Hugo Lloris admits Spurs are 'a mess' as humiliated keeper explains why he was subbed at half-time in Newcastle mauling

• Magpies hit five in opening 21 minutes
• French keeper offered little resistance
• World Cup winner now nursing a knock

WHAT HAPPENED? The French goalkeeper was hooked during the break at St James’ Park after being beaten on five occasions in the opening 21 minutes. He was replaced by Fraser Forster, but Spurs were breached again after the interval during a forgettable showing against fellow top-four hopefuls. Lloris claims that he was taken off due to injury, with the World Cup winner not expecting a positive update on the fitness front.

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WHAT THEY SAID: Lloris told Sky Sports of his early withdrawal: “My injury does not sound good, I don’t know if it’s a muscle but around the hip when I kicked. It doesn’t sound good.”

THE BIGGER PICTURE: Lloris hardly covered himself in glory during the 45 minutes that he was on the field against Newcastle, but Spurs were well short of the expected standard as a collective and their club captain admits that things need to improve quickly. Lloris added: “It’s very embarrassing. We should apologise to the fans. We didn’t show a good face and we could not match the performance of the Newcastle players. We were late in all aspects of the game and we completely missed the first part of the game. The second half is a different story but it’s really painful. It is not even about tactics, we just could not fight and we were late. I think Newcastle just had a great performance, they were very aggressive and offensive everywhere they had the ball. It is difficult right now to assess the performances but there was a lack of pride. You can get punched once or twice, but it was like we could not even react or bounce back. Newcastle deserve a lot of credit for starting the game at 100 miles per hour. They knew exactly what to do. We can try to find excuses and analyse the performances but the first thing is we miss the fight. In football if you go on the pitch without the desire to show aggressiveness makes things very hard. It was a bit of a mess on the field.”

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WHAT NEXT? Things are not about to get any easier for Tottenham – who are six points adrift of the Champions League places and only four clear of Brighton in eighth – as their next two Premier League games are set to see them face Manchester United and Liverpool.