Match to be played on Saturday 8th March 2014 at 17:30. Venue: Stamford Bridge, London.
Tottenham will go to Chelsea this weekend looking for their first league win at Stamford Bridge in 24 years.
Spurs are fairly high on confidence at the moment and have several players who can win them this game. Head coach Tim Sherwood has a couple of selection dilemmas to work through including who to start up front following Roberto Soldado’s goal last weekend.
Here’s the side he could go with.
GK – Hugo Lloris
One of the most proactive goalkeepers in the Premier League. He’s always looking for ways to clear the danger so his back four don’t have to.
RB – Kyle Naughton
Kyle Walker is edging towards a return to full fitness but Naughton is likely to continue down the right. He needs to have a great game defensively against Eden Hazard.
CB – Michael Dawson
Dawson will provide experience in the heart of the Tottenham back four and he’ll back himself to deal with any Chelsea striker. He needs to drop off quickly to compensate for a lack of pace.
CB – Jan Vertonghen
Vertonghen will have a lot of stick from the home support to deal with due to his confrontation against Fernando Torres in the reverse of this fixture. If Torres plays, he may try and play on it.
LB – Danny Rose
Rose could come back into the team following a brief spell out with a knee problem. He’ll be fresh as he missed the second leg of the Europa League tie against Dnipro and didn’t play against Cardiff City last weekend.
RM – Aaron Lennon
Lennon’s pace will be important because there is a good chance that Spurs will be forced to counter attack at times during the match.
CM – Mousa Dembele
Dembele is one of the quickest and most powerful central midfielders Spurs have available. He’s versatile and can protect the back four and also burst forward when his team are on top.
CM – Nabil Bentaleb
Bentaleb has had a lot of football since Sherwood came in as the new head coach. It’s likely that the boss will keep faith with his youngster. He needs to set the tone and pace of Tottenham’s play, trying to influence their shape.
CM – Paulinho
Paulinho needs to do what he does best and just get stuck into proceedings. He compliments the other midfielders well because he’s intelligent enough to go from an attacking and defensive mind sets to the opposite in no time.
LM – Christian Eriksen
Eriksen didn’t feature for Denmark against England due to a back problem. If he’s anything close to being fit he needs to come back into the side.
ST – Emmanuel Adebayor
His resurgence under Sherwood continues and he has the ability to take this game away from Chelsea quickly. He’ll need to hold the ball up well at times and try to occupy both Chelsea centre backs.
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