Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino and Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola addressed the media ahead of Tottenham’s hosting Manchester City tomorrow night. We have videos of both sessions below.
“It is not about one result that we are going to show that we are ready or not ready [to challenge for the title],” Pochettino said in the run-up to this weekend’s headliner fixture.
“We have already shown we are ready to compete. We need to be consistent during the whole season and be the best team like Manchester City are doing today. We need to show ourselves that we can compete.”
Pochettino video:
If Spurs win, then Guardiola will have suffered his fourth loss in a row, something that hasn’t happened over the course of his career. The Catalan revealed what he told his team Tuesday night, after the Champions League elimination loss to Liverpool.
“Of course it’s not easy,” said Guardiola. “They are human beings and they are disappointed, because they did absolutely everything, but now we have the most important title in the season by far.”
“You can win Champions League by playing seven good games, but not n the league. In the league you have to play a lot of games. We have to take five points, so we have to stand up, look forward and play Tottenham, one of the toughest opponents. We scored two legal goals against Liverpool [that were disallowed]. In that competition, it counts a lot.”
“With the little details, the influence is so, so big. But we did a better competition than last season in the Champions League.We will try to come back stronger next season, but I don’t have the feeling of failure. We did it well.”
Pep Guardiola Press Conference video:
Injury Report: go to this link
Manchester City starting XI prediction: go to this link
Tottenham Hotspur starting XI prediction: go to this link
Odds via Bet365 Manchester City 6/4 Tottenham 8/5 Draw 13/5
Prediction: Tottenham 2, Manchester City 2
As always, feel free to post to your own Manchester City and/or Tottenham starting XI predictions, as well as your score predictions, in the comments section below.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV and the Tribune company’s blogging community Chicago Now.
Follow him on Twitter, Instagram, Sound Cloud, LinkedIn and YouTube.