Villas-Boas rules out signing a left-back for Tottenham in January

The Spurs boss has revealed that Danny Rose is not expected to return to action for another two to three more weeks but is making "good progress" on a foot injury

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Tottenham manager Andre Villas-Boas has ruled out signing a left-back in the January transfer window despite Danny Rose's continued absence through injury.

Goal exclusively revealed in October that the Portuguese is expected not to spend in January despite having a £40 million warchest available and, when asked if he might buy a replacement in the winter, he told a pre-match press conference: "No, I don't think so."

Rose is not expected to return from a foot injury for "two or three weeks" and Villas-Boas concedes that he has injury problems ahead of Sunday's clash with Manchester City.

"Danny Rose is still out but making good progress on his injury so we're looking for a two-or-three-week period now finally for his return," the head coach remarked.

"[Christian] Eriksen is obviously out, hopefully only for four weeks, due to his injury for Denmark. The rest of the team is back in training – [Vlad] Chiriches, [Nacer] Chadli, Etienne [Capoue] and now Zeki Fryers. All of the team is in contention to be selected for the game.

"Everyone is working extremely well so [on Saturday] we will make the selection but we had a good week – long for the people who stayed, short for the ones that came back from international duty. We just want to recover as soon as possible."

Spurs go into the game just a point ahead of Manuel Pellegrini's men and Villas-Boas is wary of the attacking potential available to the Chilean.

"Their goal tally is absolutely incredible, including their last big result against Norwich [which City won 7-0]," he added.

"We have to take their striking force into account, the players they have in attack, players that have been extraordinary this season like Yaya [Toure] and Fernandinho. We're unsure whether [David] Silva will return to the team or not but their attacking force is tremendous.

"Obviously they have been suffering a couple of problems at the back but still they are a well-organised side and they don't concede a lot and they have a good organisation about them, so it's a tough challenge.

"Last season we took it to the dying stages of the game - we lost but had the game in our hands to win so we go there to play the game and to try to get the result."