Aston Villa's Ollie Watkins gives Tottenham thrashing verdict

All eyes were on Villa Park as fourth hosted fifth, with Unai Emery’s side edging the first half before being blown away by swashbuckling Spurs after the break.

James Maddison and Brennan Johnson goals were followed by Villa skipper John McGinn receiving a straight red card for a reckless challenge on Destiny Udogie.

There was no coming back from that sending off, with Son Heung-min and substitute Timo Werner completing a 4-0 hammering in stoppage time.

“Really disappointing,” Villa striker Watkins said. “First half I felt we had a few opportunities on the break, I had an opportunity myself, I’ve chopped back, maybe I should shoot.

“But I felt in the first half they didn’t cause us too many problems, I think they had one corner.

“Second half we’ve come out a little bit slow and they’re always quick coming out in the second half.

“They’ve scored two goals really quickly and it’s very difficult against a good side to come back from 2-0. Obviously, with our captain getting sent off as well, it was difficult.”

The result saw Spurs cut the gap to fourth-placed Villa to two points on a day when Emery’s men had the chance to extend their advantage to an eye-watering eight points.

Watkins’ disappointment was clear after the heavy home loss but there will be no wallowing in self-pity after what he believed was just a bump in the road.

“The ref said he checked it but (Micky Van De Ven) has definitely caught my Achilles there,” the England international said.

“Then I felt another one, from I think it was Pedro Porro, in the early five minutes of the game, which is not great trying to run it off.

“But that’s no excuse for a poor performance from myself, I can definitely do better and, as a team, we can do better.

“But this doesn’t define us, this game doesn’t define our season.

“We’ve done unbelievable to get where we are, really proud of all the boys, we’ve still got a lot of football to play. So, this game doesn’t define our season.”