He said: “We first have to prove that we are a top- four club because we have never done that before.
“We haven’t even proved we are top five because it took us until two games before the end of the season to get there. So are we good enough? That’s my challenge to the players.
“I want to concede less goals because last season we conceded 54. We need to get that down to 30 before we can compete with the best.
“We score a lot of goals — 57 last season. But if we want to be in the top four, we have to score 70 goals at least.
“We have to be better than Liverpool if we want to be in the top four.
“But if you look at them they buy different players, they buy experience.
“We buy the best young players like Gareth Bale, probably the best 18-year-old left-back in Britain but who still needs to develop.
“The most important thing is if we can develop them, then we can challenge for the title in the future.
“But I can’t say we’ll be better than Arsenal or Liverpool because we need to improve aspects of our game in defence and attack.”
