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Preview
On the 6th Feburuary 2011, Roberto Di Matteo was sacked as manager of West Brom, after a 3-0 defeat by Manchester City, their 13th defeat in 18 games.
On the 6th of February 2011, Andre Villa - Boas was managing a Porto Side, on its way to an unbeaten domestic league campaign in Portugal, which ended with Europa League success and a reputation as Europe's most in demand and talented young manager.
This prompted Chelsea to part with £13.3 million to appoint Andre Villa - Boas as their manager, a manager dubbed “mini mourinho“, and given a task to change the Chelsea style of play and build for the future.
His assistant manager was, Roberto Di Matteo, highly thought of at Chelsea, and deemed not good enough to be Birmingham City manager after he applied for the post. A complete turnaround in events lead to Andre Villa-Boas to then be replaced by a man who was sacked by West Brom and couldn’t get the Birmingham City job & hired as Villa-Boas's assistant, to then take over and steer Chelsea to win the champions league, depriving us (Tottenham) of a place in the champions league and that in itself is enough to add even more spice to what will be London's most atmospheric derby of the season.
When Redknapp was fired from the Tottenham job, Andre Villa - Boas name was touted about, he divided opinion, yet when Levy announced Andre Villa - Boas was to take over at Spurs, you could sense many differing views on this, to the point many spurs fans believed “why have we sacked our most successful manager in the premier league era, for someone that failed at Chelsea”.
That is for Andre Villa - Boas to answer & prove, with what he achieves at Spurs, so far he has lost a single league game against Newcastle on the opening day of the season, and after a slow start (in terns of performance) has got the team playing an attacking 4-2-3-1, which does have its flaws, yet its clear Villa - Boas is an attacking manager and the players are adapting to his methods, which the players proved by defeating Man Utd for the first time in the premier league at Old Trafford.
If Tottenham win this game, then we will set a new club record of 17 points, from the first 8 games in a premier league season, a stat which may surprise a few, especially the fans that still have doubts about Villa Boas (
).Also, in the last six league games against Chelsea at home, Tottenham are unbeaten, 3 wins & 3 draws, which is impressive considering our record previous to that.
Chelsea have surprised many with their form, as the general view before the season started, was that while they had one of the leagues most talented squads, and exciting summer signings in Hazard, there was still question marks over Torres (given the role to fill Drogba's departure) and also Roberto Di Matteo as a manager at this level, especially as this was now his team, and he has to guide and manage the team from the start of the campaign.
With Chelsea coming into the league game as league leaders, Tottenham five points behind and having the confidence from defeating Manchester United, add in the fact Andre Villa - Boas will be out for revenge, and the spurs players have their hunger to make sure they don’t miss out on champions league football, again, I think it’s fair to say this should be one of the most tense & exciting games between the two teams for many years.
Line Up
I expect us to stick with 4-2-3-1 and the team (outfield players) that faced Man Utd & Villa, unless players are injured in the final round of international games.
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There is the option of starting with Adebayor, and question marks about the fitness of Dempsey for this game, with the other main talking point currently the goalkeeper situation.
Will Villa-Boas go with Friedel or Lloris? either way, both players are capable, yet the general view seems to be that Friedel should be picked for his premier league experience, as he is still a highly talented keeper.
Previous Meeting
(Thursday, December 22 2011, 20:00 Premier League)
White Hart Lane, ATT: 36,141.
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Tottenham 1 Chelsea 1
8' [1 : 0] Emmanuel Adebayor
23' [1 : 1] Daniel Sturridge]
Tottenham: Friedel, Walker, Gallas, King, Assou-Ekotto, Modric, Parker, Sandro, Bale, Adebayor, Van der Vaart.
Subs: Gomes, Kaboul, Pavlyuchenko, Bassong, Kranjcar, Rose, Livermore.
Chelsea: Cech, Bosingwa, Ivanovic, Terry, Cole, Ramires, Mikel, Meireles, Sturridge, Drogba, Mata.
Subs: Turnbull, Romeu, Lampard, Torres, Malouda, Ferreira, Kalou.
[video=dailymotion;xn7srz]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xn7srz_tottenham-1-1-chelsea-22-12-11_sport[/video]

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