Tottenham Hotspur’s campaign hit an untimely bump earlier in today’s North London derby with a 2-0 defeat at the hands of Arsenal at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Read the match report here, the player ratings here, or have your say on the match via the Vital Spurs fan forum here. Here, you will find excerpts of Antonio Conte’s post-match reaction to the defeat.
Speaking to SPURSPLAY via the club’s official website, Conte started by stating his disappointment at the defeat, given the historical significance of the fixture:
“For sure, I’m disappointed and I’m sorry for our fans because I know the importance of this game. It’s a tough day because we are talking about a bad result, about a loss”, said Conte.
Conte then began to dissect the match by focusing on the positives, predominantly that his side had multiple chances to score either side of Arsenal’s decisive first-half goals:
“I think the performance was good because I think we started the game in the right way, in a strong way, but then we conceded a goal and after this, we had the opportunity to level the game with Sonny but the Arsenal keeper made a fantastic save and instead of going to 1-1, we conceded a second goal.”
Indeed, shortly after Hugo Lloris’ own goal, Heung-min Son, after being played in by Ryan Sessegnon, was thwarted by Aaron Ramsdale, before Martin Odegaard doubled Arsenal’s lead 15 minutes or so later.
Ramsdale would go on to make a host of impressive stops to keep Spurs at bay, particularly in the early second half, including a notable save from close range to deny Sessegnon. Conte cited the second-half response from Spurs as a big positive from a day where they were few and far between, and praised Ramsdale for keeping his side at bay in search of their search for the goal that would ultimately elude them:
“The second goal could kill everybody, but instead I think we had a great reaction in the second half because we didn’t lose our heads. In this type of situation, the risk is to start to play, to lose the distance and to lose the balance and then instead of recovering the result, you risk conceding other goals.
“Instead, I think we created other chances to score. We were unlucky because after a few minutes, we had the chance to go 2-1.
“I think their keeper was the best player on the pitch today. That means that we tried to attack, we tried to create chances, but now we have to move on as we know that on Thursday we have another tough game against City.”
Conte was then quizzed about how he addressed the players at half-time in response to the shambolic manner in which the first half unravelled, stating that he urged his players to stay positive and maintain a level of focus until the end to ensure that the contest did not fly away from them. Even though the final outcome was not ultimately the desired one, Conte was proud of his players for heeding these instructions:
Antonio Conte