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Spurs head coach Ange Postecoglou has hit back at the idea irregular visitors to the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium are “plastic” or “tourist” supporters.

The makeup of the home crowd has been a talking point over the last week, after Spurs announced a 6 per cent increase in season ticket prices and tighter controls around senior concessions. It has led to accusations that Tottenham would prefer to have a more transient crowd as irregular visitors are more likely to spend more when attending matches.

But Postecoglou forcefully argued that to brand those who can only go to games from time to time was extremely unfair.

“That's really harsh — and I'll tell you why," he said. "Because I'm probably ‘plastic’ and ‘touristy’ because I was coming from the other side of the world really passionate about football and if I could get access to see a Premier League game that was the world to me.

”So to label people 'plastic' or 'tourists' I don't think that's fair just because people live on the other side of the world. This football club has supporters all over the world. It has supporters all over the UK who don't always get access to the games and I think we should always be able to accommodate them."

More below

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Ange Postecoglou dismisses ‘tourist’ supporter claims after Tottenham season ticket hike

Chelsea midfielder Erin Cuthbert admitted there was a degree of frustration after Friday's WSL win over Arsenal was delayed due to a sock issue but praised the way her side handled the situation.

Kick off at Stamford Bridge was delayed by 30 minutes after Arsenal arrived with the wrong colour socks.

“We were quite frustrated, we'd been waiting to play the game for a while, we were quite fired up," she told Sky Sports.

"But I think we channelled it quite well. We came out and did a warm up because there's always a risk and there's always something in the back of your head about getting injured because you've not ran in a little while.

"We'd already done a team talk, it was quite weird. The team talk was done, it was really, really late in the day that we found out. But we’re professionals, we have to manage it. It’s our fault at the end of the day if we don’t start well. But I thought the girls handled themselves impeccably."

Despite conceding three goals in the opening 32 minutes in the 3-1 loss, Arsenal captain Kim Little dismissed suggestions the 30-minute delay contributed to her side’s slow start.

“No, I think we’re all professionals, you have to cope with adapting to things, so no I don’t think so,” she told Sky Sports. “We know we all have to turn up as soon as that whistle blows and we didn’t do it in the way we wanted today."

More below

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Sock issue delays kick-off in Chelsea’s Women’s Super League win over Arsenal

Raoul Bellanova, Michael Folorunsho, and Lorenzo Lucca have received their first call ups to the Italy senior squad for March’s friendlies in the United States.

Head coach Luciano Spalletti has named a 28-player squad for the fixtures against Venezuela and Ecuador.

Forwards Gianluca Scammacca and Ciro Immobile both miss out once more, having not been included in November’s squad.

Tottenham left-back Destiny Udogie returns to the squad after not being selected in November due to a hamstring injury. Teammate Guglielmo Vicario, yet to be capped at senior level, is also included.

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Three first-time call ups in Italy squad for March friendlies in United States

Tonight's Women's Super League fixture between Chelsea and Arsenal at Stamford Bridge has been delayed due to an Arsenal kit issue.

The match had been scheduled to kick off at 7pm, but this has been pushed back to 7:30pm.

Arsenal arrived at Stamford Bridge with white socks instead of red, which would have been a clash with Chelsea. Arsenal players returned to warm up in grey Chelsea socks.

A Chelsea statement read: "Kick-off has been delayed for an indefinite period due to an Arsenal kit issue."

Chelsea sit top of the WSL, three points ahead of Arsenal. Over 30,000 tickets were sold for Friday's fixture.

And with that, I've got some weekend preparations to get on with ahead of covering a couple of excellent games this weekend.

Make sure you keep this feed open through the rest of today. The news team will be on hand to bring you any headlines and breaking stories we get.

In the meantime, enjoy the rest of your Friday and here's to some fantastic football.

There may well be good news for Real Madrid by the time they face Manchester City in the Champions League.

Head coach Carlo Ancelotti has told our correspondent Mario Cortegana today he expects to have Thibaut Courtois and Eder Militao available after the international break.

