A Super Sunday thriller saw Chelsea close the gap on Liverpool with a 4-3 win over Spurs. Despite taking a quick 2-0 lead though, Tottenham looked second best throughout the contest, and leave manager Ange Postecoglu facing a difficult festive period.
For Chelsea though, Enzo Maresca looks to have finally unlocked the enormous talent in a previously underperforming squad. Adam Clery looks at how they turned the tide and why their best player barely even had to touch the ball.
For Chelsea though, Enzo Maresca looks to have finally unlocked the enormous talent in a previously underperforming squad. Adam Clery looks at how they turned the tide and why their best player barely even had to touch the ball.
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00:00Right then, hello there my dear friends, my name is Adam Cleary, it always is, I have
00:08already finished this coffee and welcome to another very exciting episode of Tottenham
00:14Doing Tottenham Things.
00:16This time featuring a special guest performance from Enzo Maresca's Gaslighting Title Challenges.
00:22And you're right, yes, I have done better intros.
00:27Alright so forget the steam engine, the internet, the telephone, penicillin, anything like that.
00:32Britain's only good export around the world is clearly Sky Sports Super Sunday and this
00:36was another great example of why that is.
00:40Tottenham set up in their 4-3-3 that they'd never ever change from, we'll get to that
00:43in a bit.
00:44And Chelsea, this is nice, they've found a way to make Enzo Fernandes work in this team.
00:49There's not really too much to bore you with in the starting XI's, like James Madison was
00:53left out, but that's not really a massive surprise if you're going to play Kulishevsky
00:57in the midfield three against quite a good team.
00:59And Moises Caicedo continues at right back in something we will discuss later on.
01:05Now if you did watch the game, or you've so much as looked at your phone since it finished,
01:09you will know the story of the afternoon was that Tottenham take this really good 2-0 lead.
01:14Everybody's happy, the sun is shining, joy on the faces of those in the home ends.
01:18And then, and I hate using this term, they go and spurs it.
01:23But what that actually means in reality is that their way of playing gave them a really
01:27strong start to the game that Chelsea couldn't deal with or particularly defend against.
01:32But they then figured that out across the course of the match, wrestled control of the
01:36game, and Tottenham could not get it back.
01:38And do you know what?
01:39You are absolutely bang on, I've read the comments every single time I use a momentum
01:43graph and I say like, oh I don't really like using momentum graphs, but in this particular
01:47case, yeah I'll just shut up with that now, momentum graphs are actually good.
01:51But this one paints about as good a picture of this game as you could possibly imagine.
01:56A very chaotic and back and forth opening exchange of which Tottenham were clinical
02:00in front of goal when the chances presented themselves, but then some big brain stuff
02:04from Chelsea on the pitch, figuring out what to do, and just that is an enormous period
02:10of dominance, only really relaxed once they'd taken a 2-goal lead with about 5 minutes left.
02:16But beyond simply that pretty little bar, I did think the way this game swung back and
02:20forth told you everything you need to know about where both teams currently are.
02:25Like, we're going to go into a lot of depth about what it is that's so good about Chelsea
02:28at the minute that let them turn that around, but it would be very easy to assume the only
02:33reason Tottenham got into that 2-goal lead in the first place was because Mark Kukerea
02:38kept falling over, but it had a lot more to do with what is good about this team than
02:43the length of his studs.
02:44And if you look at both the goals, they are caused by him just falling on his face to
02:48this sort of comedy noise.
02:50Yep, something like that.
02:52But in both examples, Tottenham are really putting the squeeze on Chelsea in quite a
02:56vulnerable area.
02:57But in the first one, Chelsea have the ball, it comes back to Caldwell, and the objective
03:01for him here is to then take the press out of the equation.
03:05You can see, Fernandes knows he's going to want to play that forward and beat these players,
03:09so he starts making the run out from behind, I think this is Kuliszewski here, to be able
03:14to receive that.
03:15But then, and this is a product of good coaching and good structure, he realises what's going
03:19on, he puts the brakes on and makes sure that he's actually covering that central pass,
03:24and now bang, Caldwell's in trouble.
03:26He's running backwards with the ball, the second pressure is on his blindside, his obvious
03:30pass is gone, so he's got to hurriedly give it to Kukerea.
03:34And yes, he does just fall over and that is kind of the most important bit, but he does
03:38so because he's backpedalling away from the ball, the ball into him is slightly panicked,
03:42Johnson's now free because of this cover by Kuliszewski, to put as much pressure on
03:46him as he wants without worrying about being taken out of the game, Tottenham do manufacture
03:51that situation to a degree.
