Ange Postecoglou has said the responsibility lies with him after Tottenham crashed to a third consecutive Premier League defeat at Chelsea.
The top-four hopes of the north Londoners suffered another setback after a meek performance against their capital rivals, with Chelsea well worth the three points as goals from Trevoh Chalobah and Nicolas Jackson sealed a 2-0 win at Stamford Bridge.
Defeat made it three successive losses for Spurs, following damaging results against Newcastle and Arsenal.
Spurs looked out-of-sorts throughout and now face an uphill battle to reach the Champions League, with a seven-point gap to Aston Villa and just one game in hand.
Postecoglou said Spurs lacked belief and aggression in their game and said the blame lies with him after a disappointing defeat.
“It wasn’t a good night,” he said at his post-match press conference.
“We certainly didn’t play anywhere near the levels we needed to get a result here tonight. That’s disappointing. I guess the responsibility lies with me to get that right.
“We didn’t have any belief or conviction in our football. It’s fair to say that’s been missing for a little while so, again, that’s my responsibility and up to me to fix.
“We’re lacking some conviction, some belief in our football and, look, I’ve got to take responsibility for that, I’m the one preparing the team and I’ve got to have a look at how I’m doing that.
“Like I said, we lacked a real sort of conviction and positive mindset in our football. We didn’t really have any fluency, any sort of aggression with and without the ball. It’s a bit unlike us because if nothing else we’ve always been competitive, especially in the first half, it was missing today.”
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