Tottenham Hotspur served up a wonderfully woeful evening’s worth of football as they were thrashed 4-0 by Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
The dullness of the first half was encapsulated by Jose Mourinho’s risk-free football and our lack of invention in the final third.
But that was nothing to what would happen after the break, as Spurs thumped the self-destruct button yet again, aided it must be said by some diabolical officiating.
It was yet another spanking to a ‘top four’ side and it came after yet another Tim Sherwood experiment with selection.
The formation sort of worked without flourishing. Players that might have been able to ignite a spark were left looking like they were holding damp fireworks.
But whatever you say about the tactics nothing could have predicted what the calamity of the second-half would be.
Jan Vertonghen’s slip and then instinctive stab at the ball set up Samuel Eto’o who finished with ease. It was an embarrassingly soft goal to give away and meant the home side didn’t even need to unbox the brilliance of their creative players at any stage.
Before I had time to contemplate the err, referee Michael Oliver completely killed the game by awarding them a penalty and then sending off Younes Kaboul.
Eto’o was again involved as he fell over despite having been hardly touched. Maybe the dive was so good it conned Oliver, but it’s not like the referee had a bad view.
It was weak, cheap and oh so typical of key decisions made against us in these ‘big’ encounters.
