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Mourinho insists Spurs will 'fight for the dream' of winning FA Cup

Jose Mourinho insists Tottenham will ‘fight for the dream’ of winning the FA Cup ahead of the club’s fifth round tie against Norwich tomorrow night.

The north London side host their divisional rivals at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, seeking to secure their place in the quarter-finals as the club bid to end a 12-year wait for major silverware.

Only Arsenal and Manchester United have lifted the FA Cup on more occasions than Spurs, though the club have failed to reach the final since their last success back in 1991, losing at the semi-final stage in two of the past three seasons.

World football’s oldest domestic competition is likely the club’s best chance of winning silverware following a difficult campaign thus far, and Mourinho insists his side will be doing all they can to reach May’s final at Wembley, despite their injury troubles.

“My focus is a long-term focus, and as with a long-term focus, everything is the same for me. I want to win the trophy with Tottenham, that doesn’t change for me,” Mourinho told his pre-match press conference.

“This season, the circumstances are not easy and the fact that I couldn’t play in the Carabao Cup gave me one less chance to try to win a trophy. [We were] 12 points behind the fourth [when I took over] and 30 points behind the first, it obviously made [winning] the league impossible too.

“So you are right, in this competition, we are in this moment, 15 teams – because Portsmouth are out – and of the 15 teams we have a dream to fight for.

“It doesn’t matter [about being without] Kane, Lloris, Sissoko, Sonny or whatever, it doesn’t matter. While we are in the competition, we are going to fight for the dream.”

Mourinho has enjoyed a mixed start to life at Spurs since his arrival as Mauricio Pochettino’s successor in November, though the Portuguese refuted suggestions that failing to win a trophy this season would constitute as a failure for his debut campaign.

“This year? No!” he insisted. “Because I came in the middle of the season. Because I came with the train midway. Because of so many difficult circumstances. I wouldn’t feel it at all.”

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