Chelsea stayed calm and weathered a strong Tottenham Hotspur onslaught to take all three points in the London Derby.
A lot more than local pride was on the line when Champions Chelsea arrived in North London to take on Tottenham as both sides had their eyes on taking a step towards securing Champions League football for next season.
Changes were inevitable for Chelsea after last week’s embarrassing 5-1 defeat at Manchester City, and Sonia Bompastor replaced Sandy Baltimore and Wieke Kaptain with Sjoeke Nusken and Johanna Rytting Kaneryd. They needed a strong reply after seeing their title challenge go up in flames in their last two Women’s Super League (WSL) games.
After her late red card in their 2-1 win over West Ham, Drew Spence was replaced in the middle by Gauspet, while Hanna Wijk and Amanda Nilden came in as Josepfine Rybrink started on the bench.
The Lineups
TOT: Kop, Nilden, Hunt, Koga, Wijk, Blackstad, Summanen, Holdt, Gauspet, England (C), Vinberg
CHE: Hampton, Carpenter, Bright (C), Girma, Buurman, Walsh, Nusken, Cuthbert, James, Thompson, Kaneryd
The Action
In a game with such high stakes for both sides, Tottenham were always going to come out swinging. Olivia Holdt set the tone ten minutes in when she collected the ball in her own half and carried it with purpose towards the Chelsea box. She saw her shot rattle off the crossbar, but this early statement of intent from Spurs was also a worrying sign for the Blues.
Chelsea looked to strike back immediately when Keira Walsh lofted a ball over the Spurs backline, landing at the feet of Kaneryd, but Lize Kop smothered her touch, and that was the high point of the opening thirty minutes for the Blues.
In her first appearance at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium, Signe Gaupset introduced herself to the extended home fans with an excellent performance in the middle. She repeatedly looked to move the play forward and get stuck into challenges. She nearly got on the scoresheet when, during a scramble in the box, she had two close-range shots blocked, and then from the ensuing corner Julie Blaksted headed one just over the bar.
Tottenham were all over the current WSL champions and should have scored on multiple occasions. Their best chance came when Blaksted whipped a strong ball across the face of the goal and former-Blue Bethany England steered it just over the bar from very close.
Unsurprisingly, they soon came to rue these missed chances when just before the break, Walsh stayed composed in a crowded box and fired one into the bottom corner after Spurs failed to clear their lines from a corner. Coming completely against the run of play, the home side now had a huge mountain to climb after a very positive first-half performance.
Those regrets were deepened for Martin Ho’s side when Chelsea picked up where they left off and doubled their lead in the opening minutes of the second half. A clever run in behind from Nusken caught their high backline sleeping, leading to Alyssa Thompson having a near-open goal to rifle the ball home.
The home fans fustrations only grew soon after when it appeared that Carpenter clearly handballed it in her own box, but referee Phoebe Cross turned down their pleas for a penalty.
A triple change from Martin Ho saw Lenna Gunning-Williams and Cathinka Tandberg come on to try breathe new life into their performance after Chelsea did an excellent job at preventing them from builidng any momentum after the second goal. The two combined well when Gunning-Williams first-time cross found Tandberg’s head, but she continued the trend of seeing her effort fly just over the bar, adding to their plethora of missed opportunities.
As the half continued, Tottenham slowly clawed their way back into competing; however, these misses were becoming dangerously contagous as next it was Holdt’s turn for a heartbreaking miss. A lovely throughball from Tandberg left Holdt one-on-one with Hannah Hampton, but the England No. 1 made herself big, and the Danish international fired her shot straight in her arms.
That was one chance too many for Spurs who couldn’t recreate the fluidity of thier first half counter attacking and will be disapointed to leave with nothing. After a very weak first half performance, Bompastor will be thrilled with her sides professional performance in the seocnd fourty five that saw them take home the three points with relative ease.
A professional Chelsea performance
Chelsea fans’ nerves must’ve been shot after thirty minutes of this game, as wave after wave of Tottenham chances were getting closer to furthering their woes. But after some lucky breaks, two quick goals on either side of halftime ended their poor run of form and gave them a much-needed boost.
Despite a lack of intensity in the first half, their improvement in the second is cause for optimism for the remainder of their season. They showed their professionalism and quality by killing off any momentum after the second goal by recycling possession and not giving Spurs an inch. Even a draw today could’ve seen their campaign spiral, but they stopped the bleeding for now.
A frustrating afternoon with plenty of positives for Tottenham
There’s no sugarcoating how disappointing this was for Martin Ho’s Tottenham. Chelsea came into this game on their worst run of form in years after suffering their heaviest league defeat since 2019; they were absolutely there for the taking.
And for forty minutes, Spurs rose to that challenge and looked the better team. They allowed Chelsea to keep possession as they did a brilliant job of keeping them at arm’s length, and then hitting them with quick, efficient counterattacks. But unfortunately, they couldn’t make the most of it.
Bethany England, Oliva Holdt, Cathinka Tandberg, and Julie Blakstad all missed chances that should’ve either given Spurs the lead or got them back into the game. But with each miss, it seemed more likely that Chelsea would get back into it, and ultimately their superior quality paid off.
But there is a lot of good for Ho to take away from this performance. New signings Julie Blakstad and Signe Gaupset both look as though they can take this side to another level with their directness and creativity. Olivia Holdt continued her impressive season with another great performance, and this is another example of Spurs taking the game to a top-four side.
It’s only his first season in the job, but things are looking bright for Martin Ho and Tottenham, even if their dreams of European football may have to wait another year.