Goalkeeper Courtois has missed the entire season after an ACL injury in training just before the season started, while Militao tore the ACL in his left knee in the opening game of the season.

It had been thought that both may not return this season. Here's Ancelotti:

???? “They have started working with the team this week, we will take advantage of this break to do friendlies against the youth team. I think they will be ready for the match on the 31st (against Athletic Bilbao). We won’t take any risks. They are doing very well.”

You can read more from Mario with the link below.

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Eder Militao, Thibaut Courtois on track to be fit for Real Madrid vs Manchester City

It was a pretty big morning in European football, as the quarter-finals of the Champions League, Europa League and Conference League were all drawn.

You want highlights? Of course you do.

First up, here is a mouthwatering Champions League draw:

Those are the first legs with the first team at home.

It also reflects the semi-final draw, which was also made. The winners of the top two ties will play each other in the first semi, and again from the second two quarter-finals.

It's such a big game, Luton v Nottingham Forest deserves one more post. Here are a couple of picks from the Opta stats pool ahead of the mammoth Premier League clash:

And on the less-productive side of the fence (sorry, Forest fans):

That's the game for Luton, but it's hard to know which is bigger for Nottingham Forest: tomorrow's match of the days thereafter?

The club is now expecting to discover its fate over breaching the Premier League's profit and sustainability rules (PSR) on Monday.

A hearing to decide on what punishment Forest will face was held last week, on Thursday and Friday.

It means all parties will avoid an impactful announcement before kick-off, but it's still unclear what the punishment will be.

You can read more on this one from our Forest correspondent Paul Taylor with the link below.

Luton Town have a huge game at the bottom of the Premier League tomorrow, when they host Nottingham Forest.

That comes off the back of a remarkable 4-3 midweek defeat at Bournemouth, where Luton had been 3-0 up at half-time.

So how did manager Rob Edwards deal with all that?

???? "We lost a game of football in a strange way. But I’d like to think we dealt with it pretty quickly. We stayed over that night, had a good meeting with the players once we got back to the hotel. It was important to me we tried to shift the focus onto learning from what we got wrong, not sweeping it under the carpet. We've got to deal with it.

"It’s important to me as well the players want to run for us, for each other, for me. So there’ll be some honesty, which there was the next day and some good stuff in the meeting.

"The players have got a huge Premier League game tomorrow; it’s not difficult to get up for that."

Edwards believes there should be no questions about his team's mentality. That said, the real answers come tomorrow.

Even when Gary O'Neil is trying to be a little covert, he can't help being extremely honest about it.

Such as today when he sat down for his pre-FA Cup press conference and declared he would not be offering any team news, because it's a big game for his Wolves side and he'd decided that he wouldn't.

A reminder that they host Championship side Coventry and really should win. It makes you wonder whether they've suddenly got a load of players back - or out.

O'Neil did at least confirm Matheus Cunha is back in full training after a hamstring injury.

O'Neil did say he'd be open to discussing the team news once the team was out ahead of kick-off, but we all know that's not the same thing.

Now this is exciting. We've got these four FA Cup quarter-finals taking place this weekend.

Two of them include Championship opposition and should really see the Premier League side through but you never know. As for the other two, they should prove fun:

Tomorrow (times in GMT)

Sunday

We've also got live coverage of those two games from Manchester right here on The Athletic this weekend. I'll see you there.

There were some tentative mentions of European football to Fulham boss Marco Silva, which is probably a bit of a stretch. But that could be a future discussion if Silva continues to build on his current squad.

That will mean managing potential departures and keeping hold of the squad's talents - including defender Tosin Adarabioyo, who is among those whose contract runs out this summer.

Here's what Silva told our reporter Thom Harris a little earlier:

???? "I would love to keep him. We have a few players towards end of their contracts: Tosin, Bobby Decordova-Reid, Kenny Tete. We would like to keep them as they are important for us. Part of the furniture.

