Villas-Boas wary of Villa backlash

Andre Villas-Boas does not believe Aston Villa’s humiliating defeat at Chelsea will influence their Boxing Day clash with his Tottenham side.

Paul Lambert’s men were hammered 8-0 at Stamford Bridge on Sunday, the heaviest top-flight defeat in Villa’s history.

Nevertheless, Villas-Boas has praised the job that opposite number Lambert has done so far this season, choosing to focus on their recent victory against Liverpool at Anfield rather than the performance against Rafa Benitez’s title challengers.

“Their result at Anfield was tremendous, so it will be a difficult game,” Villas Boas told reporters.

“Credit to Paul Lambert for overturning a situation that was difficult for him in the beginning.

“He has a young team, full of energy, so it will be a different type of opposition to the Stoke game (which Spurs drew 0-0 on Saturday), but an excellent game for sure.

“There is still a long way to go. The festive period is very important.”

After beating Lambert’s side 2-0 at home earlier in the campaign, Villas-Boas singled out Villa striker Christian Benteke as the player to watch out for this time around after his recent goalscoring exploits.

“He has been outstanding, for sure,” said the Tottenham boss. “He has eight goals so far and I think he is surprising everybody. He has strong competition from (Darren) Bent.

“I think Paul Lambert was courageous in his decision to keep on persisting with a player that he got so well in the transfer market, so credit to them.”