Jose Mourinho admits "nobody is happy" at Manchester United following last Sunday's 3-2 loss at Brighton and has warned similar mistakes would cost them against Tottenham.
Mourinho pointed to their home victory against Leicester on the opening day of the season as an example of winning as a result of less sloppiness at the back, and has warned they will need a similar performance to beat Spurs on Monday.
"You know, just looking to Leicester and Brighton," he told MUTV. "Against Leicester we didn't make mistakes, we played well, we won. Against Brighton, we made mistakes, we paid for the mistakes and we lost.
"So, I think you look at football in a very pragmatic way, normally you get what you deserve, so if we want to win against a good team against Tottenham, we cannot make mistakes."
After a disappointing start to the season, Mourinho said he and his players are itching to set the record straight.
"I think nobody is happy, obviously," he said. "But I have enough experience to know that in football you cannot look back for good results, for bad results and you have always to look to the next one. That's our life.
"So, I'm really happy with the work we did in the week, with the players' commitment and I look forward for the game.
"You can look at [having to wait until Monday] from two different perspectives. By one side I would say yes but, on another side, I would say we need time to work and some time to try to recover some players from injury, so it was not bad for us."
Alexis Sanchez, Nemanja Matic and Antonio Valencia could all return for United after recovering from injuries.
United have an excellent home record against Spurs, particularly since Mauricio Pochettino took charge, winning this fixture 1-0 on the last three occasions and 3-0 once before that.
Mourinho says he hopes to keep up United's tradition of performing well in big games.
"That's what we tried to do the last season," he said. "In big matches last season we managed to get lots of good results, which in the end are points like the other points in the other matches. But for the supporters normally it has a little different feeling."