Ben Davies is unconcerned by Tottenham’s lack of transfer activity, saying that recruitment sprees provide no guarantee of success.
Spurs are yet to sign a player this summer and are running out of time to do so, with the transfer window closing in 10 days on Aug. 9.
The north Londoners left it similarly late last year before adding five new faces to their squad, including club-record signing Davinson Sanchez.
But even if Tottenham are unable to strengthen as much as they planned, Davies has faith in the existing group, which finished third in the Premier League last season.
“It doesn’t worry us,” he said. “We’ve got a good squad here and even on this preseason tour [in the U.S.] so far the boys have put in a good performance and a good shift.
“We see all the teams around us adding but that’s football. We don’t worry about that. All we have to worry about is what goes on behind closed doors for us.
“Can we compete with Manchester City and the top clubs? I think we showed last year that we could. The squad is the same at the moment but we’ve got a lot of quality here.
“Of course the teams around us are going to strengthen but new faces doesn’t necessarily mean that teams are going to be better.
“We’ve been competing there or thereabouts for the last couple of years and all we can do is go that one step further.
“The quality of the teams in the league is getting better and better and that means we have to keep upping our game to be up there and kick on this year.”
Tottenham spent last season with Wembley as their home ground, and they will now have to get used to another stadium as they prepare to begin play in their brand-new stadium in Haringey in September.
Spurs had a stuttering start at the national arena a year ago, collecting just two points from their first three league matches there, and the unfamiliarity of their new surroundings could be a disadvantage again this term.
But Davies feels the squad’s experience of adapting to Wembley, and the fact the club and supporters will be back in their own territory, will speed up the settling-in process.
“Last year we did really well in playing at Wembley all year,” he said. “Of course you can’t really complain about the actual stadium and what it is, but you’re still not in your home stadium and it feels a bit disconnected from what you normally have with all your home fans there every single week.
“With the new stadium, hopefully we can settle in quickly there and we’ll [feel at] home sooner rather than later as the season goes on.
“We haven’t been able to familiarise ourselves with the place yet, but at our training ground they do everything they can to make it as realistic as possible. We’ll be training on the same sized pitches and it will be the same quality as it would in the stadium.
“Nothing is going to actually prepare us for what we’re going into but I’m sure when there’s around 58,000 Spurs fans in there it’s going to feel like home quickly enough.”
Davies spent his first two-and-a-half seasons at Spurs as the second-choice left-back, deputising for Danny Rose.
But with his teammate and rival missing much of the last 18 months due to injury, the Welshman has grown in importance and made noticeable improvements, particularly offensively.
“The way full-backs are going now you have to be as creative as possible as well as being solid defensively,” said Davies, speaking after playing football with foster children from the First Star programme during Spurs’ tour of the U.S.
“I’ll always say that a full-back is there to be part of the defence first and foremost, but if you can chip in at the other end with the odd one here and there it’s definitely a valuable asset to have.”
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