Frank takes responsibility for 'painful' North London derby defeat

Tottenham boss Thomas Frank shouldered all responsibility for his team's crushing 4-1 defeat to rivals Arsenal in the North London derby, a result he described as "painful". 

Frank watched on as Eberechi Eze's hat-trick, the first in this fixture in the Premier League era, and Leandro Trossard's early strike compounded them to a fourth league loss. 

Having gone 3-0 down, Richarlison's sensational 55th-minute shot from distance offered hope of a comeback, but Eze completed his treble with a fine finish 21 minutes later. 

Indeed, after conceding the opening goal in just three of their first nine top-flight games this season (W5 D2 L2), Spurs have done so in each of their last three matches (D1 L2).

Arsenal's impressive victory, which moved them six points clear at the top of the table, was their joint-biggest over their London rivals, further piling the pressure on Frank. 

"It's extremely painful – I won't walk away from that," Frank, whose side have now lost three of their last five league games, told Sky Sports.

"We can only apologise to the fans for that performance. It was a bad performance. I've seen a lot of character and fight in this team, but we didn't win enough duels."

In an attempt to nullify Arsenal's free-flowing attack, Frank switched to a three-man defence of Micky van de Ven, Cristian Romero and Kevin Danso from the start. 

But that tactical alteration failed to pay off when Trossard squeezed the ball past Guglielmo Vicario before Eze netted his first of the game in the 41st minute of proceedings. 

The Tottenham boss reverted to his usual back four after the break, with Danso replaced by Xavi Simons, but Eze brought up his brace 25 seconds into the half before sealing his hat-trick 14 minutes from time. 

"I will always take responsibility for my choice," Frank continued when asked about his decision to change his formation. 

"My view on it is that no matter what formation we played, we didn't have enough duels or intensity in the decisive moments, [which makes it] very difficult to win a football match."

It is not the first time this season that Spurs have struggled in the final third, with Frank's team managing just three shots on Sunday, only two of which were on target. 

Spurs have recorded the two lowest expected goals (xG) totals in a Premier League game this season, 0.07 against Arsenal and 0.1 against Chelsea at the start of November.

Indeed, in the Premier League this season, only Aston Villa (10.9), Sunderland (10.6) and Burnley (8.7) rank lower for xG than Spurs (11.2). 

"It has been an ongoing theme that we are working hard to improve," added Frank, whose side visit European champions Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League on Wednesday.

"It doesn't look good today, or against Chelsea. There will be noise – we played against our biggest rivals, and we lost badly – but we'll keep noise out and focus.

"I know this team is competitive. Of course, it looks bad, it was not good enough."