Tottenham Hotspur manager Tim Sherwood has explained that he did not recruit in January as he did not feel that he could improve his squad.

Spurs were linked with Liverpool target Yevhen Konoplyanka and Juventus forward Mirko Vucinic among others in the winter transfer window.

However, Sherwood believes that the existing playing staff at White Hart Lane is strong enough to secure them a top-four finish and could not have been bettered by the options available to him last month.

"If they had thrown me a name like Lionel Messi, I might have taken it," he told Sky Sports News. "The names being bandied around this January were not any better then what we had, in my opinion.

"I feel like we are taking the club in the right direction. But we've got a long way to go and we have to maintain it and I certainly realise that.

"We just have to keep in that fight right to the death and I believe that our players have got the quality to take us where we want to be. We've got a strong enough squad to be able to compete."

Sherwood has admitted that he may not remain Tottenham manager beyond the end of the season, even if he guides them to Champions League qualification for the first time since 2010.