Guglielmo Vicario has spoken about his failed attempt to rouse the travelling Tottenham supporters after the 1-0 Europa League defeat in Alkmaar.
Spurs' season now revolves around the European competition and in a big round of 16 first leg clash, the north London side came up short by a long distance and the single-goal deficit - due to Lucas Bergvall's own goal - for the second leg flatters them.
The visitors only registered a single shot on target against AZ and it's debatable whether Wilson Odobert's second-half effort was a miss-hit cross anyway that needed to be parried out by the goalkeeper.
After the dismal display, Vicario, one of the few Spurs players to come out of the game with any credit with his saves, led the way over to the 950 travelling supporters and attempted to call on them to continue their support by passionately raising his arms up in the air repeatedly.
It was a miscalculated move and the surprised supporters hit back with angry words towards Vicario and the group of players who had followed him. The goalkeeper looked disappointed at the reaction and walked off from the group towards the tunnel.
It's not the first time the Tottenham players have put in a poor performance and then had to take the disappointed feedback from the understandably upset fans. Vicario admitted afterwards that he could appreciate the frustration among the fans in his failed attempt to bring them together.
"I can understand the disappointment for the night because we didn't play our football," he said. "So I can understand the frustration of the fans, but we still have a lot to play for, especially in the second leg. It's just a way of trying to stay together because we have the opportunity to go through to the next round.
"They can [be critical]. They have to be, they must be disappointed for the game we played tonight but we still have another game to play against AZ at our place, so it's the moment to stick together now because we can go through this round."
Ahead of next week's second leg at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, where the tie can still be salvaged despite the woeful display in Alkmaar, Vicario added: "We need [the fans] every game, home and away. We know they are very important for us and now is a big moment of the season and with them we can play with one more man on the pitch so it's so important.
"I can really understand the disappointment they had because we didn't show our level of football tonight. It's disappointing for us but we have to analyse and forget, and be ready for the next round."
Vicario admitted that he is baffled by the inconsistency of this Tottenham team this season, which has recorded some big wins but far too many defeats with 18 now in all competitions this campaign.
"I don't know. It could be whichever reason but we know what we have to do but for us tonight is very disappointing," he said. "We take the responsibility for what happened but now we're going to show the real Spurs in the next game.
"The performance is nowhere near the level we should have played this game. We know, it's frustrating. The result of course is not great, but we have to play the second leg, so it's on us. Now we have to analyse but also forget straight away this game. We have a big game on Sunday and ready for the second leg next Thursday.
"They created some good chances but the result is 1-0. So we have to play at our place next Thursday."
Despite the display in the Netherlands, Vicario still believes Tottenham can go all the way in the Europa League.
"Of course. We have to think game by game, as we thought we had to do in this game, and we didn't," he said. "It's really disappointing from our perspective but I can understand the fans out there, but now we have to play another game. There's still everything in our hands and we can reverse the result."
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