Manchester City are now level with Chelsea at the Premier League summit on points, goal difference, goals scored and head to head records – a fittingly unlikely state of affairs after a remarkable match at White Hart Lane.
The visitors led through Diego Costa’s 14th league goal of the season but a brace for Harry Kane added to efforts from Nacer Chadli, Danny Rose and Andros Townsend’s penalty, meaning Chelsea strikes from Eden Hazard and John Terry after the interval were in vain.
Afterwards, Mourinho chose to highlight the performance of referee Phil Dowd – comparing his display unfavourably with what he assessed to be a “clean performance” from colleague Martin Atkinson when the latter took charge of Chelsea’s 2-1 loss at Newcastle United last month.
The Portuguese’s comments come on the back of him pointing towards a perceived “campaign” against his team after Cesc Fabregas was denied a strong penalty shout and booked for simulation during Sunday’s 1-1 draw at Southampton.
But there was no similar flashpoint on which to pin Mourinho’s assertion of unjust “Christmas gifts” and “predictable” decisions against his team following their London derby reverse.
“We had important Christmas gifts in the last two matches, Christmas gifts that people who love football do not like,” he told BT Sport.
“I don’t want to be punished. I want to be around for the next match so I prefer to say that we just lost. Tomorrow is another day.
“Every game is unpredictable but there are things in the game that are becoming predictable.
“Of course I hate to lose but I prefer to lose like I did against Newcastle with a clean performance from referee Martin Atkinson and an unlucky performance by us. But in a game when you lose because of football is a different feeling.”
Mourinho also paid tribute to Chadli and Kane for punishing defensive errors made by his team.
“I think we made some defensive mistakes, some individual defensive mistakes,” he said. “It was not easy for my defenders to cope with Nacer Chadli and Harry Kane. It was also very difficult for Tottenham defenders to deal with an amazing Eden Hazard and good Diego Costa.
“You can speak about crucial moments of the game but I prefer to focus on the result. The players tried a lot but the fifth goal killed a bit our fantastic reaction.”
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