Stoke City manager Mark Hughes has admitted that his side were second best as they lost 3-0 on their travels against Tottenham Hotspur this afternoon.

City were outclassed by a Spurs side with plenty of attacking talent on show, as goals from Roberto Soldado, Mousa Dembele and Aaron Lennon gave the hosts a comfortable victory.

"Spurs are a good side, they worked hard, moved the ball around quickly, they have a lot of power and pace and we struggled to cope with that," said Hughes, according to Sky Sports News.

"There are reasons behind that, we are missing a few key players, but we still need to do a little bit better than we did on the day. Credit to Spurs, they were significantly better than us.

"We struggled to get a foothold in the game and really have an outlet for our play. On occasions we need to get in behind teams and we haven't got that option."

The result sees Stoke sitting in 12th place in the Premier League table.