Roberto De Zerbi refuses to speak to Tottenham players, calls on 'leaders' to 'lead'

LONDON -- Tottenham coach Roberto De Zerbi called on the "leaders" in the squad to "lead the team" as he criticized the manner in which they conceded the first two of Aston Villa's goals during the visitors' 3-2 win in north London on Saturday.

Goals from Johan Manzambi, Nicolas Jackson and Emi Buendia proved too much to overcome despite a late second-half fightback from Spurs that saw them score their first and second goals of the Premier League season.

This is Spurs' worst start to a Premier League season after five games, with two points and a goal difference of minus-6, eclipsing their poor start to the 2008-09 campaign (two points, minus-3 goal difference).

Spurs were on top in the opening exchanges but missed several presentable opportunities to open the scoring and were ultimately punished for their profligacy when Manzambi broke the deadlock on the stroke of halftime.

His goal came seconds after play was restarted following Micky van de Ven's facial injury which saw him leave the pitch for further treatment. With their captain off the pitch, Spurs' 10 men duly conceded a sloppy goal.

Things got worse in the second half after Mohammed Kudus had an equalizer ruled out for offside in the buildup when Jackson doubled Villa's lead thanks to some poor Spurs defending.

"I don't want to speak about the first half," De Zerbi said in a postmatch news conference. "When we dominate the game, we create more chances to score. We play well. I want to speak why or better. I don't want to speak, but my focus is why we concede the first goal [when we have] 10 players just for one minute.

"In that situation we can stay stronger, we can communicate more and more and more. We can defend in a compact way. I put Bentancur as a center back in that minute and Mateus Fernandes as a midfielder. So if we bring a red card, we can play 40 minutes, 70 minutes, 60 minutes with 10 players and what is the problem?

"And then in the second half we scored the goal with Kudus offside. I don't know if some players lost energy, but we conceded one unacceptable goal from a goal kick."

De Zerbi cut a frustrated figure on the sideline for much of the contest, pulling his T-shirt over his face as his players failed to find the back of the net in the first half and sitting with his hands on his head in the dugout as Villa took control of the match in the second.

The Italian continued: "We knew before the game because this season Aston Villa are playing 86% more long balls than last season. And we spoke in many, many meetings yesterday and two days ago.

"To that we have to explain another game like Newcastle where we played the first half well, 60 minutes OK. And then we lose for sure. ... It is my responsibility. ... I take my responsibility. But in that moment of the game when the game is different than ball possession, than playing in the last third because we can't play 90 minutes in the last third like the first half, because there is an opponent -- Aston Villa is not a so bad team. It's a good team, good players.

"The moment when we have to defend, we have to defend compact. The leaders have to be leaders and to lead the team."

De Zerbi later added that he had opted not to speak to his players in the aftermath of Saturday's defeat.

Aston Villa have won as many domestic matches at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium (three) in the past year as Tottenham.

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"Today I am very disappointed, very sad and very frustrated for the performance because we can't lose this game in this way, absolutely," De Zerbi said.

"We can't concede the second goal. We can't lose balance just because in the first half we are losing. In the beginning of the second half, I spoke with the four attackers to use the head, [stay] calm. It was Minute 50, 51, all second half, calm, play, enjoy and don't take risk. We take space or when we go in the last third with more attention. But the goal we considered, the second goal, was incredible."

Spurs face a three-week wait for another opportunity to win their first game of the Premier League season when they face Manchester United at Old Trafford on Oct. 10 after the extended international break.