JOSE’S EYES ON THE PRIZE
Boss in silverware vow despite injury woes
JOSE MOURINHO has vowed to be the man who brings silverware back to Tottenham despite another injury setback, which has forced him to rule out Steven Bergwijn for the rest of the season.
Bergwijn, a £26million signing from PSV Eindhoven in January, damaged ankle ligaments at Burnley last Saturday.
His absence will be keenly felt as Spurs attempt to turn around a one-goal deficit in Leipzig tonight in the Champions League, their final hope of a trophy this season.
‘Tottenham is not going to be my only club without silverware,’ said Mourinho, who arrived at the club last November and signed a contract until 2023.
‘I won at every club and I believe I am going to do it also with Tottenham.
‘I am here for three or four months. I get the team in a very difficult situation and now it is even more difficult, but I believe in me, I believe in the players, I believe in the club and I believe that during my contract I will help the club to do it.’
Tottenham are enduring their longest post-war trophy drought. It is 12 years since their last major prize, the League Cup. And they are firmly in a rut of five games without a win. Last week, they crashed out of the FA Cup on penalties at home to relegationhaunted Norwich City and are seven points adrift of the top four in the Premier League.
Harry Kane, Son Heung-min and Moussa Sissoko have been out with long-term injuries, and are now joined by Bergwijn and Ben Davies, who is missing from the trip to Germany with a hamstring problem.
‘Ben will be out for one week, two weeks,’ said Mourinho. ‘Steven, I don’t expect him to play this season. I have never known anything like this, especially speaking about traumatic injuries.
‘We were psychologically more down with the other injures. (But) we are very confident. I am very motivated, very calm and very positive.
‘We are losing 1-0 at half-time (to Leipzig) as we were at Burnley and we have the second half to play. We go with everything we have. How can you score two goals minimum without Kane, Son and Bergwijn? There are many ways to score goals.
‘Momentum is not the best but these boys deserve something special. The boys deserve the kind of happiness that a victory in a knock-out Champions League tie can bring.’
With form and fitness stacked against them, Spurs have little scope for optimism, apart from last year’s European campaign under Mauricio Pochettino, which took them to the final and included more than one act of remarkable escapology. Most notably against Ajax, whom Spurs lost 1-0 to in the home leg of the semi-final before progressing on away goals after a hat-trick from Lucas Moura in the return. Mourinho (left), however, dismissed the idea of repeating the miracle of Amsterdam by citing the absence of an aerial threat akin to Fernando Llorente, who was released at the end of last season and is now at Napoli. ‘Without Llorente, if we want the long balls in the box, and play for second balls, we can’t do it that way,’ he said. ‘We have to try in another way.’
Lucas and Giovani Lo Celso did not start at Burnley in anticipation of this fixture, although they were both forced into action at half-time with Spurs trailing and performing poorly, while Ryan Sessegnon is fit after an injury and is expected to return.
‘It’s not a time to get the violins out,’ said Dele Alli, who has been deployed as the central striker during the injury crisis. ‘We have to step up and show our character. I like scoring goals. It’s probably not my most natural position but we’re in a position where everyone needs to step up.
‘We’re not going to hide. No one can look at where we are and be happy. We’ve always been at the top end, fighting for things. To be where we are is not good and not something we’re used to.’