Peter Crouch says there is no doubt in his mind that Tottenham have what it takes to reach the Champions League final at Wembley this year ahead of their first group game against Werder Bremen (11/10 Werder Bremen – 90 minutes).
The north London outfit are entering their first-ever Champions League campaign having defied the odds to secure fourth place last season ahead of mega-rich Manchester City.
Their finish in the Premier League table made sure of a spot in the last round of qualifying for the tournament and after a slight hiccup in the first leg they eventually turned over Youngs Boys of Berne, thanks in part to a Crouch hat-trick.
Spurs have now headed out to Germany for their first European Cup game since they were dumped out at the semi-final stage in 1962 by Benfica.
Just less than half a century later and Tottenham have returned to Europe’s top club competition with confidence high they can go on a decent run.
They have been drawn in Group A alongside last season’s winners Inter Milan (1/6 to qualify from Group A), Werder Bremen (20/21) and FC Twente (9/2).
Despite having been paired with Inter Spurs certainly fancy their chances of progressing to the knockouts stages ahead of Werder and Twente.
Tuesday’s game against Werder will be good test of Tottenham’s European credentials as they take on the four-time Bundesliga champions.
Despite the nature of the occasion Spurs boss Harry Redknapp has seemingly headed out to Germany with other things on his mind having been heavily linked with the England manager’s post after current boss Fabio Capello announced he would leave in 2012.
Redknapp has said he isn’t looking that far ahead and claims he is totally focused on the job in hand.
The former West Ham, Portsmouth and Southampton boss will certainly have injuries on his mind having lost Michael Dawson and Jermain Defoe to ligament damage before the game.
However, some good news came on Monday after it was revealed Luka Modric could be fit after badly bruising his leg in Saturday’s 1-1 draw with West Brom.
Despite potentially missing three key players Crouch has backed the Tottenham (40/1 – Champions League outright) squad to come good and get off to a winning start in their Champions League campaign as he aims for an appearances in the final at Wembley in May.
“I was a part of Liverpool side that got to the 2007 Champions League final and the quality in the Tottenham dressing room right now is a match for the team we had at Anfield three years ago,” said Crouch.
“We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves by saying we can get to the final or anything like that because we have only just qualified for the group stages for the first time, but I firmly believe we are good enough to enjoy a good run in this competition. We just have to believe in ourselves if we are to make the most of this opportunity.
“With the final being held at Wembley this season, it would be great for an English team to get there and there’s no reason why Spurs cannot have a good go at making it happen. We have plenty of players in our squad who are capable of doing some damage in this competition.”
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