Latest Pochettino quotes, team news and expected line-up v Leicester

With the Capital One Cup semi-final tie against Sheffield United still very much in the balance after a slender 1-0 victory earlier this week, Head Coach Mauricio Pochettino will be hoping his side progress to the next stage of the FA Cup with consummate ease.

Leicester City visit White Hart Lane tomorrow afternoon for the fourth round FA Cup clash off the back of a defeat at home to Stoke last weekend and have picked up just seven points out of the last six league games, only scoring five goals in the process.

However, we all know league form counts for nothing when it comes to cup football and the Foxes will arrive at the Lane fully confident of causing an upset.

Given the way Tottenham performed on Wednesday night against Sheffield United, I’m surprised Nigel Pearson’s men aren’t favourites with the bookmakers to turn us over! I jest of course, but in all seriousness, any performance of that calibre again will surely see us being knocked out of the FA Cup at the weekend.

Lack of pace

The Blades clearly had a game plan midweek and nearly executed it to perfection. If it wasn’t for a calamitous piece of defending by Jay McEveley to concede a late penalty, the tie would be heading back to Bramall Lane goalless.

For me, the most annoying thing about Wednesday night was not the fact we failed to break down a League One side in open play, or for that matter even create any clear cut chances, but that we played without any pace or purpose.

The midfield were happy to slow the game down at every opportunity and Harry Kane was clearly getting frustrated, so much so that he was dropping deep enough to pick up the balls of the centre halves.

Don’t even get me started on Adebayor, because we could be here a long time! All I will say is the decision to give him the armband, whether he is a vice captain or not, was absolutely ludicrous and I pray we never see him wearing it again.

Team selection

Having already beaten Leicester just a few weeks ago, Spurs have the edge over their rivals and the fans will be extremely disappointed if we fail to make it through to Monday’s draw for the fifth round.

Team selection could prove vital though and it will be interesting to see how Pochettino plays it tomorrow afternoon with so many crucial fixtures in the coming weeks.

Leicester will be boosted by the introduction of record signing Andrej Kramaric on Saturday afternoon following the striker's recent arrival from Croatian outfit Rijeka, and he is likely to lead the line at White Hart Lane.

Meanwhile, Kasper Schmeichel and Zoumana Bakayogo are struggling with foot and knee injuries respectively. Matty James will serve the second game of a three-match suspension, but Esteban Cambiasso and Dean Hammond could be available again.

What they said

Mauricio Pochettino commenting:

…on squad fitness:
“I am happy that all players are available to be selected,” said the head coach. “Only Nacer Chadli is still away. Maybe Monday he is here and starts training with us.”

.. squad rotation:
“Maybe [there will be changes],” he said. “We analyse a lot of things from our players and the games and maybe it’s a moment to rotate some players, but I still haven’t decided which players.

“Maybe there won’t be a lot [of changes] for this game but we need to keep fighting in the four competitions. You can see that we have ahead a very busy period, a lot of games.

“Tomorrow will be the 37th official game - that’s nearly one season - and so we need to keep all of our players in a good condition to fight in the four competitions.”

.. on captain Ade starting against Leicester:
“It depends on my decision when I select the players.
“If Kaboul or Lloris are on the pitch, it’s not possible because Younes Kaboul is the captain.”

..on Leicester:
“We always expect tough games and it’s another Premier League team.

“Leicester have good players and for us it was difficult against them [at Christmas]. It’s an important competition for us and we expect a very tough game again.

“Am I surprised that they’ve been struggling in the league? No not surprised, because all the teams in the Premier League have quality and good players. It’s the toughest competition in the world.

“We need to be focused on the game and we need to be ready. It’s a good game to show character and to try to get the victory because it’s important to go through to the next round in the FA Cup.”

Commenting on the prospect of coming up against England Under-21 teammate Harry Kane, Leicester defender, Liam Moore said:
“He’s a great player and it’s no surprise that he’s getting the goals that he has done this season.

"You see it in training all the time, if you get the ball to him in good positions he’s going to put it away.

"It’ll be a great test if he does play, but they’ve got a really big squad and a squad full of quality and I’m not too sure what their selection process will be in the next few games, but if he does play it will be tough.

"But we’re confident we can beat anyone on our day, we just need to turn up and play our football as well as we can.”

Starting line-up

Vorm, Chiriches, Fazio, Kaboul (c), Rose; Capoue, Dembele; Townsend, Paulinho, Lamela; Soldado

 

Agree entirely with your team selection bar Paulinho, I feel Kane will start again because there's no midweek game (I think). Leicester are a PL side and will have looked at our game vs Sheffield and will almost certainly play the same way. We need more creativity and pace centrally, which means Eriksen must play behind Kane and Soldado, who I believe must play off each other if we are to get the best out of Soldado, while Eriksen and Townsend will occupy the wider areas. Would also love to see Onomah feature

 

We have the 2nd leg our semi against sheff utd. I think his going to go for the other right back we hope we never see again. We've rode our luck these past few weeks. Reality will set in when were beaten tmrw and wed. Then what ? Are we really going to finish in top 4? No chance. And defiantly knocked out in Europa in next round. Reality is top 6.