Despite a number of Watford players appearing alarmingly under par in yesterday's 4-1 mauling by Tottenham Hotspur, defender Christian Kabasele insists his team-mates gave their all against Mauricio Pochettino's men.

The Belgium defender played the final 11 minutes of the crushing loss by which time Walter Mazzarri's team had long given up any hope of getting something from their first game of 2017.

But it was more the manner of the defeat than succumbing to a slick Spurs side which will prove most alarming for the Italian head coach.

That is, however, not an opinion shared by Kabasele, who felt the Hornets had given their all.

He said: "We try every game to give 100% but in this game Tottenham were simply better than us. We see that there is a big difference between the teams, and we didn’t have an answer to their challenge.

"Every time you concede a goal, it’s annoying. That’s for everybody, not only defenders but the fault of everybody, just like it’s thanks to everybody if we score.

"We need to find the solution together and recover as fast as we can to go to Stoke."

Kabasele also admitted confidence in the camp had been low after a 20-minute spell which saw Spurs take a four-goal lead at Vicarage Road.

He said: "When you lose 4-0 after 46 minutes, the confidence is not there but we are professional footballers and we need to work and switch off from this game. We need to prepare for Tuesday in the best way possible."

There are not a lot of teams who have several important players injured at the same time. We don’t have the luck with us at the moment - we don’t have luck with us at the moment and keep players fit for Tuesday.