Tottenham defender Jan Vertonghen has insisted that his side must improve defensively as it has been a problem for them all season.
Spurs crashed out of the FA Cup on Wednesday night after losing a penalty shoot-out against Norwich City.
It comes amid mounting pressure on Jose Mourinho and his side as they continue to battle to keep up the pace in the battle for Champions League qualification.
With their FA Cup hopes over for this season, they will hope to overturn a 1-0 deficit against RB Leipzig in the second leg of their Champions League round-of-16 tie next week.
While many will arguably point towards their lack of goals, particularly with Harry Kane and Heung Min-Son currently sidelined due to injury, Vertonghen believes that they have to improve at the back.
“It is a big disappointment. We started well and I think we had chances to kill the game but we didn’t,” he said after the Norwich game, as quoted by the Daily Mail.
“It’s definitely a fact that we don’t keep enough clean sheets, that we concede too many goals. Not just now, in the last week, it’s since the start of the season, even more than a year ago we started to concede too many goals. It’s a problem we need to solve.”
Given Tottenham have the joint-worst defensive record of the top 10 teams in the Premier League standings, having conceded 39 goals in their 28 league outings, the statistics would back up Vertonghen’s point.
With Burnley away on Saturday evening, it remains to be seen if they can put those issues right and keep things tight at the back to try to secure three crucial points.
Any chance our champs league game could get cancelled due to some flu going around ? If it is I can’t see it being played to soon as numbers will only go up,could be a blessing in disguise for us .
Hard to talk about our defense shipping goals, and performance of Jan and Toby, without mentioning our lack of a true DM since Wanyama and Dembele got perma-crocked and Dier lost all his pace.
Need Sissoko back, ASAP. He’s not really a DM either, but he does a pretty good imitation of one.
Hard to keep clean sheets when you set up to play a game in your defensive third.
Toby gets his new contract and gets a cigar on… typical. Jan is still alright but needs to be used effectively these days.
Jose was meant to improve our defence, nothing happened. Then again, he didn’t play in a back four at a World Cup did he….
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Fantastic my favourite
Hope they smell nice
I think Jan has to admit to his own shortcomings in this respect.He has definitely lost what little pace he had and doesn’t seem to be spacialy aware as before.Whether this has contributed to Toby’s drop in form is debatable.Then there is a lack of decent fullbacks and the absence of a proper holding midfielder,it’s no wonder we’re shipping goals in industrial numbers.
Mourinho has an unenviable task which appears to be beyond him currently.Mid table beckons for this version of THFC.
I think Jan has to admit to his own shortcomings in this respect.He has definitely lost what little pace he had and doesn’t seem to be spacialy aware as before.Whether this has contributed to Toby’s drop in form is debatable.Then there is a lack of decent fullbacks and the absence of a proper holding midfielder,it’s no wonder we’re shipping goals in industrial numbers.
Mourinho has an unenviable task which appears to be beyond him currently.Mid table beckons for this version of THFC.
Ah so in 6 years my sheets shall be clean
I have lots of clean sheets…thats what happens when you’ve been married for 13years 🤨