Ange Postecoglou called for his injury-hit Tottenham squad not to be judged on their performances and said criticism of his side is "agenda-driven" after being knocked out of the FA Cup by Aston Villa.

Spurs' hopes of lifting a domestic trophy this season were ended in the space of four days and now their only chance of silverware remains in the Europa League having lost to Liverpool in the Carabao Cup semi-finals on Thursday.

Tottenham were without 11 first-team players for their defeat at Villa Park and Postecoglou passionately defended his squad's efforts, referring to Liverpool's much-changed side being beaten at the Championship's bottom club Plymouth on Sunday.

"Take them out of any team," he said. "How did Liverpool go today? And they just did that for one game. Do that for two and a half months. Any team, do that for two and a half months in multiple competitions.

"I don't care about me, people will judge me or whatever. But you can't judge this group of players on what's happened. They've given everything. Two 18-year-olds, a 17-year-old, a 19-year-old and a 21-year-old goalkeeper starting against one of the best teams in the country at home.

"They [Villa] had a week off, they didn't play on Thursday night against Liverpool. We did. Same group of players, not a change. You can't measure this group of players on that and their performance. It's too easy for people to be critical of them. I have huge admiration and respect for them."

Asked whether he would get the time to show what this squad could do, Postecoglou said: "I'm not talking about me. People can judge me, they can say I've done a bad job, I'm not up to it or whatever, that's fine.

"What I'm saying is you can't be critical of players and players' performance during this time. If you do, then do that with everyone else when they've got nine or 10 or 11 players out - none of them have - and for every game.

"I'm not just saying we had to do it today. We've been doing this since the middle of November. You can't judge the performance of these players or critique them on what they've done. All they've done is give all they can and that's all you can ask for.

"My responsibility at this club is this group of players and team to get them to play in the manner I want them to that will bring us success. Whether people think I can do that or not is for others to judge but there's got to be a better appreciation for what a very small group of players have been doing for the last two and a half months.

"It can't be that people think that is an excuse. That's just not anywhere near close to objective analysis. That's just agenda-driven stuff. If it's to get rid of me that's fine, good on you, go for it a million times. But in terms of this group of players, what they've given over the last two and a half months has been outstanding. It's a credit to them, I can't speak highly enough of them."