Mauricio Pochettino is taking his afternoon press conference ahead of tomorrow’s FA Cup replay against Aston Villa, but his first priority has been to clarify something he said after Sunday’s crushing defeat to Wolves.
The coach said after the game that his team were not good enough to be in the top four or the top six, and some took this to be a criticism of the quality of the players at his disposal.
But the coach has made it clear today that he just meant that the way those players had played on the day was what was not good enough to get them into the top four:
“I want to clarify. ‘Are the players good enough to be in the top four, six’? I said today we are not good enough. [It was said] Pochettino said the players aren’t good enough. No. Out of context. Today [vs Wolves] we are not good enough [for top four/six].”
Pochettino is very diplomatic (as is evident from this clarification) and would have been very careful not to deliberately transfer blame on to the players or the sporting directors who chose them. Let’s hope this group are “good enough” tomorrow night.
