José Mourinho Launches Passionate Defence of Spurs But Claims 'Dead' Team Are in Trouble

​Tottenham Hotspur head coach José Mourinho has leapt to the defence of his side after they fell to a 1-0 loss to RB Leipzig on Wednesday, but confessed that his team are in real trouble for the rest of the season.

With both Harry Kane and Son Heung-min sidelined with injury, Spurs have been left incredibly short in attack. The likes of Lucas Moura and Steven Bergwijn have played plenty of minutes, while second-half substitute Érik Lamela played without having even returned to training following an injury.

Erik Lamela

During the game, ​Spurs were incredibly flat in the first half, but showed signs of improvement in the second half once Lamela and Tanguy Ndombele had been introduced from the bench. During a post-match interview with ​BT Sport, it was suggested that 'the real Spurs' only showed up after the break, and Mourinho wasn't happy.

"What do you mean by 'the real Spurs'? Come on, let's be loyal to the boys and tell them they did everything they could do," he began.

"Lamela - you know how many training sessions with the team? Zero. Direct from injury to recovery with physios and then direct to 20 minutes in the ​Champions League.

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"There are two perspectives - an amazing group and amazing guys but another side you see how we are at the moment. It's a situation like going to fight with a gun without bullets.


"I know Lamela could only give us 20 minutes and I knew Ndombele could not play for 90 minutes. I tried to manage the pieces I had. Don't tell me ​Lamela and Ndombele could have started the game, they couldn't have started the game."


Mourinho went on to admit that he is seriously concerned by the fitness of his depleted side, with many players already struggling to cope.


"I'm not worried with the 1-0 - we can go there and win. What worries me is that these are our players for the next however many matches," he said.

Lucas Moura - Soccer Midfielder - Born 1992

"Moura was absolutely dead, Bergwijn was absolutely dead, Lo Celso was absolutely dead. We are really in trouble. If it was just this game I'd say no problem but we have FA Cup and ​Premier League games."


Finally, he also took a shot at BT Sport. Saturday's meeting with ​Chelsea was brought forward to enable it to be broadcast by the network, and Mourinho was very unimpressed with the lack of rest that will give his team.


"Here we go Chelsea, drinking sparkling water with lemon and watching the game on TV," he said. "Saturday morning, thank you [the interviewer] very much for the choice."


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Source : 90min