Every word Thomas Frank said on what he told Tottenham stars at half-time and why he must text Klopp

Thomas Frank applauds Tottenham fans after the win against Manchester City (Image: Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)

Thomas Frank had plenty to say in his press conference after Tottenham won 2-0 at Manchester City in the Premier League on Saturday.

City had most of the first half pressure in the opening half an hour or so but Spurs turned the game on its head on 35 minutes. Pape Matar Sarr headed on a Pedro Porro ball down the right into Richarlison's path and the Brazilian fired the ball across for Brennan Johnson to smash home with James Trafford only able to get a hand to it on its way in. The Wales international was flagged offside but VAR overruled that call on the pitch.

Tottenham's pressing then earned them a second goal before the break. City keeper James Trafford hit a short pass in his box that Sarr intercepted and while the goalkeeper managed to get a hand to the ball at Richarlison's feet, it went sideways for Joao Palhinha to smash home his first goal for the club.

City could not find a way back in the second half and it was the visitors who looked more likely to score with a string of chances for Richarlison, one for Dominic Solanke and two for Wilson Odobert as Spurs took home all three points and a clean sheet.

Our Tottenham correspondent Alasdair Gold was among those putting the questions to Frank after the game. Here's a full transcript from the press conference at the Etihad Stadium.

Another clean sheet, another three points, you must be delighted?

Thank you, yeah, very delighted. Extremely proud of the players' performance. I think it was an exceptionally good performance. I think the first 35 minutes, we know a couple of things, we know it's always difficult to play against City. Here at the Etihad it's even more difficult.

The first 35 minutes I thought was fairly even, but with City on top, I think they were more on top than us. There was a big mentality shift in terms of staying in the game and keep doing what we wanted to do, scoring a great goal. Maybe that changed a little bit of momentum, but we definitely stayed on top and went 2-0.

Second half, I think we were very good. The big spell where we could think that they would put pressure on us, I think we were very aggressive in the high pressure, that we were very front-footed, with the mindset to constantly go for the 3-0 goal.

And then, then I must say that the clean sheet makes me very happy. It's a big thing we've been working on, not on clean sheets as that's easier said than done, but on the defensive side of the game, high pressure, middle block, low block, defend the box mentality, blocking shots, everything.

Because if you get clean sheets you're closer to winning a game and also last year we had six clears, so yeah, that's very big for me.

So many good individual performances, but you've got Joao Palhinha in, scoring his first goal for the club, how important is that combination between him and Rodrigo Bentancur?

I think it's fair to say that we got a few questions about the transfer market yesterday, a lot about why not and what if and all that. What is 100% sure we brought two top players into the club, Kudos and Palhinha, both of them have performed very well, which I'm very pleased with, and then Palhinha, yeah, wow, you know, sometimes players need confidence and they need to be on top and I don't think he's fully fit yet, where I want him to be, but very pleased with his performance and he's definitely helping the team.

You were 2-0 up in the Super Cup but held on this time, what were the lessons learned?

I referenced it at half-time. When you’re tired keep going. That was one thing. Two that we had to keep being brave on the ball. Three that we had to keep being good in the high pressure. But also that’s easier said than done. But from every game you learn. From games where you don’t get the result you want, you learn maybe even more. And then I think in some ways of course the other thing was a foul, this was away at the Etihad. One of the most difficult places to go to. But the defensive principles are more and more and then I think the mentality is the key thing. You need mentality to win games like this.

You spoke yesterday about for each match you compile three key themes or principles, what were the three today?

Defensive side of the game, be brave in phase one and two and set pieces.

Did you use the Eze thing as inspiration this week or just not mention it at all?

I think that's very, very easy [to answer]. I never ever use one word about any player that's not at our club.

I think it was Jurgen Klopp who said there's no better playmaker in football than an effective press essentially, what do you make of that statement?

Yeah it was good, he was a clever man. I need to text him and say 'hey, that's awfully clever'. I definitely believe in the aggressive press as you saw today, as you saw with my Brentford team, you know, I believe in the high pressure. I believe in if we can be front footed. I like that mentality. I think it's offensive, you know, it's a more offensive way of defending and then it's more fun to defend in the opponent's half, and of course today I think we were very successful also to score a goal from it.

With Sarr in that position does he bring that effective pressing in that central role?

Yeah, definitely and you say there's a few things. It depends from game to game, players in different positions, systems, but today he was very good like the rest of the team. I think it was difficult to pick one player today. I think everyone performed fantastically.

For the first goal, you managed to beat the Man City offside trap, and it seemed to cause a lot of uncertainty, putting the ball over the top, is that something that you pinpointed to exploit?

Yeah we talked about the high line, and one thing is to talk about it and try to train it. It's never that easy. So to be fair, I think we ran into offside six times before that. So of course the goal looks very successful and that's what we look at. Well there's a few times where we didn't do it well enough, but yes, of course, we tried to do it.

You were here a couple of years ago with an outstanding performance from your Brentford team, was this performance even better given that you've only just started to put your fingerprint on this Spurs side?

I think it's two different teams, two different contexts, but I think that both performances were top and both performances, when I look back at them, I'll be very proud of.

You said you had quite a lot of questions about the transfer market in the build-up to this game, but is this performance a timely reminder that the success of a season, the success of a team is not just about what you can do in a transfer market and the players you can bring in?

Yeah, I think it's extremely important that, a couple of things that we understand we have a good group of players, a talented group players, a group of good quality players that I'm very pleased with. So that's why we brought in two good players to help. Can we improve it? Perfect. If we can't, you know, then we have very good players and we just showed that today, so yeah, very happy with that.