FA PREMIER LEAGUE THE TITLE RACE Tottenham 2 Chelsea 1:FRANK LAMPARD made a point of approaching the departing away support after the final whistle, his defiant one-finger gesture offering dispirited fans a reminder of Chelsea's league position. Carlo Ancelotti maintained the theme during his post-match duties.
“Win the next three games and we are champions,” he said, a statement of mathematical fact. Yet such public insistences of strength suddenly feel unconvincing. This team have endured the latest twist in a remarkable title race, and nerves are leaving them queasy in the run-in.
Chelsea departed with their lead slashed to a solitary point and the underlying conviction that the title will be theirs, already unsettled by a jittery display against Bolton in midweek, shaken yet further.
This was a narrow defeat on paper but a thrashing in reality. Gareth Bale alone could have dispatched the visitors by four goals, with the leaders just as grateful Roman Pavlyuchenko and Jermain Defoe were profligate.
Ancelotti’s team had been made to look vulnerable, even hapless at times. The Italian called for calm with his “not the time to panic”, but he would have been alarmed by his players’ deficiencies.
The manager will hope the volcanic dust cloud hovering over the country allows him to remain in London for the next few days, as he is due in Naples tomorrow to give evidence in the latest hearing over Italy’s match-fixing scandal dating back to 2006.
Ancelotti could do with an uninterrupted week overseeing his side’s preparations for Sunday’s awkward visit of Stoke. John Terry will miss that fixture following his dismissal and with Ricardo Carvalho still two weeks away from a return to fitness, there will be a makeshift nature to Chelsea’s defence as Rory Delap hurls his throw-ins into the penalty area.
Paulo Ferreira’s toils – the full-back was tormented by the excellent Bale and eventually taken off in favour of Branislav Ivanovic – added to the management’s concerns given that the Serb may have to deputise in the middle against Stoke.
Terry had been verbally abused by a home supporter as he departed down the tunnel at half-time, the offending fan subsequently ejected and apparently banned from Spurs’ next home game, but he remained rattled. The penalty award against him was harsh but his bookings, both clear despite his protestations as he retreated to a din of abuse, were untimely.
“People look too much at John’s performances,” Ancelotti said. “Maybe sometimes he has had some problems and he didn’t play so well here, but look at his season and he has been absolutely fantastic. I was a player and I know that, sometimes, you are not always rational. Sometimes you lose control.”
Chelsea should be more than capable of recovering from setbacks such as this but Ancelotti must be privately infuriated that, yet again, an opportunity to keep the chasing pack at arm’s length has been passed up. Too often this season their concentration has lapsed just as the watching world believed the race was up.
Tottenham out-classed them. They were better in every aspect of play, tearing into pedestrian opponents from the start and overpowering a Chelsea team who used to relish trips to White Hart Lane as a shortcut to three points.
Didier Drogba was a frenzy of frustration by the end. Lampard apart, visiting players departed numbed in defeat and haunted by the grim implications of Paul Scholes’s late winner in the day’s early kick-off. “I have already reminded them that we are still in control,” Ancelotti said. These players will need reassurance as self-doubt creeps in and United hover at their shoulder.
Similar strength will be required in the coming weeks as that mustered by Spurs since their crushing disappointment in the FA Cup semi-final against Portsmouth. To have summoned victories over Arsenal and Chelsea since that reverse at Wembley is remarkable.
Bale was their outstanding performer, battering in the second with his right foot, but their strength of character was personified by Michael Dawson at the heart of defence. As concerned as Fabio Capello will have been to witness Terry’s display, he must have been hugely impressed by the Tottenham captain, the England manager having departed moments after Dawson suffocated Drogba’s shot eight minutes from time.
Spurs will travel to Old Trafford on Saturday pepped and Chelsea will look to them for an unlikely favour. “We will go there and we have got no fear whatsoever,” Dawson said. “We want to be where Arsenal, Chelsea and United are, in that top four on a regular basis. Let’s hope it can start this year. It is in our hands now.”
Guardian Service
CHELSEA'S RUN-IN
Played: 35. Pts 77
Sun, Apr 25th: v Stoke City (h)
Sat, May 1st: v Liverpool (a)
Sun, May 9th: v Wigan Ath (a)
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