Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp has defended his January transfer dealings. He refused to admit it may have been a mistake allowing ­Roman Pavyluchenko and Vedran Corluka to leave in January, while Steven Pienaar went out on loan.

Redknapp said: "Not really. Who went? Corluka wanted to go. He wanted to move. Pienaar wanted to go, so we let him go.

"The only problem is that we are a little bit short up front.

"We haven't got the biggest squad. Chelsea made eight changes to play Arsenal and still looked good. I couldn't make changes as I only had a striker and two centre-halves.

"If one of those got injured, I was bang in trouble and would have used Bongani Khumalo in defence.

"He's been on loan at Reading and never got in their side but we had nobody else. We were desperate.

"We just have to keep going. But Newcastle have to go to Chelsea and Chelsea do not look like they are going to lose too many games at the moment."