Coyle bemoans Clarets errors

Burnley boss Owen Coyle felt his side's Carling Cup defeat by Tottenham was 'self-inflicted'.

The Clarets face an uphill battle to reach the final after going down 4-1 at White Hart Lane, despite leading 1-0 at half-time.

Second-half goals from Michael Dawson, Jamie O'Hara, Roman Pavlyuchenko and Michael Duff's own goal turned the game on its head after Martin Paterson had given the Championship club a first-half lead.

Coyle was unhappy with his side's defending as they capitulated to Spurs after the break.

"I think it happened [the defeat] because it was self-inflicted," Coyle told Sky Sports News. "I have to say we were terrific in the first half and they did everything we asked of the lads.

"They were well warned at half-time to expect Tottenham to come out with their tails up, but each goal when you look back at it was self-inflicted.

"It was just basic errors and we paid a heavy price. At this level when you are playing against the quality Tottenham have the margins of error are minimal and we really did conspire to shoot ourselves in the foot.

"I think when you analyse the game we certainly weren't a deficit of three goals in the game, we were far better than that but the bottom line is we have conceded very, very soft goals."

Rallying call

Coyle admits his troops face a massive task in the second leg at Turf Moor on 21st January if they are to reach Wembley, but the Scot insists his side will give it their all.

"We will never give up, we have a good set of lads and have a great spirit about us," added Coyle.

"It is an unbelievable task to try and beat Tottenham 3-0 and if we are able to replicate the 45 minutes for 90 minutes then we would have a chance.

"We are always positive, we will go to win game and see where it takes us but they are a good side but I think we showed especially in first half we are also a good side."