Rio Ferdinand has blasted Tottenham manager Jose Mourinho for making ‘excuses’ after his side’s 1-0 defeat to Chelsea on Thursday.
Jorginho’s penalty in the first half was enough to condemn Tottenham to a third successive defeat in the Premier League, which has seen them drop to eighth place in the table.
Chelsea were dominant in the first half and finally got their breakthrough through a spot kick after Eric Dier brought down Timo Werner in the box.
Tottenham offered little in attack without the injured Harry Kane and though they improved after half-time, their one major opportunity was wasted by Carlos Vinicius as he headed wide in the closing stages of the game.
In his post-match interview, Mourinho focused on Chelsea’s penalty decision rather than finding fault with his side’s display, although he did choose to criticise Vinicius.
‘In the end, it’s the penalty that decides the game because the couple of chances they had, the couple of chances we had, in the end, it’s scoring a penalty that is not a penalty that you say in a dangerous situation, one-vs-one, almost scoring,’ Mourinho told BT Sport after the match.
‘And then in the second half I think it was much more difficult for them, we press them much better and higher, we brought a different spirit to the game and in the second half I believe we deserved a bit more.’
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After watching Mourinho’s interview, Ferdinand slammed the Portuguese manager’s ‘excuses’ and took aim at their lack of direction.
‘I just hope that his conversation and the way he talks to the team is very different to what I just saw there,’ the former Manchester United defender told BT Sport.
‘Because that was an excuses-filled interview more than anything. I understand the manager coming out and dressing down your players in public may not be the way to do it in today’s game but you really do hope those players are getting the message that’s very different to that.
‘We can talk about [Heung-min] Son and we can talk about Kane but that doesn’t come away from the fact there doesn’t seem to be any game-plan, even getting out from the back.
‘There’s no movement, there’s no game plan, there’s no direction with this team.
‘I just see people playing off the cuff, hoping to get it to Ndombele at the moment who is going to do something to get Son in, if that happens. ‘They had one shot all game and that was in the 89th minute.’
