Chelsea legend finds it difficult to root out reason for ‘tension in the air’ at Stamford Bridge

Chelsea beat West Ham on Sunday but needed a very late winner from Christian Pulisic to seal all three points.

It was a tough match and one that Chelsea had full control over, yet didn’t really look like penetrating the West Ham defence.

Callum Hudson-Odoi is struggling with a latest injury setback.

The late subs helped that as well as Romelu Lukaku winning a penalty and reducing our opponents to ten men. But before that it was all looking rather gloomy at Stamford Bridge once again.

And there was a bit of a gloomy and odd atmosphere around the whole game to be honest, and not just in the stands. Thomas Tuchel stayed rooted to his bench for most of the game, which is basically unheard of. It was all a bit eerie and as Chelsea legend Pat Nevin describes it, there seems to be a ‘tension in the air’.

I’m glad he wasn’t the only one who noticed this.

“There was an odd atmosphere at the Bridge at the weekend and it was difficult to get to the root cause of why this was the case,” Nevin wrote in his latest column on the Chelsea website. “Certainly the limitation on fan numbers could have had an effect and maybe even the warm end-of-season weather could have had some bearing, but that didn’t fully explain the tension in the air.

“At the end of a long, hard season there are some games that just fail to sparkle. This isn’t a new phenomenon for any side, but fortunately there was just enough magic dust to get us over the line in the dying embers of the game. Those three points could be huge as we close in on the coveted top-four position. The quicker we get there the quicker Thomas Tuchel can concentrate on the one piece of silverware still open to us, the FA Cup.”

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