03:53So yes, funny man go fall down, oopsie, but welcome to the one channel on YouTube where
03:59we'll try and explain why funny man go fall down, oopsie.
04:03And obviously as well, it's brilliant centre forward work from Dom Solanke, but they covered
04:06that quite well on telly, I thought, like he waits and waits and waits on the blindside,
04:10he stays where the defender can't see him for as long as possible, and then sticks that
04:14big old long leg out right at the last second and scores that way.
04:18So you see, it's not just slapstick, Tottenham are good at doing this kind of thing.
04:23But just to go back to that accursed graph, yeah, that is not what maintaining a dominant
04:292-0 lead looks like.
04:31Chelsea, once they got to grips with this game, or in Mark Kuterela's case, got to grips
04:36with the actual pitch, they were brilliant.
04:39Now there are two things to talk about here, my friends.
04:42The first one is that Chelsea in general are just absolutely fantastic right now, and I
04:47don't know why they keep trying to deny it, we are having another Chels pool title race.
04:52But secondly, and indeed where we are going with this video, is that the stuff that Chelsea
04:56are good at specifically, highlighted precisely the stuff that Tottenham are bad at specifically.
05:02And the thing you keep hearing about this team is that they always want to play their
05:06way, they never change for the opposition, like Jamie Carragher had that whole, I wouldn't
05:09wear shorts and T-shirt if it was pissing it down outside thing on Sky.
05:13And the thing is, that's not actually terrible, like having a really instilled, defined style
05:18can actually take you really, really far.
05:20But the problem is that the difference between being principled and predictable is about
05:27as wafer thin as Parma ham.
05:30And Enzo Maresca is Italian, isn't he?
05:34And that's where Parma is.
05:37So Cole Parma ham, you could do.
05:39There is a joke in there somewhere.
05:41So the big news in Chelsea land is in the last couple of weeks, they've effectively
05:44gotten their dicks out on the table.
05:46I'm going to move that.
05:48And instead of inverting a defender into the midfield, they are now, I don't know why I'm
05:54just doing the exact same thing again, inverting a midfielder from defence.
05:59And that now gives them this, and just take a moment to really enjoy that, as a box midfield.
06:06Now I will happily hold my hands up here.
06:08I thought Enzo Fernandez's time at Chelsea was pretty much up.
06:12He doesn't have the physicality or the athleticism or just the tongue or the desire or the heart,
06:16the backbone or the arsehole or anything to play as one of the two pivots.
06:20And you don't want him as the sole 10 they tend to use, because then A, you've got a
06:24force called Parma out onto the right hand side.
06:26Not ideal.
06:27And B, he doesn't have that dog in him there either.
06:30He can't really lead a press for you.
06:31But now this absolute masterstroke, in my opinion, I'm really annoyed.
06:36This has never occurred to me, gives you just the best of absolutely everything.
06:40Because with Caicedo inverting into here, you've got just everything you want from two
06:44pivots in these positions.
06:46And you've now got him in the front line, but you can still have Parma and Jackson lead
06:51the press when you need to.
06:52And obviously, Mureska's teams don't press anywhere near as Pochettino's did.
06:56So he's just free to be in the exact space he wants to be in and do stuff.
07:01And what's the stat, which I clearly should have looked up before I came on camera, like
07:04a goal or an assist in every one of his last five starts.
07:08Like Fernandes is very good at doing stuff, just that stuff, not the other stuff.
07:13Just look at the little scamp in this game without the sort of weight and expectation
07:17of being required to do all the hard work, like the hard work just being an option.
07:22He gets absolutely everywhere, but look how much damage he can do in this part of the
07:28pitch.
07:29Like that's where you want him to be.
07:30That's what you need to enable to happen without leaving the back door wide open.
07:33And this system, ah, just really clever.
07:37But this is also a really good idea of why we constantly hammer this idea on the channel.
07:41It's systems are fun and great and interesting and nice to talk about, but they only get
07:45you so far.
07:46Like Tottenham came up against this as a box midfield in their other most recent home game
07:51and absolutely had its pants down.
07:54But the difference between Chelsea's box midfield and Manchester City's, and I can't believe
07:58I'm going to say this, is that individually, man for man, Chelsea's is so much better.
08:04Like you've got proper solid defensive coverage in these two positions, dogged determination
08:08and exploitation of space in these two positions, and a really high bar of technical quality
08:15in all four players.
08:16So unlike in the City game, you can't outrun them, you can't out fight them, you can't
08:20out pass them.
