Tottenham Hotspur 3-1 Chelsea: 3 reasons why Spurs beat Chelsea

#3 Tottenham benefited from a refereeing call early on

Eden Hazard might've won a penalty in the first half for this clumsy challenge by Juan Foyth

While nobody could argue that Tottenham were by far the better team in today’s game – particularly in the first half – it’s hard to disagree with any Chelsea fans who suggest their side might’ve been a little hard done by. With Tottenham 1-0 up, Chelsea finally launched an attack and on a different day, they could’ve had a penalty.

Eden Hazard broke into the Spurs box and was tackled clumsily by Argentine defender Juan Foyth, but referee Martin Atkinson decided a foul had not been committed and allowed play to continue with Tottenham almost breaking away. On a first view, it appeared to be a close call to make – it did appear that Foyth had muscled into Hazard’s back, but perhaps the Belgian had gone down a little too easily.

On a second viewing from an alternate angle though, it appeared that not only had Foyth crashed into the back of Hazard, but he’d also made contact with the Chelsea man’s knee, causing him to hit the deck. In fact, it was eerily similar to the fouls made by Foyth in Spurs’ game with Wolves a few weeks ago – fouls that saw Wolves awarded two penalties.

Chelsea fans will be left rueing Atkinson’s decision, but nobody ever claimed that referees were perfect. And without VAR to back them up in this season, incidents like this will continue to happen. Chelsea were well beaten by a better team today, but it’s hard not to wonder what could’ve happened had they been rightfully awarded a spot-kick at 1-0 down.