Mehdi Nafti says Birmingham's crop of young and inexperienced players have the mental strength to win the battle to stay in the Premier League.The Tunisian international insists Alex McLeish's side have more quality than the team which was relegated from the top flight two years ago.

And Nafti takes great heart from the way City overcame losing defender Martin Taylor, who was red-carded after his tackle on Eduardo, after just three minutes to force a 2-2 draw with leaders Arsenal last weekend.

Now they face another test from a side in north London with newly-crowned Carling Cup winners Tottenham their opponents at St Andrews on Saturday.

Nafti said: "People talk about it being a testing period for our young players but I think they are ready for that.

"They were ready for it last season when there was the pressure of playing for promotion to get back into the Premier League straight away.

"It is the same sort of thing now. I think we are ready for that because we knew at the beginning of the season we would be struggling and be in a fight to stay up.

"We knew that and we were prepared for all season to be like that. We have to show now that we are capable of staying up.

"Now we hope we can build on that draw against Arsenal. We saw the mentality was quite strong against Arsenal and we need to turn that into points now.

"We are approaching the end part of the season and we need points on the board. Now it is all about winning games.

"I know we are soon going to be playing teams like Reading, Wigan, Fulham, all those teams near us in the table. We need to be strong mentality, to keep the same mentality as last weekend and add a bit more to our game."

Nafti added: "This team has probably more quality than the one which went two years ago. It is a young team but with very good players. We are starting to build a new team now but I am very confident.

"What do we have to improve to stay up? If we knew that, we would have won more games but we have had a few games where we have had no luck at all and did not deserve to lose."

Nafti is aware that Blues manager Alex McLeish will ultimately be judged on whether he can keep Birmingham in the Premier League.

He said: "Maybe he is more calm than Steve Bruce. They are different. You can't play all your career with the same manager so you have to adapt.

"I always say a manager is good when winning games. If we stay up, people in Birmingham will say 'Alex McLeish is the best manager we've ever had, he has saved the team, we need him for next season'.

"If we go back down, they will say 'we should have kept Steve Bruce'. It is always the same. It is always about results."

McLeish will demand his players repeat the performance they gave against the Gunners to have any chance of bringing Spurs back down to earth after their cup final win over Chelsea.

He said: "Spurs will come here with a spring in their step having just won the Carling Cup. We will congratulate them on that but we won't be standing around admiring them come Saturday.

"The players have to show the level of performance we got last weekend. People say Tottenham might be relaxed but it can work both ways. They can be relaxed and play out of their skins.

"I've been involved in winning cup finals before and then playing great the next week. I've been involved in cup finals and then being on the wrong end of a result the following week.

"It is important what we do in our approach. Before the Arsenal game, I spoke to the players in the dressing room and told them exactly what I wanted and sometimes they leave it in there.

"But they went out and carried it out to

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