Pep Guardiola provided a fitness update on Kyle Walker, who has been out injured since the international break.
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Football fans across the world have every reason to get excited when Manchester City host Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter-final second leg. This contest has become a regular fixture in this competition lately, with both teams constantly being involved in the fight to lift the coveted trophy. The only disappointment is that this fixture has come in the quarter-finals instead of later rounds.
Either way, the supporters got treated to a spectacle in the first leg at the Bernabeu last week when these two sides played out an action-packed 3-3 draw. Both teams were in front at some point or another in the Champions League fixture but, in the end, they would have been content with the draw. Since there is no away-goal rule, there is still everything to play for in the second leg when Manchester City welcome Real Madrid to the Etihad Stadium.
Ahead of the important clash, Pep Guardiola provided a fitness update on Kyle Walker, who has been out injured since the international break. “I will see the training, the last one or two training sessions he feels good. His face, his mood. I don’t know if [he will feature] from the bench or not, but as Bernardo said it is good news. Today at 4 o’clock we have the last session, and we will decide. Of course Kyle is important. His attributes and quality, everyone knows – he is special,” Guardiola, quoted on the club’s website, said ahead of the match.
Shifting the attention back to the game, Guardiola emphasised that his side will be “going for it” when Real Madrid visit Etihad. “With our people, we feel safe, we feel protected, we feel supported. We know we can handle momentum. We are going for it. We have a gameplan we believe in, and we are going for it. If we lose, we lose. We shake hands – Real Madrid will deserve it. I want us to play and deserve to be in the semi-finals,” he explained.
The manager added: “You have to adjust something from Bernabeu – the result was good, but we have to perform a little better. We have the last training session, and we will talk about that and hopefully go through. We need to feel the pressure – we don’t want to lose the game. We need hunger to compete. It is true we feel more comfortable because we have won [this competition now].”
Even though Guardiola accepted that home support will be helpful, he also wants his side to do some things different from the first leg. “Our people at home will help us a lot. You can’t for 90 minutes, all the time, be better, you have to suffer. We need to be who we are. Always in the last years, we have been, and I have the feeling we are ready to perform well. If you don’t, you will not beat teams like Real Madrid. Real Madrid know us, we know them. Carlos made some surprises in the first game,” he explained.
The manager added: “We need the right mentality, be ready to suffer, always we had momentum. In that way always we can do it. We have to be prepared. But we won’t know until the 10th minute [of this game] the qualities of those playing. Some things we need to do better that we weren’t good at in the first game. We have to give them credit – Real Madrid are not just any opponent. We have to impose our way of playing as much as possible, but it is not possible to do that over 90 minutes.”
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