Mauricio Pochettino has joked that Daniel Levy is “concerned” and “worried” about losing him as Tottenham Hotspur manager.

The Argentine was in relaxed mood after guiding his side to the Champions League knockout stages with a 1-1 draw at Barcelona on Tuesday. He has been repeatedly linked with jobs at Real Madrid and Manchester United and told how the prospect of him leaving to join another club had made chairman Levy “jealous”.

The 46-year-old signed a five-year deal in May but, addressing the matter of the repeated speculation and conversations with his superior, Pochettino spoke in a jovial manner. “Daniel does not laugh,” he said. “I know it gets boring but he maybe is worried, he is concerned. It is normal. It is not nice for Daniel to hear all that history of course.

“Do I have to reassure him? No. It is like in football when the sporting director or the club president says ‘no, the manager is going to be here and we trust in him’, and next game [he is] out. If you reassure something it is because you are thinking different things.

“He is a worried man because he is jealous about me!”