Tottenham forward Rafael van der Vaart has stated that despite Arsenal’s revival over the last six weeks, Spurs are better than them and are the number one team in North London.
The balance of power between the two bitter rivals seemed to be changing as Harry Redknapp’s men beat the Gunners 2-1 at White Hart Lane recently, but Arsenal are now only three points from the top four after beating Chelsea 5-3 on Saturday.
However, the Netherlands international was full of praise for his team and how they were playing, and believes they are superior to their local rivals.
“We are better than Arsenal,” the ex-Real Madrid man told Sky Sports.
“In our last seven games we have won six and drawn once. It’s a long season, but I think we have a bigger and better squad.
“Are we the best team in London? Maybe, but it’s still early. We’re in a good way. We are much better than we were last season,” he stated.
Van der Vaart labelled current league leaders Manchester City as the best team in the country, and hailed Roberto Mancini’s outfit’s performances of late.
“Man City are the best team in the league and below them you have a lot of good teams and we are one of them.
“At the moment they are really good. They are winning games easily and how they played against Man United was impressive, but they also have the difficulty of a lot of egos so that could also be a problem.
“When you play for a big team, when you buy a lot of good players and a lot of players also aren’t happy.
“Look at (Emmanuel) Adebayor. He is a great player for us, but he was not even in the squad at City and was training with the youngsters,” he concluded.
Van der Vaart will be rested for the Europa League trip to take on Rubin Kazan on Thursday, with the match against Fulham at Craven Cottage on Sunday in mind.
By Gareth McKnight
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