Pochettino 'worried' about Alli as Tottenham midfielder set to miss start of season
Dele Alli missed Tottenham's final pre-season friendly and is facing a spell on the sidelines, much to the dismay of Mauricio Pochettino.
Mauricio Pochettino admitted he is "worried" about Dele Alli after revealing the Tottenham midfielder is set to miss the start of the new season with a fresh hamstring injury.
Alli was ruled out of Tottenham's final pre-season friendly against Inter on Sunday and is now in a race against time to be fit for next Saturday's Premier League opener against Aston Villa.
The 23-year-old missed a number of matches with a similar injury problem last season and Pochettino is concerned about the amount of time one of his star men has spent on the sidelines in his four years with Spurs.
"I don’t know if the club will communicate the time [he will be out] but I don’t believe he's going to be ready for the start of the season," Pochettino said at his post-match news conference.
"Some players are a little bit shorter in their preparation. It’s not ideal, but it’s after going to be such a tough season and we are happy. We need to improve. We have one week to prepare for the game but we're going to arrive in a good condition to try to beat Aston Villa."
Club-record signing Tanguy Ndombele made his home debut in Sunday's International Champions Cup match and Pochettino is not ruling out more new signings before Thursday's deadline, despite a lack of recent dialogue with chairman Daniel Levy.
"I am happy with my squad," he said. "You can see today a lot of younger players."
"Every season we are always open to improve the squad and to try to find the right players to be stronger and better and there are still four days. We'll see what happens in the next few days. But Daniel is in Miami and I haven't had the opportunity to talk to him."