Mauricio Pochettino insisted that Tottenham deserved more than another loss to Chelsea after watching his team surrender an early lead at Stamford Bridge and suffer their first Premier League defeat of the season.
A spectacular goal from Christian Eriksen gave Spurs a deserved lead in the 11th minute, but Pedro Rodriguez equalised for Chelsea against the run of play with a similarly impressive strike just before half-time and Victor Moses completed the Blues' comeback with the winner shortly after the break.
The result sees Chelsea return to the top of the Premier League after their seventh consecutive victory, while Tottenham's winless run at Stamford Bridge now stretches to 31 matches in all competitions.
"If we analyse the game, we were better than the team that comes [into this match] in very good form," Pochettino told BT Sport. "I think we competed very well in the first half and it was a little bit unlucky how we conceded the goal.
"I think we deserved more -- maybe to go into half-time at 2-0, 3-0 or 1-0, but never 1-1. In the second half we conceded another goal and then we fought, we competed and had chances to score a second goal, but it was impossible.
"We need to be quite disappointed for the result but I think we need to be pleased for the performance and for the way we competed, because we competed against a very good team and I had nothing to say about [the performance] to my players.
"If you put aside the result, I think we have the possession, we have more attempts than Chelsea and all the stats are for us. But football is not only stats, it's about being clinical. They scored [a second goal] and for us it was impossible, but I think it was a very competitive game."
Tottenham have now won just one of their last 10 matches in all competitions and remain fifth in the Premier League, seven points adrift of Chelsea. Pochettino says he expects a reaction from his players when they welcome Swansea City to White Hart Lane on Saturday.
"We feel disappointed in the game we lost," he added. "It's tough to compete in the Premier League and be at the top in the Champions League. We failed that but now we need to look ahead. We have one week to prepare the game against Swansea and we need to recover.
"But we need to be quiet because the performance was good, we showed that are a team that will compete well. We recovered that and that is very important."