0-0 draw was probably the right result.
Here’s the Four Findings from the game:
Chelsea looked bare without Diego Costa.
Before the ‘Costa deserved to be dropped’ comments start to flood in, let me explain. Yes, I also agree that Costa needs some time on the bench to re-evaluate, but was today the right time to do it? Remy and Falcao were both out, so we stick Hazard up top. Given, Hazard didn’t have the worst of games but Diego offers something different. Costa is there to be physical and brings other team-mates into play, and that’s what we needed today but it didn’t happen because we had someone smaller up top.
Chances need to be created.
Again, we really need to start making chances. It’s easy to say, but I just want to see it done. It’s all good and well having all these creative players, but if they don’t…create…what’s the point in having them? Willian, Pedro and Oscar did play well, but the former Barcelona man in particular needs to learn to take his chances, whilst Oscar needs to realise a few seconds quicker when to release the ball.
Spurs had it easy.
We played into Spurs’ hands today, and there’s no other way of saying it. We didn’t make life difficult for the hosts and never made them re-think their strategy. They saw a lot of the ball, and maybe we were fortunate they didn’t take the couple of chances they had.
On to the next!
There’s no point dwelling on the result of this game and should just start to focus on the next game now. Let’s not use Hazard upfront, it doesn’t suit our system and never has. Instead, we use the physicality in the squad we have, and let our creative players shine.
