Mauricio Pochettino believes Harry Kane’s words after Tottenham’s draw to Olympiakos in the Champions League were misinterpreted.
Spurs threw away a 2-0 lead to draw 2-2 in Greece prompting Kane to bemoan the Premier League club’s inability to see games out.
The striker also suggested that Spurs were making ‘similar mistakes’ to the ones the team were making in the 2014/15 season, Pochettino’s first in charge.
Kane said: “That’s the hard part to get your head around because we’re not young anymore, we’re not inexperienced.
“We’ve played in a big games for club and country.
“I can see why the manager is frustrated because he’s been here for six years now and we’re still making similar mistakes to the ones we were in his first year.
“We’ve got to find a way to get around it, improve and get better. That’s all we can try to do.”
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Speaking to talkSPORT, the Spurs boss was asked if he felt Kane’s comments about similar mistakes being made were fair.
However, Pochettino suggested the words by his star striker have been taken the wrong way.
“Be careful. Be careful when you translate what the players say after the game in the media because sometimes we can take the words in different ways.
“Always have respect with what the players say and you can assess what the players say on the media.
“I’m not going to ‘shush’ what one or another player is telling you. Because I wasn’t there, I cannot talk about the words and the intention of them but of course when you are disappointed you always look to try and improve and we were talking under different aspects and in my opinion we need to still improve.”
However, Spurs will have to put their setback in Europe behind them quickly as they return to action in the Premier League on Saturday lunchtime.
They face Leicester at the King Power Stadium – a game you can listen to LIVE on talkSPORT, kick-off 12:30pm.
Brendan Rodgers’ side, who have been tipped to mount a serious challenge to break into the Premier League’s top six this season, are currently fifth and level on points with third-placed Spurs.
But when asked about Leicester’s potential to finish in the top six, Pochettino insisted it was far too early in the season to be making predictions.
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He added: “Yes we are in the same position [as Leicester]. We share the same position and have eight points.
“We’ll see [if Leicester can challenge for top six]. It’s too early to talk about contenders, to talk about what is going to happen in the future.
“Still all the teams are finding their best – we’ve only played five games in the Premier League.
“Until you play between 10 and 15 games, it’s difficult to see what is going to happen, if we are contenders, teams that are very seriously going to be contenders. It’s still too early to talk.”
LIVE on talkSPORT
Check out all the live commentaries coming up across the talkSPORT network this weekend
- Leicester vs Tottenham (Saturday, 12:30pm) – talkSPORT
- Leeds vs Derby (Saturday, 12:30pm) – talkSPORT 2
- Everton vs Sheffield United (Saturday, 3pm) – talkSPORT 2
- Newcastle vs Brighton (Saturday, 5:30pm) – talkSPORT
- West Brom vs Huddersfield (Sunday, 12pm) – talkSPORT 2
Saturday is GameDay on talkSPORT. We’ll bring you LIVE commentary of Premier League games across all three time slots on Saturday – 12.30pm, 3pm and 5.30pm – with Leicester vs Tottenham among our games this weekend.