Mick McCarthy today backed his Wolves “meaner machine” to continue their unbeaten away record at Tottenham on Saturday.

Boss McCarthy’s hard work on the training ground to improve his side’s defending sees Wolves go to White Hart Lane aiming to make it four unbeaten on their travels after draws at Arsenal, Bolton and Birmingham in the FA Cup.

And although he is still angry about Chelsea’s late winner 10 days ago, McCarthy has been encouraged by the otherwise tighter defending to stem the flow of goals against, which is only “bettered” by the bottom three in the Premier League.

“We’ve got to be harder to beat, so our recent away record is a good starting point,” said the boss.

“The clean sheet we had on Saturday is a plus too. People ask where does confidence come from? Well for defenders, it’s clean sheets, and it doesn’t matter who it’s against, you feel good about that.

“We’ve looked harder to beat, that’s for sure.”

McCarthy has been especially happy with Wolves’ defending from set-pieces. “Maybe I shouldn’t say it because it’s tempting fate, but we’ve defended free-kicks and corners particularly well,” he said.

McCarthy added: “I thought we played well in the second-half against Bolton and Arsenal, so we’ll go to Spurs in good spirits.”

Meanwhile, Saturday’s return to Tottenham may come too soon for Jamie O’Hara.

The former Spurs midfielder underwent final checks on his double hernia but didn’t train yesterday and the players are off today.

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