Barcelona’s hot scoring form of late has Luis Enrique confident that his side can not only knock out Paris Saint-Germain from the Champions League on Wednesday night, that they can do so with goals to spare.
Recent routs over Celta Vigo and Sporting Gijon have boosted the Catalans’ morale and their optimism is high going into the return leg of the last-16 tie, despite their 4-0 deficit.
“We are in the middle of the tie, we have nothing to lose and a lot to win – if they scored four, we can score six,” the Asturian told the press on Tuesday afternoon. “We arrive in good form and we have to be confident.
“Without a doubt, we have to be patient as the result of the first leg was very clear, but we are only halfway through.
“We have to do a lot of things throughout the game and assert our dominance in attack and defence because PSG are a difficult team and will make things hard for us.”
With Unai Emery naming a large travelling party of players to travel from the French capital, the Barcelona boss was similarly keen to keep his cards close to his chest regarding team selection.
“Any of the 20 players I have at my disposal could play together,” he said.
“We can play with many systems and I do not want to give any hints to Emery.
“Everyone has to be professional and know that sport puts you in situations of all kinds. If this team has not needed a comeback like this so far, it’s because we’ve been generally very good in our first legs.”
A boisterous Camp Nou will greet the two sides on Wednesday night and Luis Enrique is hoping for constant backing from the home fans, even if the tie goes to penalties.
“Every football game needs good emotional management, but this one even more,” said the coach. “The players should be calm but not the fans.
“The Camp Nou must be a pressure cooker from 20 minutes before kick off, we need the supporters to be hyper alert and hyper excited.
“Marc-Andre [ter Stegen] does not need to hear about [penalties], he knows that all he has to do is stop them from scoring. Our players will know in themselves if they are more or less prepared to take a spot-kick. “
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