Tottenham boss Thomas Frank sorry for 'extremely painful' defeat to Arsenal in north London derby drubbing

Tottenham boss Thomas Frank sorry for 'extremely painful' defeat to Arsenal in north London derby drubbing - 'We can only apologise'

Tottenham manager Thomas Frank said he was sorry for the 4-1 defeat to Arsenal at the Emirates on Sunday in the north London derby. He said the performance was "not good enough", with those sentiments echoed by the club's goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario, who then looked ahead to his side's UEFA Champions League tie at Paris Saint-Germain on Wednesday, live on TNT Sports and discovery+.

Tottenham manager Thomas Frank apologised for the "extremely painful" 4-1 defeat to Arsenal in the north London derby on Sunday.

Spurs slumped to defeat at the Emirates in a loss that has left them sitting ninth, though they could end Monday in 10th depending on the result between Manchester United and Everton.

Richarlison grabbed a second-half goal for the visitors, but it was not enough to cancel out Eberechi Eze’s hat-trick and Leandro Trossard’s opener for Arsenal.

Frank has come under pressure for some underwhelming performances since his arrival from Brentford in the summer, and the manner of the defeat will do little to quell any dissatisfaction amongst the club’s supporters.

Speaking to Sky Sports after the loss, he did not make any excuses and said the performance was not to the required standards.

He said: "I think it is extremely painful. I won't talk away from that. It was a bad performance. It was completely the opposite of what the intention was when we came here. We can only apologise to the fans for the performance.

"I think, no matter if both teams wanted to play short, they got more out of that, and we couldn't get out. When the team went long, we didn't win enough duels. That is exemplified by the 2-0 goal and the 3-0 goal, where a player went through two or three players.

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"I have seen a lot of character and fight in this team, but we didn't win enough duels. We can call that whatever we want, but we didn't win enough.

"I tried to play a 5-4-1. I will always take responsibility as it's my choice in the end to take the system, and we changed it at half-time. My view on it is that no matter what formation we played today, we don't have enough duels or intensity in the decisive moments, and it is very difficult to win a football match.

"The goals I want to see more in detail. The whole game, I need to watch tonight, and it will be a difficult watch. We were not aggressive and stepped forward when we could, and they played it round us."

Asked about his team’s struggles to create chances, he added: "That has been an ongoing theme that we are working hard to improve. It doesn't look good today or against Chelsea. We need to keep working on it.

"There were a lot of things in this game we need to do better. We are four months into it, and they are further in their journey as a team and that was very obvious today. Of course, there will be noise. We played against our biggest rivals and we lost badly.

"But we keep the noise out and we focus. I know this team is very competitive, and we showed that against Man City and PSG [in the UEFA Super Cup]. Of course, it looks bad today, and it was not good enough."

'We didn't fight' - Vicario sorry for defeat

Tottenham goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario echoed his manager’s thoughts, but looked ahead to their trip on Wednesday night in Paris, when they play current Champions League holders Paris Saint-Germain.

He told Sky Sports: "A very bad night for us. First of all, we have to apologise to the people that support us every day. They expected us to fight and today we didn't fight. That's not negotiable to do in football at this level.

"It's a tough night, a very bad defeat, but we have to stick together. We have a big night on Wednesday, but we need to stick together. Tonight we didn't show the things we are normally capable of.

"The emotions are high, but we need cool heads and apologise to the people that support us and have travelled today.

"I think we waited too much to get into the game. We were too passive. The game plan we prepared was different.

"Today we didn't fight. We have to apologise, first of all, for this. But we have to stick together and move on because on Wednesday we have a big night."

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