Pochettino laughs off Ranieri´s ´favourites´ claim

Mauricio Pochettino has laughed off Claudio Ranieri’s assertion that Tottenham and Arsenal are favourites to land the Premier League title over the Italian’s table-topping Leicester City.

Ranieri has guided Leicester to the top of the table ahead of the north London duo with the Foxes five points ahead of the third-placed Gunners and two in front of Pochettino’s men.

Speaking ahead of Leicester’s home game with West Brom on Tuesday, Ranieri said: “I think Tottenham and Arsenal are the favourites [to win the title]. Arsenal have the players who can do everything, they can win every match.”

When asked 24 hours later what he made of those claims, Pochettino said: “I laughed a little bit. In football it’s good to play a bit like this and joke but we knew from the beginning of the season what our objective was.

“If you remember at the end of last season, our intention was clear: to reduce the gap to the top teams.

“We have learned a lot and improved. We need to fight in every game. Today we are in a very good position but there are still 11 games to play.”

Spurs visit London rivals West Ham on Wednesday before hosting Arsenal on Saturday and Pochettino insists they do not feel more pressure than their title rivals.

He added: “We are in a good place but we are trying to win the next game. They [Leicester] are on top, they have the pressure too, like all the teams that are chasing.

“We don’t feel that [we are favourites]. For us it’s important to keep our level, our fitness, our mentality and we’ll see what happens.

“It’s too soon to talk about what happens at the end of the season.”