Jose Mourinho stood by his tactics after Manchester United's 3-0 loss to Tottenham on Monday, the largest margin of defeat at home of the manager's career.
Goals early in the second half from Harry Kane and Lucas Moura had Spurs up 2-0 inside of eight minutes of the restart.
But Mourinho thought his side still had a chance to rally until Lucas put matters to rest five minutes from full-time.
"The [score] was 2-0 but the team was in the game, and I think everyone could feel one goal could change the direction of the game," Mourinho told Sky.
"I felt Tottenham felt it, I think we were feeling that too. But then the third goal came and killed the game.
"We work all week, and by the strategic point of view we didn't lose, by the tactical point of view we didn't lose, but we lost the game."
Before entering the tunnel after the game, Mourinho spent an extended moment on the sideline applauding the United fans who stayed through the 90 minutes.
He spoke glowingly of the support while also aiming a dig at media coverage that has already veered towards the negative after last week's 3-2 defeat at Brighton.
"All our fans don't read papers, all our fans don't watch television, all our fans are more intelligent than that," Mourinho said. "They answered in an absolute amazing way. I don't think it's normal for a team to lose a game and for the supporters to react like that."
Mourinho proceeded to take further issue with journalists in his postgame news conference, eventually walking out while repeating the word "respect."