Tottenham coach, Mauricio Pochettino has accused his boys of joking with the second half against Southampton after his team conceeded twice in five minutes, losing the game 2-1 after a first half lead.
3rd-placed Spurs now face a battle to remain in the top-four and manager Pochettino — serving the first of a two-match touchline ban — spoke about his players’ mentality.
His words, “We need to realize if you do not fight with intensity for the Champions League, you will struggle,”
“The reality is you cannot only play for 45 minutes, we are a Champions League team, into the quarterfinals,” said Pochettino, whose side beat high-flying Borussia Dortmund 1-0 in Germany on Tuesday to complete a 4-0 aggregate win.
“When you lose the momentum after 45 minutes, that is about mentality. For us, we lost the momentum and gave them relief. It is so difficult to understand why we changed so much from the first half to the second,” Pochettino added.
“I am very disappointed, we were better in everything and then we lose the game.
“It is about competing better for the first goal if you want to be a contender for big things. The second half we did not take it seriously.”
“We are fighting against big sides [for the top four],”
“We had a big gap, welcome to the reality, we are under pressure to win games. It is a massive challenge for us.”
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