Tottenham defender Toby Alderweireld hailed his side's 2-1 win over Southampton as 'the most important' of the season so far and said his side proved doubters wrong about their unity.
Serge Aurier's first-half red card and Hugo Lloris's error gifting the Saints an equaliser threatened to derail Spurs again, but the team rallied and secured the three points with an impressive performance.
Speaking to the press after the match, Alderweireld said that the game showed Spurs are not divided and that hopefully that's the end of the matter.
"You know in the press everyone is talking about ‘There’s not a unit in the dressing room, it’s all gone wrong,’ it’s not like this," he said. "I think we haven’t played badly.
"We're now in a little bit of a corner where it hasn’t happened for us and we have to grind for the results, and I think like today, again it would have been an easy game to lose today but to get this result it showed a lot of character from the lads.
"We said at half time, ‘this is the moment to prove that we are a team,’ and it was important to get three points today, and more important not the way we played on the ball, but off the ball. I think we today we showed everybody wants to fight for the team and wants to get good results and I think today we showed that.
Alderweireld also praised Lloris for putting his mistake behind him and producing a big performance in the second half.
"Of course, if you play against 10 men for 45 minutes, you know there are going to be some chances for them but I think Hugo did very well second half and as a team, unbelievable credit to us," he said.
Spurs host Bayern Munich in the Champions League on Tuesday night, and Alderweireld says their run to the final last season has changed their mindset about the competition.
"We took some steps, before we were happy to just play those games, now we’re not happy with that, we want to get results," he said. "Of course, we were disappointed with the last result but we didn’t lose [against Olympiacos] and in the home games we’re going to try and win, so we’re going to give 100%."
Source :
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