Spurs and the mad b*stard hand Chelsea victory in game for the ages

4-1 in a game with five disallowed goals, two red cards, 21 minutes of stoppage time, high line madness from Ange Postecoglou and a second half hat-trick for Nicolas Jackson. F*cking mental from start to finish.

Micky van de Ven swung a leg, Raheem Sterling dived, Cristian Romero crunched Enzo Fernandez, Moises Caicedo scored from 25 yards, but through the legs of Jackson, who was offside according to VAR, which didn’t give a penalty for the challenge on Raheem Sterling, but did for Romero losing his head for the second time in this game and the 427th time in his Tottenham career.

It was less than ten seconds of action followed by a good six minutes of VAR umming and ahing before Cole Palmer scored the penalty to get Chelsea on level terms with Spurs, in probably the most concentrated period of madness in the most bonkers game of Premier League football it’s possible to conceive of.

Spurs were irresistible for the first 15 minutes. Chelsea and Mauricio Pochettino were indefensibly baffled by the system Tottenham have played all season, with the full-backs pushing high into pockets and James Maddison dropping deep. And it was the playmaker’s pass from left-back that opened Chelsea up for Dejan Kulusevski’s opener, at which point Chelsea were on their way to a hiding.

The game turned on Destiny Udogie’s two-footed lunge on Raheem Sterling, which was ‘at the top end of wreckless’ and not ‘dangerous’ according to VAR, but could easily have been a season-ender had Sterling not pulled his foot away. The perceived injustice of Udogie remaining on the pitch woke Chelsea up and diverted Tottenham’s energy away from playing stunning football to committing acts of utter lunacy, with manager Ange Postecoglou the lunatic in chief.

Romero could have been sent off before his crunching tackle to concede the penalty, as he needlessly kicked out at Levi Colwill from the deck, David Beckham-style. Romero was followed off the pitch, in very quick succession, by the two other players in the squad they can scarcely do without: Van de Ven and Maddison both hobbled off with injuries.

And yet, without his playmaker to put his foot on the ball, or his two first-choice centre-backs, Postecoglou – the nutter – instructed his backline to play on the halfway line. That didn’t change when Udogie was shown a second yellow and they went down to nine men.

The next 20 minutes featured Chelsea playing straight balls over the top of the Spurs defence, generally for players in offside positions, sometimes for Guglielmo Vicario to sweep up brilliantly, and very occasionally to create a chance for them to spurn.

It was awful from Chelsea. They were panicking in a situation where the slightest bit of composure would slice Tottenham open, and the moment they did that, playing a few passes on the wing before releasing Sterling, they scored.

It was Jackson who slotted in from Sterling’s square pass, before scoring another in carbon-copy fashion in the 94th minute, then his hat-trick in the 97th by accidentally going around the goalkeeper. He still had time to miss a second sitter of the night, spanking the ball over the bar, having fluffed a very simple headed chance earlier on.

Nicolas Jackson celebrates a goal for Chelsea with Reece James.

While we would like to thank Postecoglou for the gung-ho bedlam, and he may argue that it worked most of the time and would have been considered tactical genius had either of Rodrigo Bentancur or Son’s late chances to level gone in, it was ridiculous. Chelsea – terrible and timid though they were – couldn’t fail to make them pay eventually. The Blues had an xG of 4.04, the highest in the Premier League this season, and had Spurs sat back – given Chelsea’s struggles againt low blocks – they may well have come away with a big point.

“Go down to five, we’ll still have a crack,” Postecoglou said when asked about the high line after the game, insisting “it’s who we are, mate”. Naive? Yes. Entertaining? Absolutely.

It’s probably the end of their title challenge though. The result itself isn’t too damaging – they’re only a point behind Manchester City. And the performance won’t be either – they showed grit and determination along with the insanity. But the injuries to Van de Ven and Maddison, as well as the suspension for Romero, will be costly, with their replacements significant downgrades.

Finally a big scalp for Chelsea, but far from a convincing display in a game they should have put out of sight long before second-half stoppage time.

But let’s not dwell on what comes next for these two sides, who like the rest of us, no matter how much they insist they’re now focused on the future, won’t be able to put the nonsense of Monday night at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium out of their minds.

It was the most compelling, high octane game of football of this season; quite possibly any season. Cheers for that, Ange, you beautiful, mad b*stard.