Antonio Conte has pointed out that some of his Tottenham Hotspur players have been “collapsing” when they have come “under pressure” this season.
Spurs resume their Champions League campaign on Tuesday night as they come up against AC Milan in a last-16 first leg tie.
Conte watched his Tottenham team beat Man City and then follow that up with a 4-1 defeat at Leicester City at the weekend when a spot in the top four was theirs for the taking.
Spurs have notoriously failed in big moments over the years and Conte has hinted some of his players cannot live with the pressure.
“If you want to win or achieve some targets and have a good position in the Champions League or in England in the Premier League you have to be stable,” the Italian, who had his gallbladder removed a fortnight ago, said.
“And this stability is lacking this year. I always talk about it with my players. It is very difficult to keep concentration, it is very difficult to stay focused all of the time.
“It is not an easy task being so focused. We are working on that, playing under pressure all of the time is good for some players and bad for others.
“Sometimes players feel motivated, other times they feel so much under pressure that they can’t perform.
“Maybe for a period they have a good performance and then they collapse all of a sudden if they feel too much pressure.
“We are working on this, we want to make our players more resilient.”
He added: “I think that the pressure is different between Italy and England. In Italy you speak about football from Monday and you finish on Sunday. You speak only football and then you have a lot of TV that speaks football and putting a lot of pressure.
“You are born in this way and you grow in this way, with this pressure, and you are used to living with this type of situation.
“In England I think that there is an atmosphere that brings to enjoy football without a lot of pressure, because football is a sport and in Italy sometimes football is not only a sport, it is a war between the teams and the fans.”
Spurs have had a tough run of injuries this season with Dejan Kulusevski, Richarlison and Lucas Moura among those who have suffered and in the last few days skipper Hugo Lloris has been ruled out for up to two months, Yves Bissouma has had ankle surgery and Rodrigo Bentancur faces a long stint out with an ACL injury.
And Conte says this has played a part in his side’s turbulent season.
“There are also external…
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