Mauricio Pochettino says Clinton Njie could be out for “a while” after suffering a knee ligament injury.

The Cameroon international missed Sunday’s home defeat against Newcastle and Spurs’ head coach is now waiting to discover how long he will be out of action for.

“Clinton picked up a ligament injury in his knee and maybe we miss him for a while,” he said. “It’s difficult to say [for] how long. Maybe in the next few days we can communicate better with more specific details. Will it be more than a month? Maybe yes.”

Pochettino added: “[Mousa] Dembele is close, we need to assess him now in training.

“[Ryan] Mason’s still out and so is [Alex] Pritchard. We hope that after the last training session everyone will be good.”

Pochettino faces his former club Southampton on the south coast tomorrow (Saturday) following a disappointing result last weekend, when Spurs lost a 1-0 lead and suffered a 2-1 loss against Newcastle at White Hart Lane.

“I think we need to learn about the last game,” he said. “I think we are agreed with the players, they feel the same as me. The first half was fantastic and the second half was not in the way we wanted to play.

“It’s important to recognise when you make a mistake, in the way that you play and how we need to change.

“It was hard for us because the expectation was big and we missed the opportunity to be in the top four. But we are very young, we have a very young squad and we need to learn about that. This is the most important thing now.

“We expect a very tough game because I think Southampton have one of the best squads in the Premier League. They have unbelievable players and a great manager - but we are ready to compete. Our objective is to get three points and to recover our feeling, our performance.”

Meanwhile, Pochettino has welcomed the decision by Haringey Council this week to grant planning permission for Tottenham’s proposed new 61,080-seater stadium, which is scheduled to be ready in time for the 2018-19 season.

“I think we are all excited about that, about the future of the club,” he said. “It was a big decision. I want to congratulate our president of the board because the job [he did] was fantastic, and I think for our supporters and for us it’s a big thing. It’s an exciting time at Tottenham because the future can be great.”

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