Antonio Conte has seemingly played down Tottenham’s chances of winning this season’s Premier League title despite their fast start to the campaign.
Spurs sit second in the table – level on points with Manchester City – and are unbeaten domestically heading into the international break, winning five of their opening seven league games.
Their most recent victory came on Saturday with a 6-2 thrashing of Leicester. The two sides went into the break level at 2-2 after an impressive first half from the Foxes, but Son Heung-min emerged from the bench to score a hat-trick and help his side to a huge win.
Conte was quizzed on his decision to drop Son following his recent goal drought, and it was put to the Italian that big clubs need this competition for places in order to succeed.
“Yeah, but honestly, In the past, I did the same in every situation I worked in: Chelsea, in Juventus, in Inter Milan,” Conte replied, before revealing his staunch assessment of his current squad.
“When you want to be competitive and fight for something important and I repeat, we have just started our path because, in my opinion, our squad is not still ready to be strong, strong compared with City, Liverpool and Chelsea – then we fight also with Arsenal and Manchester United.”
However, Conte has challenged his charges to find it within themselves to take their collective game to another level in order to win the club’s first trophy since 2008.
He added: “We have just started, but if the players want to play for something important, to lift a trophy – they have to understand this. Otherwise, they continue to play every game, but they don’t go to win anything. This is clear. Clear. It happened in the past here, and I repeat, I want to try and change. I want to try and change to bring this team to another level. I will try to do my best. But I’m not worried about this. For sure, it’s not easy. It’s not simple. But I have to get the best decision in every moment.”
Credit: 90min.com