08:21So the counter attacks that Tottenham used to sweep up the other end and get all those
08:25goals, they're off the table because the individuals are totally different to Manchester City's.
08:31Interesting theorem, Adam, if you've got a really convenient, nice stat you can use
08:34to back that up there, and yes, so glad you asked.
08:37I actually do.
08:38If we look at the duel winning percentage between Chelsea's four players in the middle
08:42here and the three that were in the centre for Tottenham, that's dominance, baby.
08:48It's virtually impossible to win every single duel in a game of football because the way
08:52the ball bounces might mean you go in, you've never got a chance, nobody's ever totally
08:56dominant.
08:57You're looking at like anything from 50% to sort of 80% as a marker of, you won your 1v1s,
09:02you won your battles, and that's all of Chelsea's players, and not all of Tottenham's.
09:09So then, with both the shape and the individuals, and the fact Marc Uribe changes boots, nullifying
09:15Tottenham's greatest attacking threats, Chelsea could then set about unpicking their system
09:21and dominating the game.
09:23So how do they do it?
09:25Well, my dear friends, and I do hope I've got time to sort of do the production values
09:29on this.
09:30I put a scary castle in the background, change the lighting and do a kind of sinister noise.
09:35They use the power of fear.
09:38If I haven't done any of that, this is going to look really silly.
09:43The reason you keep hearing Tottenham players get described as naive is because if you do
09:48not have specific, adaptive, match-by-match plans, if you're just constantly trying to
09:53play your own way, then the vast majority of your game plan does come down to personal
09:58instinct.
09:59And if you are playing against Chelsea, your instincts are going to constantly tell you
10:04to stop Cole Palmer.
10:06And what Chelsea did was they sussed that fact out, and they used that to then go and
10:11win the game.
10:12So we're going to leave the Chelsea players on the pitch here, but show you Tottenham's
10:15average positions across that 90 minutes of all of their starters.
10:19Now it isn't quite as dramatic in graph form as it was during the game, but you will
10:22see there is a definite imbalance here across the centre of the pitch.
10:27It seems to be weighted a lot more into this area than it does anywhere else.
10:32Like Sarr and Basuma are both over to this side of the pitch, like van de Ven's a lot
10:36closer to this sort of area.
10:38Porro's got the same job as a dog, he's a lot closer to the middle than his opposite
10:42number is.
10:43And even Kulishevsky, who yes, does play in sort of the channel rather than out wide,
10:47he's way closer to the middle than you'd expect him to be.
10:50I'm going to leave this on, right, and this graph's going to be terrible because I had
10:53to sort of screenshot it on my phone after about 25 minutes or so, right.
10:57This is Cole Palmer's sort of opening influence in that match.
11:02You'll see he's really struggling to get into his preferred area, and he's doing that thing
11:07we've talked about it loads and loads of times.
11:09When he can't get space where he wants, he actually comes out into more of the right
11:12back area.
11:13And you can see even here, most of these passes are backwards.
11:16He really struggled to get in the game.
11:18But then at 2-0, with yes, Mark Kukerea having changed his boots, things started to turn
11:23and all of a sudden, and this is the rest of his contribution to the game from then
11:26on, he did start to get in this area.
11:29And when he did, Tottenham were in major, major trouble.
11:33And all of a sudden, if we put those Tottenham positions over Cole Palmer's heat map, you
11:39can see why that is.
11:41He has a gravity to him as a football player, and virtually every single player, even remotely
11:47in his area of the pitch, whether they were in front of him, behind him, beside him, whatever,
11:51were getting drawn into his area.
11:54Because those instincts, as opposed to the game plan, made them feel like they should
11:58do that.
11:59And just before we look at the goals, because believe me, this is what causes most of the
12:03goals, here is how I would best surmise this as an example, right?
12:07Now the ball is on this side of the pitch, yes, but regardless, look at how many Tottenham
12:11players are getting drawn towards Cole Palmer in this situation.
12:16It does not need to be that many.
12:19And the thing is, Palmer doesn't really contribute anything to this move of significance, because
12:23he is marked out of the game.
12:25But the knock-on effect of that is that there's all this space here, like it leaves them massively
12:30overexposed on the opposite side, because everyone's so focused on Palmer here.
12:35And it's so bad that even when the ball comes out to this side and Palmer's not in the game
12:39anymore, the players around him are reluctant to leave that area.
12:43So the ones dealing with Sancho and Kukerea, they are there, but it leaves this enormous
12:48gap between the two.
