Antonio Conte fears Tottenham squad is weaker after January transfers

Antonio Conte has said Tottenham’s squad may have been technically weakened in the January window and that the club’s transfer policy will slow the rate at which he can make the team competitive.

The manager was desperate for reinforcements but the club missed out on Adama Traoré and Luis Díaz and brought in only Dejan Kulusevski and Rodrigo Bentancur from Juventus on deadline day.

On the same day Tottenham’s two most expensive players – Tanguy Ndombele and Giovani Lo Celso – left on loan, Dele Alli joined Everton on an initial free transfer and Bryan Gil went to Valencia less than six months after his £25m arrival from Sevilla.

In an interview with Sky Sport Italia, Conte said: “What happened in January is not easy. Four players left in January. Four important players for Tottenham, two have arrived. So even numerically instead of reinforcing yourself you may have, on paper, weakened.

“Then precise choices were made for many reasons. But I certainly never expected that in January four players who I still considered important would change their shirts for a thousand reasons. This shows the difficulty. Tottenham in the last session of the summer transfer market and in January changed eight players.”

Conte said the 21-year-old Kulusevski and 24-year-old Bentancur were perfect signings in the framework of Tottenham’s transfer philosophy but believes the approach will require patience.

“It is inevitable that in January it is very difficult to get two players like Bentancur and Kulusevski to sign who, I repeat, are the ideal prospects for Tottenham,” he said. “Because Tottenham is looking for young players, players to be developed, not ready players. That is the issue.

“The vision, the philosophy of the club is this. It is inevitable that if you want to grow faster and if you want to be competitive more quickly you need players with a lot of experience because they also lead to an increase in experience in your team. But then again, the vision of the club I realised is this and will continue to be this. For this reason it will take a lot of patience.”

Conte said psychological work was being done daily with the players “to try to make each player grow individually” and that confidence was fragile. The team have lost their past two games, at home to Southampton and Wolves.

“When you take the job in a team that hasn’t won for a long time it is inevitable that you will lack confidence,” he said. “The confidence is down and many times at the first obstacle you throw yourself down the negativity increases even more; sometimes you grant goals that you struggle to accept.

“This has been happening to us in the last period. This is part of a process of a team that has to grow a lot to try to be competitive … They need to work a lot and this does not scare me at all.”