Speaking to the press after earning a point against Brentford, the Palace manager reiterated his stance for the tournament which begins for Premier League sides on Tuesday night.
“It’s important for us to win football matches,” he said. “To win football matches will give us confidence for the rest of the season. We are at the beginning of the season, players are feeling strong, are feeling good, there are two games before the international break and we will play these two games with the best starting XI I have.
“We will play all the games with the desire to win it; I don’t think we can choose which competition we can go into. As a football club we don’t have this privilege, we have to take one game after the other. The next one is on Tuesday and we will put [out] a strong team to compete.