"We have been trying to renew with Tosin. The club have been speaking with his agent. Let’s hope we can hear some news in the coming weeks, but from me I would like to keep him at the football club.”

One of the games of the weekend comes in the FA Cup, where Manchester United host Liverpool for a place in the semi-finals.

A home victory at Old Trafford would bring one of the highlights of another difficult campaign - but one now painted in a more optimistic light thanks to INEOS' investment in the club.

However, this week it has been questioned whether that future will include striker Marcus Rashford, or whether it will actually be funded by his potential big-money sale?

Manager Erik ten Hag addressed that very subject his afternoon, speaking to our correspondent Mark Critchley:

???? "We did not sign him last season for four years with the intention to sell him now. He should be part of this project. It is not a subject we don't talk about."

I highly doubt that will be the end of the subject, but it certainly puts Ten Hag's view on the table.

Leeds United defender Pascal Struijk may need to undergo season-ending surgery on his groin injury, according to manager Daniel Farke.

The 24-year-old hasn’t played since the 2-1 defeat to Preston on Boxing Day, with the groin issue keeping him sidelined for the last three months.

Farke confirmed the defender is yet to return to training and may need to undergo a medical procedure on the issue, which would see him miss the remainder of the Championship season as Leeds pursue an immediate Premier League return. Farke said:

???? “With Pascal Struijk, some bad news, progress to come back into team training was not possible. It’s a bit complicated situation with him – he’s got a cartilage injury and there are always two ways to treat this injury.

“Either you go for surgery, if we do this he’s out for the season, or the conservative route and go for injection therapy. The doctors hoped this would be beneficial for him.

“We had to go this route, the cartilage needs some healing, it has progressed but the next 10 days will be decisive.”

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Leeds’ Pascal Struijk may need season-ending surgery on groin injury, says Daniel Farke

That Spurs update feels a like a good moment to remind you there are just FOUR Premier League games this weekend - and here they are:

Tomorrow (times in GMT)

Sunday

We'll preview some of the finer points to these games, as well as the FA Cup quarter-finals, as we go on through the afternoon here in the UK.

Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy has been ruled out of his side’s FA Cup quarter-final at Chelsea due to a calf injury.

Vardy, 37, has scored 15 goals in 28 games in all competitions this season but has also been managed, making only 12 Championship starts amid a knee injury that kept him out for eight league games over the festive period.

Leicester manager Enzo Maresca sad:

???? “We played Sunderland away and he didn't train (before the Hull game). He just did something before the game.

“Then he played the last game and, fortunately for us, he scored twice, but then he felt an injury.

“It is just a small problem, but as I said many times, we all love Jamie Vardy but at the same time we cannot forget that he is 37.”

Tottenham's summer transfer plans "won't change" depending on whether they qualify for the Champions League.

Speaking ahead of tomorrow's trip to Fulham where a win would take Spurs fourth, head coach Ange Postecoglou said:

???? "I doubt our off-season plans in terms of strengthening the team will change markedly from where we are now (if Tottenham qualify for the Champions League).

"We know what we need. We know the areas we need to strengthen, we know the kind of players and profiles we need. And that won’t change, irrespective of how the season finishes for us, because for us it’s about growth. It’s not about just having one target — and those plans are well in place."

The likelihood of Spurs playing in next season's Champions League will be impacted by whether England have four or five qualification spots. That will be decided by the performances of the Premier League teams involved in this season's competition, with the expectation they will do enough to secure one of the additional spots.

If there are five qualification places, Tottenham are in an extremely good position: six points clear of sixth-placed Manchester United, and a win at Fulham would make it nine points with the same number of games played.

Spurs will also be confident of finishing above fourth-placed Aston Villa, who they beat 4-0 on Sunday and trail by two points having played a game less.

Spurs' chances of going fourth tomorrow will be boosted by the return of Richarlison, who Postecoglou said he expected to be fit enough to be in the Tottenham squad. Micky van de Ven misses out however, with Postecoglou confirming he will be replaced by Radu Dragusin for his first Spurs start.