Antonio Conte has admitted that his Tottenham side face a tough battle against Newcastle United to finish in the Champions League places, after he claimed that "medium-low" teams are spending money on important players.
Manchester City reminded everyone why they are very much still in the title race during a scintillating second-half display against Spurs on Thursday night. Pep Guardiola's side found themselves 2-0 down at half-time thanks to goals from Dejan Kulusevski and Emerson Royal.
After the break, the reigning champions came out with a vengeance and within eight minutes of the game's resumption, they were back level. Boos during the interval from the Etihad crowd soon turned to cheers as City added two more through the game's man catalyst Riyad Mahrez.
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The result ensured Newcastle kept their five gap to Spurs in fourth place with a game in hand on Conte's side. The Italian is far too aware of the uphill battle his squad face when trying to break into the top-four as he bemoaned the level of competitiveness in the English top-flight and spending power of the clubs around him.
"I think first of all we have to try to do our best, to work really hard and at the end of the season we will see which is our position," Conte said. "For sure for our Champions League place there are teams like Chelsea, like Liverpool, United and now Newcastle."
"Also in England there are teams like Brighton, Brentford, I don’t want to forget some teams and it becomes really difficult because every team, every club can spend money.
"You go to play against a team that you think is medium-low and instead you find important players. I said in the past and I don’t want to repeat, but it will be a difficult season and we have to try first of all to recover all the players."
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