Steven Gerrard has been readying his Aston Villa squad to take on Tottenham Hotspur at Villa Park on Saturday.
And after completing the final training session of the week, the Aston Villa head coach joined the media for his pre-match press conference on Friday afternoon.
Here’s what he had to say…
On team news…
“We’re likely to make some changes. We’re nearly at full health. Marvelous Nakamba was one we’ve been waiting for and he’s had 60 minutes in the Under-23s and a strong week, so he’ll come into the squad.
“Emi Buendia and Tyrone Mings picked up niggles from Wolves. Tyrone trained yesterday and he’s been ok, so he’s available.
“Emi Buendia trained today and assuming there’s no reaction from today’s session, he’ll be available. That makes us virtually full strength.”
On the squad’s reaction from the loss to Wolves last time out…
“It was a collective, in terms of that game. We’re all in it together and we all didn’t turn up until half-time, we all went away with regret and frustrations.
“Tomorrow gives us an opportunity to try and come out of the blocks quicker and try to find a performance over 90 minutes – that’s what we need if we’re to find the outcome we want.
“It’s always the case if you prepare for a game, especially a local derby, and you’re on the losing side of that fixture and you don’t give the best version of yourselves, of course you’ll go away frustrated.
“The good thing about football is the next big game is only round the corner and I’ve seen the reaction I wanted from the players.
“I’ve also given them the final message of the week and that’s not to leave it on the training ground, let’s see it at Villa Park tomorrow and try to give our supporters a performance to be proud of.”
On Marvelous Nakamba’s return…
When asked how happy he is to have Nakamba back, Gerrard said: “Extremely happy because when we came into this job, we had the right boost and bounce, and we found a bit of consistency in the team early on. Marv was a really big part of that.
“He’s still got a bit to go, in terms of where he’s at physically, but the part he played in how we wanted the team to look, he’s been missed.
“We can’t get him up to speed quick enough. This week we’ve pushed him and he’s had extra training. He’s an important player for us, so when we get him back capable of 90 minutes at this level, I’m sure he’ll be a big help to the team.”
On Harry Kane…
“Harry Kane’s world class. He’s been very loyal to Tottenham, in my opinion. We need to make sure we’re very diligent and, defensively, set up right to control him.
“He’s one of very few players on the planet that when he’s at it, he’s unstoppable. He’s that level of player.
“He has good back-up, in terms of the other forward players around him – Son Heung-Min, Dejan Kulusevski. We need to be right at it tomorrow, from a defensive point of view.
“We need to avoid errors like we did against Wolves. But if you’re asking for my sole opinion on Harry Kane, he’s a world class operator.”
On facing Tottenham…
“We show clips, we show footage, we show their strengths, we show their patterns and we make sure we’re really diligent in giving the players the information they need. At the same time, we do the exact same in where we believe we can hurt Spurs.
“Spurs are in great form and they’ve got a top-class manager. You have to remember that over the course of the season, Spurs aren’t unbeatable.
“It wasn’t so long ago that the manager was extremely frustrated because they had inconsistencies. Good team, good form, good players but not unbeatable.”