Stoke City defender Ryan Shawcross has expressed his excitement ahead of a potentially tough start for the Potters' 2017/18 Premier League season.

City have arguably been handed one of the toughest starts to the 2017/18 Premier League campaign as they will be squaring off against the likes of Everton, Arsenal, West Bromwich Albion, Manchester United, Newcastle United and Chelsea during their first six matches of the season.

Despite the extremely difficult looking set of fixtures though, captain Ryan Shawcross is not worried and is instead looking forward to navigating the challenging start in a positive fashion.

Shawcross told Stoke City's official website: "There are no easy games in the Premier League, especially during the first few weeks of the season where everybody is looking to start well.

"Everton away is never an easy one for any side, but we have been there in the past, competed with them and beaten them, so we can go there with real belief this time around too.

"We struggled during the opening few weeks of the season last time, especially in the matches against the bigger sides, but we have a real opportunity to put that right this season.

"We have three mouth-watering games at home against Arsenal, United and Chelsea, which we will be right up for, and hopefully we will be able to make a real statement of intent in those matches.

"We know that we let ourselves down in those kind of fixtures last season, so we will be desperate to make amends for that this time around and start the season in really positive fashion."