Tottenham will host the biggest game of the Premier League weekend on Sunday, as Chelsea will be in the house for the latest edition of this increasingly heated London derby.
Whereas Chelsea are securely in the top four and actually second-best to only Liverpool in the Premier League, Spurs have fallen all the way down to 11th and have suffered as many defeats (six) as they have wins.
Ahead of Sunday’s massive clash on Matchday 15 of the Premier League, let’s take a look at two players on Tottenham and two players on Chelsea who will decide this fixture.
Tottenham RW Brennan Johnson
Brennan Johnson is one of the more underrated attacking players in European football, as the 23-year-old has been a consistent scoring threat for Spurs this season with six goals as a wide forward, including three in his last five appearances.
A pacy player with good goal-scoring instincts and a footballing intelligence beyond his experience, Johnson is often in the right place at the right time to find the back of the net, working well with Dominic Solanke at striker and superstar Son Heung-min across from him.
All it takes is one counterattack for Johnson to burn Mac Cucurella, who has clearly not carried his excellent form from the Euros to the 2024/25 Premier League season.
Chelsea CB Benoit Badiashile
Benoit Badiashile has all the tools to be one of the best center backs in the world, but after being tabbed by Zinedine Zidane as the next big thing in 2020, Badiashile has failed to take that next step.
So far, he has been a disappointment for Chelsea and is playing for his future, but Enzo Maresca and the team’s front office still believe in the Frenchman’s talent and long-term upside.
A physically imposing player with excellent ball-playing capabilities, Badiashile will be put to the test against an active Tottenham front three, especially Solanke, who has a great physical presence himself and loves pressing center backs into mistakes.
Tottenham DM Yves Bissouma
Tottenham may go as Yves Bissouma does in midfield, because no player has a tougher task on Sunday than the Malian international, going up against the powerful tandem of Moises Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez in the Chelsea midfield.
Together, Caicedo and Enzo cost Chelsea more than 200 million euros and were record signings at the time of their purchases. Both struggled mightily under Mauricio Pochettino last season but have rebounded strongly in 2024/25.
Caicedo has been so good in the defensive midfield that he is a legitimate Premier League Player of the Season candidate, while Enzo has been just as good as his Copa America counterpart in recent weeks.
Bissouma will be the one tasked with keeping the Tottenham midfield ticking, and he has the defensive skills to nearly match Caicedo’s with 2.9 tackles and 1.4 interceptions per 90.
But Bissouma’s toughest and most important job will be tracking Chelsea playmaker Cole Palmer, who quietly remains one of the league’s three best players in 2024/25 with nine goals and six assists.
Chelsea ST Nicolas Jackson
There can be no doubt that Nicolas Jackson is one of the best strikers in the Premier League right now, reaching new heights after a promising but oft-criticized rookie season at Stamford Bridge due to the publicized nature of some of his frustrating misses.
Jackson is starting to look like a refined version of the monster that destroyed LaLiga in the second half of the 2022/23 season, leading to his big-money transfer to the Premier League.
With eight goals and three assists this season, the speedy striker is one of the best all-around threats at the position in the Premier League, scoring goals with more efficiency, too.
Chelsea may not need a new striker at all. On Sunday, Jackson will be up against a Tottenham center back duo that could be much stronger with Cristian Romero potentially back from injury.
Radu Dragusin and Romero, if they start together, are very talented but very aggressive. Jackson will have a couple of clear-cut opportunities to burn Tottenham, and Chelsea hope he has his new finishing boots to match.
The managing editor of The Trivela Effect, Kevin has 15 years of experience in digital media. He covered Real Madrid from 2019-2022 for The Real Champs as a site manager. You can contact him at the site’s official Twitter handle @TrivelaEffect or via the site’s official email thetrivelaeffect@gmail.com.