Thomas Frank engaged with the latest criticisms that have come his way after Tottenham drew 0-0 at Brentford, still looking for successive Premier League wins for the first time since August.
The Dane has set out to instil defensive discipline in his side, and he was happy to see Spurs keep successive clean sheets across two London derbies away from home. However, the lifelessness and lack of chance creation from his camp have become an all too regular sight for many supporters.
“It seemed like [the fans] were not too satisfied and it's fair when we don't hit that top performance overall, but it's double-sided because I think what we need to understand is the acknowledgement of the defensive side of the game, which we've done excellent today against a team that just scored three against Liverpool, three against Man United, so on and so on. The offensive part needs to be better.
“We need to play, it's not that we don't want to play offensive or attacking football. I just think when we're not on the top of the game we would like to be, we work very, very hard on that, but while you work hard on that you can't, if you struggle scoring goals, let's say that, or create enough chances, you can't open up too much because then you need to score too many goals. So, it's a fine balance.
“You'd prefer everyone is happy and we're winning 3-0. I think the understanding of where we are right now, as a team, and as a club. That's the transparent view of it. I think we have to play with Archie Gray as a 10 - or I decided to do that - we did a little bit different at the end of the game.
“That's just step by step, we do those things. I'm very confident we will make it fluent and better and scoring enough goals, but with the amount of games and limited training times and the right offensive players available, that's part of it, it's no problem.
“This league is so tight, just look at the results today and two days ago. So tight, so even, small margins that change games. So I think we put a lot of foundation work into those two performances and competitiveness that you need to have in the team. Then we need to add the next layers.
“It's not that we're not working on it. It is what it is. I know we'll get to where we want to go. Maybe not exactly where everyone wanted to be right now, but we'll get there."