Unai Emery spoke with the media at Bodymoor Heath on Friday afternoon, ahead of Aston Villa's trip to Preston North End on Sunday in the FA Cup.
Emery's men visit Deepdale looking to secure their place in the semi-finals of the competition at Wembley, against the Championship outfit.
And the Villa boss met with local and national outlets at the club's training base to look ahead to the encounter, discussing the international break, squad freshness and consistency.
Read key lines from his pre-match press conference below...
On the international break...
“We had a good break. Of course, we were working, and we were focusing the break to try to improve with the players we were working (with).
“Not a lot (of players), because there were more of them with their national team.
“We used the time as well to analyse the matches we played, deeply, to try to do our best performances collectively and individually.
“From here, for now, until the last match we will play, hopefully for a long time as well.”
On consistency...
“The season is more or less the consistency we can have, but each moment is different.
“And now, we are in another moment, we have individually and collectively to be very demanding because we were under our expectation, our ambition to get the objective we want for the season.
“Of course, we conceded a lot of goals in the season, we are being sometimes consistent, but not enough.
“For example, we didn’t lose a lot of matches at home, only one in the Premier League, but we draw a lot of matches.
“This means we are consistent, yes, but not enough, because we are drawing more matches than we needed.
“Now we are recovering some injured players, we added other players in the transfer window, more than normal, and of course the adaptation has been different for each player.
“Now, today, Friday 28th March is a key moment, how we are going to face the last months in the competitions we have.
“Of course, the idea is to try to get better and be stronger defensively, like we were before.”
On returning from the break...
“The international break always is important for the players and, as well, when we arrived here, we had not a lot of players in the national team and we were increasing the players joining with the national team because we were performing well, collectively and individually.
“Of course, it’s better if we are here working with every player, because we were in Dubai four days and really we worked fantastic, but (with) a few players.
“But we have to use it to get our consistency with the players we work (with).
“The players, they were with the national team, they are coming back progressively. Today is the first day with Leon Bailey, with Emiliano Martínez, Robin Olsen and Andrés García.
“Of course, they have to (be) quick again to reintroduce in our structure, in our mentality, in our style, idea, in our match on Sunday, to be focused for it.
“Progressively this week, we were adding the players coming back and we worked good.
“Of course, the first (thing) is try to identify in our mind, our objective, in the next match, firstly on Sunday because it’s very important, and try to recover again our style, idea playing.”
On squad freshness...
“Two years ago, we finished the season strong, and we achieved the objective in the last two matches playing against Liverpool drawing, and against Brighton winning at home here.
“Last year we finished the season so, so tired. A lot of players injured, not enough energy, and we lost the last match against Crystal Palace away.
“This year my objective and my idea and how we are now planning the rest of the season is to try to be full energy again and every player focusing individually and collectively on the objective we are going to face.”
Watch the boss' presser in full below.