12:50And were it not for a fantastic save from Morpeth's own Fraser Forster, this enormous
12:54gap that this gravity around Palmer creates would have seen Sancho score.
12:59Like nobody even covers across into this area until the very last second.
13:04Like you have to be bearing down on goal to offset the gravity Cole Palmer has.
13:08And it's this exact thing that gets Chelsea back in the game, because when Jadon Sancho
13:13gets on the ball and cuts inside, this is the area of the pitch he's going to take that
13:18shot from.
13:19And Sarr and Basuma are right there, they're yards away from that area.
13:22It's pretty clear that he's trying to get on his strong foot to get a shot away.
13:27Somebody should get across and get in front of that area, but they don't, because why?
13:31The gravity of Cole Palmer, neither of them instinctively feel like leaving him alone.
13:37And then by the time he does get into a shooting position, Basuma's sort of closed a little
13:41bit of the ground because he's panicked now because the thing's actually happening.
13:44Way too late to get a block in.
13:46Obviously it's an absolutely brilliant hit and you give him that 10 times, he probably
13:49won't score 10 of them, but it's a scenario that's created because nobody wants to leave
13:54Cole Palmer alone.
13:55But the Fernandes goal is the best example of this by a mile, because if you think Tottenham
13:59are afraid of Palmer when he hasn't got the ball, look how afraid of him they are when
14:04he has.
14:05It dribbles in field and four players directly get drawn to try and challenge him with another
14:10three.
14:11You could argue focused fully on making sure he doesn't get through any of that.
14:15So it's more than half the Tottenham team, however you want to spin it, are like, oh
14:18no, Cole Palmer, I should deal with that.
14:20And thus look at Enzo Fernandes, absolutely screaming for the ball.
14:25It's insane.
14:26He's been given that much space on the edge of the box for a team that are defending this
14:31deep and have just, you know, lost a two goal lead.
14:34Like it is quite fortuitous how the ball lands at his feet, but look at him.
14:38Look at Sancho.
14:39Look at all the space Tottenham are leaving because, I'll just say it one more time, the
14:44gravity of Cole Palmer as a footballer.
14:47And I know I'm beating a dead horse at this point, but the second penalty Chelsea get,
14:50the fourth goal, he's going away, he's not going to do anything to you there.
14:54He's not going to hurt you in that position, but such is Sarr's like blind panic instinctively
14:59about Cole Palmer, you can't let him go.
15:02We can't not do something.
15:03So he puts in this stupid, naive challenge from behind and gives it away.
15:09Like if that was any other player in that Chelsea team, he won't do that.
15:12And as for the penalty itself, did, um, did this occur to anyone else?
15:18But you know, you know, chippy chips.
15:20Yeah.
15:21They have to be them chips.
15:22Yeah.
15:23Yeah.
15:24Yeah.
15:25Proper.
15:26That will almost certainly have been done to death by the time this, uh, this video
15:28goes out, but I promise, I swear I hadn't seen it yet.
15:31That just, uh, that occurred to me on the tube on the way in and I couldn't, couldn't
15:35stop chuckling.
15:36Yes.
15:37Just to quickly summarise the video for you, Tottenham have this really cool, actually
15:41interesting to find exciting way of playing, which can directly lead to players like Marc
15:46Kukure trying to get the kit man fired, but Chelsea are really, really, really good and
15:52very adaptive and against a team that is not very adaptive and is actually trying to rely
15:57on instinct instead, they will make, uh, mugs of them.
16:02Where's my mug?
16:03Don't worry.
16:04Found it.
16:06If you liked this video, you can of course, subscribe to us here at four 40.
16:08It was a good R-roll.
16:09Uh, wasn't it?
16:10More subs is great.
16:11More subs.
16:12Let's just do a really fun stuff.
16:13And you've kind of course, let us know what you think of the video and Tottenham and Chelsea
16:16and just anything that's going on in your life and incredibly nosy in the comments down
16:20below.
16:21And if you're too good for the comments, say it all the time.
16:23These are my social medias.
16:25You can go and talk to me about it on there.
16:27I've not got much else going on.
16:29Adam Cleary, C L E R Y X formerly known as Twitter, blue sky, Instagram, maybe just Google
16:35it.
16:36You might even get a nice surprise.
16:37Uh, if you do that, the four for two socials are in the corner of the video.
16:40The latest issue of the mags is in WH Smith's and everywhere else, uh, right now, but until
16:45next time, Enzo Moresca, sir, I see you, you little title challenging rascal.
16:53Yeah.
16:54And, um, yeah, that's it.
16:56Goodbye.