Unai Emery says Spurs are ‘favourites’ to finish above Aston Villa – Irvine Times

Villa visit north London on Sunday after making a bright start to the campaign and are five points clear.

They have also topped Spurs in the table for the past two seasons, but the Spaniard says Tottenham’s budget means they are favorites for the game and will finish above them in the league.

“They are the favorites ahead of us for the season and the favorites for the game on Sunday,” he said.

“But we’re competing and we’re confident in how we’re doing.

“We try to be rivals with these teams like Tottenham, Chelsea or Newcastle, to compete with them in the top 7, top 6, it’s a really great game.

“They are more competitors than us, we have a certain advantage on the table, but after the game on Sunday it could be different. Hopefully we can compete and control the game.

“They are favorites with Chelsea, with Manchester United, with Newcastle. But we are there and we hope we can keep it for a long time.

Asked why they were favourites, Emery said: “Because of the start how can we make a list of who is favorite with the budget, of course the budget is not enough to be favourites.

“But the gap between them and us is still big. But of course we don’t think about that.

“But I have to tell everyone that there are seven more teams ahead of us at the start, with the budget, but we are competing and in the last two years we have been progressively getting better and maintaining the same level that we are trying to set as a target.”

Midfielder Ross Barkley is the only absentee, with a “minor injury” that will keep him out until the next international break.

“We only trained with some players today,” Emery said. “The other players were resting. Today was good, tomorrow morning we will train again.

“We only had one injured player which is Ross Barkley. He has a slight injury. He is unavailable for the next two weeks.

“The others are available and completely 100 percent ready for Sunday.”