Michael Dawson out to thwart Fernando Torres

11 April 2012

Michael Dawson has warned Liverpool striker Fernando Torres that Tottenham are not in the mood to end their run of five consecutive clean sheets when they face their rivals for a Champions League place this weekend.

Spurs did not concede a goal over the Christmas period and start 2010 in the top four of the Barclays Premier League, with a four-point lead on Liverpool that could be extended to seven with victory at Anfield on Sunday.

"I was scoring goals a few weeks ago but I said clean sheets were the most important thing," Dawson said. "Since then we've kept five and that's fantastic from my point of view and the team's point of view.

"Hopefully we can keep this run going. We're four points clear of Liverpool at the moment and hopefully we'll make it seven by Sunday. We're striving for the top four, Liverpool as well.

"They had a great result at Aston Villa then drew with Reading, and it's always tough going to Anfield. The lads are full of confidence and playing well and hopefully we can take that into Sunday. Hopefully we'll get a nice win and go seven points clear of them."

Dawson is well aware of the threat Spain striker Torres poses. Since arriving at Liverpool, the 25-year-old has scored three times against Spurs.

"Whenever I play against Torres he's a top class player, you saw that against Villa when he scored in the last minute," Dawson added. "We'll have to be at our best on Sunday but let's hope we can make it six clean sheets in a row.

"When we beat them at the start of the season it was a fantastic performance by the lads and got us off to a great start to the campaign, so we believe we can do it at Anfield."

Spurs' midfielder Niko Kranjcar describes facing the club's top-four rivals as a "six-pointer".

"I can't wait," he said. "It's a massive game, a showdown between two teams who want to push into the top four.

"We're in great form and the five straight clean sheets go to show how impressive we've been in recent weeks. Hopefully that will continue at Liverpool.

"They've also been in good form over the Christmas period, picking up some good results. But although Anfield is never an easy place to go, we feel we have the quality to go and give them a game.

"It's a six-pointer. If we win the game we'll get a nice lead in front of them but nothing will be decided this weekend, it will be decided over the next 18 games.

"We have to believe, give the maximum in every game and our next game is Liverpool away, so we really want to send out a message and keep proving that we can achieve that top-four spot."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in