Carvalhal on Swansea team news and Harry Kane's absence

Swansea City manager Carlos Carvalhal doesn't believe we'll be weakened by the absence of Harry Kane when we face his side at the Liberty Stadium in the Emirates FA Cup quarter-finals on Saturday.

Top scorer Harry has been ruled out with an ankle problem sustained in the early stages of last weekend's Premier League victory at Bournemouth.

But Carvalhal is also without the services of some of his key players going into Saturday lunchtime's clash (12.15pm), and he's expecting a stern test for his troops.

“They lose very few games, and this is a David and Goliath tie,” said the former Sheffield Wednesday boss, who is set to be without Jordan Ayew (suspended), Andre Ayew, Andy King (both cup-tied), Angel Rangel, Renato Sanches, Leroy Fer and Wilfried Bony (all injured).

“Last week they were losing 1-0 when Kane came off injured and they won 4-1. Of course he is a fantastic striker – I like him a lot – but the big teams can replace good players with good players.

“We are without a lot of players for this game and that makes a big difference for us, but at the big clubs like Tottenham they have substitutes for every position.”

Goals from Fernando Llorente against his former club and Dele Alli gave us a 2-0 victory at Swansea in early January, but Carvalhal reckons his team can cause us more problems this time around.

“I think we are better now than when we played them in the league,” he said. “Swansea have not won against Tottenham since 1991 I think, and Tottenham will want to win this trophy more after going out of the Champions League.

“But as I have said before, what matters is what happens on the pitch. Two teams play against each other and we will try to exploit the few weak points they have.

“One thing for sure is that we will be ready. We have had a week to prepare for the game and I trust my players a lot. I believe we can get through and we will do everything we can to do that.”

Asked about what kind of team he expects to field at the Liberty, Carvalhal added: “I never played a weak team in this run – all we have done is protected players who had some small injury problems.

“We have always picked a team with value and we will play a strong team on Saturday, that’s absolutely sure. There will be Under-23 players in the 18 because we do not have a lot of players available, but we will fight to get to the next stage.

“They are a better team than us, but in football you know that even if the opponents are better, if they have a bad day and you have a very good day, you can win.

“This is the beauty of football. We are here to try to do something like that this weekend, so let’s see what happens.”