Neither Chelsea nor Manchester United have been entirely convincing in front of goal this season – both sides are being outscored by Erling Haaland currently – and this is the most drawn fixture in Premier League history. We’re just surprised and, if only for purely practical eking-this-out-to-16 reasons, grateful it wasn’t 0-0…
1. For 84 minutes, this looked like being one of those Big Six games. All tactical and cancel-each-other-outty and, really, if we’re honest, a bit dull. It was all set to be described by everyone as an absorbing chess match because nobody wants to look like they just didn’t understand it and that’s why they thought it was boring. Then, luckily for absolutely everyone, it went all mental. Barclays is inevitable.
2. With an eye on the bigger picture it is a point that is, quite obviously, a better result for Manchester United than Chelsea in what looks like being a cat’s-arse-tight scrap for the bottom half of the top four. For one thing, it makes it four points from two games against Spurs and Chelsea this week and that is a very acceptable outcome for Erik Ten Hag and the gang. For Chelsea, it’s two points from games at Brentford and United at home. That is… less acceptable.
3. And that’s before we even get to the nature of the equaliser, glorious header that it was from an absolutely wildly excited Casemiro. The defending was inadequate from a team that should have been able to make a better fist of seeing out those closing minutes against a United side that had already withdrawn most of its major attacking weapons when apparently accepting a point at a time the game was goalless and apparently firmly in deadlock. More annoyingly, that’s now twice this season Chelsea have dropped careless points at home to a direct rival. They hadn’t controlled this game quite so thoroughly as they did against Spurs back in August, but the (literal) point remains the same. It already seems pretty reasonable to assume there’s not going to be much between at least four teams scrapping for the last two apparently available top-four spots this season, and pissing away four points while charitably donating a point each to two of those other teams is not the one.
4. So in summary, then, very annoying for Chelsea but a decent point for United. And yet there’s one obvious reason for concern in both camps after that. For those first 83 avowedly goalless and largely chanceless minutes, the defending was…
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