Pochettino looking for Chelsea to be the ‘protagonists’ against Manchester City

After conceding twice in added-on time at the end of Monday’s 4-1 defeat to Chelsea, Spurs conceded twice more in added-on time in today’s 2-1 defeat to Wolves.

Funny thing, that. Confidence. Momentum. (And injuries.) (And it’s also funny because it’s Spurs.)

Can that same confidence and momentum, on the positive side, be enough to overcome the league-leaders tomorrow? Manchester City have dominated the league for a good while now, and have won three Premier League matches in a row at Stamford Bridge — and beaten Chelsea in six straight overall (every game since the 2021 Champions League final).

Still, Mauricio Pochettino wants his team to approach this game with confidence and momentum, and belief.

“For me, Man City is the best team, the best coaching staff, the best manager, it is the best or one of the best organisations in the world.

“It’s going to be a challenge. We want to compete against them, we know it is going to be tough. What we want is to take three points, which are important for us.

“Chelsea is never the feeling of underdog. You are Chelsea, it’s impossible. The history is there. We cannot go and say we are the big team of the day, we need to go there and try and be protagonists with our personality, our character.

“On Monday, to go to Tottenham and finish the game 4-1 and win the game showed we have character and talent to compete and fight with the best clubs in England. Now we have to build that confidence which for sure will help us to be more competitive.

“[We] need to be clever, be smart and try to challenge and try to be in the place they are now. We are all fighting to take their place.”

-Mauricio Pochettino; source: Sky

I mean we’re certainly the underdogs. But confidence and mentality can be funny things.