Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino spoke in his pre-match press conference of his confidence that his side will exact revenge on Stoke City after their double defeat last season.
During his first season at the club, the Argentine took the helm in defeats both at White Hart Lane and the Britannia Stadium in the 2014/15 campaign. They suffered a 2-1 and 3-0 loss respectively on each of those occasions, though that didn’t stop Spurs reaching the Capital One Cup final and finishing in fifth position.
Pochettino did say that the match on Saturday it is "a good opportunity [to take their] revenge”.
First-day defeat for Spurs
Their season didn’t get off to the best of starts with a a 1-0 defeat defeat to Manchester United on the opening day of the season with Kyle Walker’s own goal proving the difference.
However, despite that defeat, Pochettino claimed that he was “happy” with the performance but was obviously “disappointed” with the result at Old Trafford and said that they need to show on Saturday that they “deserve more”.
Players return to fitness
Key players were absent for the trip to Manchester, however those issues have eased slightly with Danny Rose, Andros Townsend, Alex Pritchard and goalkeeper Hugo Lloris all passed fit to play against the Potters.
Pochettino has said this week had been “fantastic” for everyone with his full squad reaching match fitness, adding that the only shame is that he 'can only pick 18 players' for the match on Saturday but that he is satisfied that all his players are ready to play.
He confirmed that Lloris and Pritchard played on Monday for the Under-21 side against Everton and Rose and Townsend trained well with the squad.
Those defensive additions could prove pivotal against an increasingly attacking-minded Stoke side with Mark Hughes bringing in the likes of Marco Van Ginkel, Ibrahim Afellay and club record signing Xherdan Shaqiri. Pochettino spoke on the arrival of the Swiss international saying he is a “very good” player.