Tottenham players hold post-match talks after relegation fears deepen

Dominic Solanke has urged his Tottenham team-mates to take responsibility and realise the situation they are in after the club’s relegation fears heightened on Thursday.

Solanke’s 34th-minute opener at home to Crystal Palace momentarily put Spurs four points clear of the bottom three, but Micky van de Ven’s inexplicable sending-off for a pull on Ismaila Sarr changed the match.

Sarr scored the resulting penalty and Palace struck twice more in first-half stoppage time to consign Tottenham to a fifth consecutive defeat, which extended their winless Premier League run to a club record of 11.

Only one point above 18th-placed West Ham, Solanke acknowledged the critical scenario last season’s Europa League winners are in and revealed a post-match meeting with the squad took place.

Spurs turn attention to the Champions League with a last-16 first leg tie at Atletico Madrid on Tuesday, but Solanke called for a group missing 10 players to step up in the Premier League.

“Yeah, another difficult one to take. Before the game, we looked at the game thinking we definitely needed to win, but it’s another game that has passed now and we need to realise the position we’re in,” Solanke told SpursPlay.

“It was difficult circumstances (with 10 men) but we’ve had a chat between us and we need to understand we need to improve and improve now.

“It is difficult and hard to say with just words, we need to show it on the pitch but it’s something we need to do as soon as possible.

“We obviously need to realise the position that we are in. We know it’s been so difficult this season with the injuries, but we can’t change that now.

“Us players on the pitch need to take responsibility and ultimately change it as soon as possible.

“It’s difficult just speaking, but we need to realise the position we’re in and we need to fight for every game. Fight for every result and there is not many games left, so we need to start (winning) soon.

“I think we need to look forward to the next games. We need to see what is going wrong on the pitch, debrief that and change, but we’re not in a position to dwell on anything now.

“We need to make sure next game we’re going to be at it, see where we can improve and see what we can do to change this form around.”