• Manchester United target says stadium has taken up resources • Spurs manager turns pocket inside out to reiterate lack of cash

Mauricio Pochettino has made it plain that he does not expect to strengthen his Tottenham squad in January because the club have no money because of the cost of their new stadium.

The manager is being courted by Manchester United, who want to appoint him as the permanent successor to José Mourinho at the end of the season, while he is also of interest to Real Madrid. Both of the European superpowers would grant him lavish budgets for a different kind of project to the one he is currently involved in.

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Pochettino has injury problems before Wednesday’s Carabao Cup quarter-final at Arsenal, with Jan Vertonghen, Eric Dier, Davinson Sánchez, Serge Aurier, Mousa Dembélé and Victor Wanyama confirmed as unavailable. Pochettino was asked whether the situation had influenced his mid-season transfer plans. Would he bring in any new signings next month?

The Spurs manager responded by shaking his head very deliberately before reaching into his tracksuit trouser pocket, turning it inside out and showing it was empty. To general amusement, he looked at his press officer. “He [the journalist] asks me if I am going to spend money,” Pochettino said. “I don’t have money!”

Pochettino was then asked whether the club had any money. Once again, he turned his pocket inside out to indicate it was empty.

The 46-year-old has expressed his frustration on a number of occasions about the restrictions to his budget – owing to the stadium – and he knows that austerity will remain the order of the day for some time. It was also interesting to hear him reference the long austerity years that Arsenal endured when they moved from Highbury to Emirates Stadium.

“One thing you need to understand is that Tottenham built a new training ground and built what is going to be one of the best stadiums in the world with our own resources,” Pochettino said. “It’s not like people came from I don’t know where and said: ’What is the cost of the new stadium and new facilities? Here’s £100m, £200m, £500m. And what does the manager want? Five players? OK, we’re going to invest £200m, £300m more!’

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“We’re doing all these fantastic things with our own resources. It’s important to make that clear when we compare with another team. To be competitive like we are, it’s tough. It was tough for Arsenal, remember, in a different Premier League and a different period in England.”

Tottenham know that they face a fight to keep Pochettino in the summer but they will do everything in their power to do so. One factor in their favour is the lack of a buy-out clause in the five-year contract that he signed last May. Unusually, Pochettino does not have an agent and he negotiated the deal directly with the chairman, Daniel Levy.

Pochettino could come to regret the lack of a buyout clause because Levy, in theory, could demand a transfer fee for him, over and above the value of the remaining years on his contract. Pochettino earns £8.5m-a-year.