Mauricio Pochettino’s Chelsea recorded a valuable point against Manchester City on Saturday in the Premier League, but it didn’t come without its major talking points.
The home side felt that they should have had three penalties during the game involving Erling Haaland, Kyle Walker and a handball shout.
Glenn Hoddle shared his thoughts on those incidents and admitted that Chelsea were perhaps lucky, in some quarters, as he told Premier League Productions (17/02/24 at 7:55 pm).
On Ben Chilwell and the Erling Haaland incident, where the left-back was accused of throwing the striker to the floor from a corner, the former Chelsea boss thinks, if the on-field referee had given that a penalty, then it wouldn’t have been overturned.
But when it came to the penalty shout from Kyle Walker, he feels the Manchester City defender fouled Raheem Sterling first, rather than the other way around.
Added to that, Glenn Hoddle was also pleased to see Levi Colwill not punished for handball in the second half by adding ‘for the sake of football, I am glad they are not giving penalties for this type of thing’.
In the end, the points were shared in a game where Chelsea pushed and pushed, but just couldn’t stop Rodri from finding a late equaliser.
Manchester City v Chelsea penalty shouts
On Chilwell penalty shout on Haaland: “It’s a slight 50-50,” said Hoddle. “Put it this way, if the referee had seen it and given it, then I don’t think VAR can possibly turn that around. There’s no way they would have turned it around. It was a foul and Chilwell has got to watch himself.
On Walker/Sterling pen shout: “I just think it’s a foul from Walker onto Sterling, rather than any other way. If you are an attacker, you may do that by laying your leg up against the defender.
“But there is the first challenge. The first connection is Walker’s onto Sterling, that’s where Sterling gets tumbled over.
On handball from Colwill: “In many ways, after last week with the two penalties at Luton. I thought this was more of a penalty than last week, for sure. But, for the sake of football, I am glad they are not giving penalties for this type of thing.”
Chelsea’s defensive display
It wasn’t so long ago that Pochettino was closer to the exit door than the Stamford Bridge dugout because things were looking very problematic for the former Tottenham boss in the capital.
But these past few results, starting with the FA Cup win at Aston Villa, have started to turn the screw for the team.
That was a very strong defensive display from the side and it should encourage the fans that Chelsea are on the up under their summer-appointed manager.
But, of course, all of that could turn on its head in an instance if the London side were to lose the League Cup final to Liverpool.
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