Thursday, 03 November 2011 23:56
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Tony Pulis: Believes reaching knockout stages would be a big achievement
Tony Pulis hailed his Stoke side after they shrugged off a punishing schedule to move to the brink of reaching the Europa League knockout stages.
The Potters lost 3-1 at home to Newcastle on Monday but bounced back on Thursday night in Israel, easing to a 2-1 win against Maccabi Tel Aviv.Although the hosts were brushed aside 3-0 at the Britannia Stadium two weeks ago, they were defending a 12-game unbeaten run at home in Europe, stretching back to Bayern Munich's win at the Bloomfield Stadium in 2004.But Stoke were always in the ascendancy and broke the deadlock as Dean Whitehead scored in the 51st minute before laying on the second goal for substitute Peter Crouch 13 minutes later.Maccabi's stoppage-time goal from substitute Roberto Colautti was not enough to stop Stoke going four points clear at the top of Group E, and Pulis' men visit Bolton on Sunday knowing they need just one point from their last two group games to reach the last 32 of a European competition for the first time."I thought the lads were brilliant tonight," said the Stoke boss.Good balance"The balance looked good. The three centre-halves were very solid. There was a bit of a lapse at the end but that's a little bit of tiredness I think."I'm very pleased. They huffed and puffed a little bit but I thought we coped with it smashing."While Pulis made nine changes to the side that started against Newcastle it was still a strong side, with Danny Higginbotham playing his first game for seven months after recovering from a cruciate ligament injury."I told him about two weeks ago that this was the game I was looking at and to get himself ready for it," Pulis added."He was smashing before he tired at the end with one or two others as well."Wilson (Palacios) got another 65 minutes. He still isn't as sharp as we want him to be but he needs to play games to get that. It's all great experience for the lads."Cup finalBesiktas' 1-0 win over Dynamo Kiev saw the Turks leapfrog their opponents into second place and Stoke can clinch qualification at home to Dynamo on 1st December."Kiev at the Britannia now is a cup final," Pulis said."If we win the game, we'll win the group, and if we don't get beaten, we'll go through, it's as simple as that."It's a massive game for us and I'm sure it'll be a great night because they are a good side. I think it's the toughest group so, if we do it, it's a big achievement, but we still have to do it."Read more http://www1.skysports.com/football/news/11095/7290127/
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