While the Chelsea players had already withdrawn in their dressing room with 15 minutes until the kick -off, Tottenham was still warming up on the field.
Djed Spence, Cristian Romero, Micky Van de Ven, Destiny Udogie stood in the formation from right to left, and practiced how they should handle balls behind them. They had a Spurs coach with those who played passages over the top, one after the other, while trying to keep their outdoor game together.
The visitors knew what would come, given the Chaos Chelsea agent led the line again in Nicolas Jackson. He got no goal on his return of a hamstring injury that had seen him miss over the past two months. However, he played a uncomfortable part in the opener of Chelsea, because Van de Ven was so busy with his presence that Enzo Fernandez was left alone to go inside.
But even without scoring himself, Jackson showed why he can be such a demon for defenders, running from his ruthless run to keeping the ball wide spraying to the wing players.
Chelsea is so much threatening with Jackson, another animal. They know, and their opponents do that too, that's why the Tottenham exercise was still underway until 7.45 pm. By 20.01pm we had already seen the way of the road in difficulty through a ball behind it.
Trevoh Chalobah launched it for a long time for Jackson to chase between Romero and Van de Ven, who started together in the Premier League for the first time since Tottenham Chelsea played for the last time in December. The striker came up for the defenders and should probably have done better with what came next. Perhaps with a little less rustiness after so long on the sidelines, he would, because Jackson sent his first attempt to Spurs goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario before Van de Ven's clearance returned from Chelsea's striker to send the ball into the post.
But this was not an isolated incident because it happened several times, Chelsea sent balls behind and sprinted Tottenham to try to stop a steam train in Jackson. It became increasingly clear as the game progressed that Romero struggled to tackle him in particular.
Chelsea needs Jackson for their run-in, which is one of the more challenging compared to their Champions League-Chasing rivals. Their last two months without a single recognized senior striker had seen them struggling to threaten, let alone score to win.
At least with Jackson now fit again, they have that presence at the top.
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