Igor Tudor has implored his struggling squad to shed a “victim” mentality and ignore external “b******s” in a desperate bid to galvanise them ahead of Sunday’s challenging trip to Liverpool.
The rallying cry follows a period of intense pressure on Tottenham’s interim head coach, whose tenure has commenced with a club-record four consecutive defeats.
This dire run includes a humiliating 5-2 Champions League loss to Atletico Madrid on Tuesday, a match marred by a “shambolic” opening where backup goalkeeper Antonin Kinsky was substituted after just 17 minutes following two disastrous errors.
The defeat marked Tottenham’s sixth consecutive loss this year, another unwanted club record, intensifying scrutiny on Tudor.
Tudor said: “Not easy situation, not an easy moment and from other side a big challenge to change things.
“Like everything in life, you can choose how to see the situation. So, you can stay and cry or you can fight.
“You can be the victim or you can say I can change something. This is the message I want to start and what I told to the players.
“Everyone speaking, everyone has opinions and the life is always how you see it. The bottle is always half empty or half full.
“Here there is nothing full, there is a lot of empty things but difficult moments don’t last forever. It will pass and I believe the players who will take this as a challenge, as an opportunity will stand up with the courage to change things, after this period they will become better people and better players.
“So, in tough moments it’s always about that, it’s always about us. In the last period, a lot of things about what is the club, the problems, no one can do nothing and this like victim-ism, like we were victims.
“I said this morning to the players totally opposition things. We are the team and we are the staff. It’s all about us. All the b*******, all the other things are b******* and sorry to use this word, but it’s on us.
“I do every day this work. Psychology work. It is important also to give the courage to the team-mates. Some of them they cannot manage, for sure. Somewhere you arrive and you can help them.
“My goal is to find if I can help to do 18 players out of 20, 15? I don’t know how much? Sometimes you cannot do anything, but most of the time you can do even small changes.
“Small help, you know, you can do it, but also it’s what I always like to say to the players, don’t be a victim.
“Don’t think it’s not about me. You know that can be the problem more than all these things about Tottenham and club, you know, like magic on the club, like bad black magic and these other b*******, you know. So this is about what I want to send a message.”
