Chelsea vs Spurs: Tactical Analysis

Solid Chelsea

Chelsea lined up again with the front 6 that hasn’t been beaten when they started together yet (well just 3 games). Chelsea's only change from the last game was Gilchrist coming into RB/RCB in possession. Spurs, without their 1st and 2nd choice LBs, put Emerson as the inverted LB in possession.

Chelsea started aggressively pressing Spurs with their usual 4-4-2 press, but what made this press aggressive was how high our Backline was. Badiashille was aggressive enough to step out of defence to mark Sarr who was in the RHS when our Midfield needed it to compress the pitch.

Jackson and Palmer marked the 2 CBs, Gallagher took on Bissouma, Noni and Mudryk, the inverted FBs. Caicedo tracked Kulusevski and Sarr, Badiashille, as previously explained.

When Chelsea didn’t press aggressively they stayed in their 4-4-2 mid-block shape off the ball and blocked central progression from Spurs which they like. They did this all game when they weren’t pressing high. Chelsea were very quick and dangerous when transitioning, which is no surprise.

Spurs used rotations to try and get out of Chelsea press. Here, Kulusevski is trapped by Noni but rotates to find himself free with a third-man run in midfield and beat Chelsea's press. Cucurella handles the 1v1 well and other examples.

Because of how compact Chelsea were in the middle though, Spurs found most of their space on the wings for 1v1s for Johnson and Son. But Cucurella and Gilchrist were phenomenal, Cucurella won 9/9 of his duels, whilst Gilchrist was dribbled past once.

Chelsea built up in a 3-2 build-up, especially from the 10th minute with Cucurella continuing to invert into midfield, continuing from the Villa game.

Spurs also like to attack with 5 in the last line, so at times Cucu was left with Jonhson going at him 1v1, and Sarr behind him making in-seam runs, giving Johnson time to deliver crosses. It was a lot of the time the way Spurs were dangerous when they were, but it wasn’t maximised enough.

Son couldn’t get the same joy because Noni was tracking the underlapping runs of Emerson well.

Chelsea also got behind Spurs with inseam runs from Palmer under Noni who was wide on the right, Cucurella even from the left side. and Mudryk has the mind to also find those passes. It troubled the Spurs all night. Cucurella had the energy to make those runs both outside and inside.

Chelsea's attacking play was also centred on giving our Wingers the ball in space in the wide areas as Spurs also love defending narrow, and with Cucurella inverting. Chelsea did that by giving through switches too. Mudryk found more space to receive 1v1, and Gilchrist central too gave Noni space out wide to receive in 1v1 positions. Both had runs to play in and threatened via 1v1s.

As for Chelsea's set-piece goal, it was coming as Chelsea tried the same routine earlier with Cucurella blocking Johnson, freeing Chalobah and Badiashille to threaten the goal at the back post. I wonder why Spurs didn’t clock on to that quickly enough.

Spurs increased their aggressiveness in their pressing and counter-pressing after the break. They were trying to use overloads/seam runs in the wide areas to get in behind and put dangerous balls into the box.

Spurs had most of the ball, pressing well and counter-pressing better than in the first half. Spurs pressed in a 3-2-1-3 shape trying to cover all our build-up options in the 3-2 shape with Cucurella in the pivot.

But we changed how we played from the Gk. This time Spurs didn’t give Petrovic time on the ball. In the first half, Ange was furious Petrovic had time to play out. Petrovic resorted to long balls time and time again which didn’t help us to keep the ball in the 2nd half.

Chelsea relied more on their defensive shape off the ball to block Spurs off with the 4-4-2 shape that turned into a 5-3-2 at times with Noni dropping deep to cover the threat of Son and Kulusevski. Mudryk did the same on the other side, joining Cucurella to cover Porro, Sarr and even Maddison when he came on and floated everywhere. This was more noticeable when Casedei came on. It was a good tweak from Poch.

The shape defensively was impressive as it covered the free men and our CBs were mopping everything up. Caicedo and Gallagher were doing a good job of blocking in front of them resorted Spurs to lots of long balls, and they couldn’t break them down. The defenders were on it plus the debutant Acheamapong, who made 4 blocks in 13 minutes. Impressive from him on his debut.

Spurs weren't without big chances and threatened enough in the 2nd half to score. Their biggest chances came when they managed to play out of the press. They had big chances to score but they couldn't capitalise on it.

Chelsea held on admirably for the win. They had moments where we played fantastic football, but for a team that has been conceding loads of goals recently, it was very good to see how solid we were off the ball.

Seun