Pep Talk: We want to win this competition, for sure...”

Pep Guardiola was in fine form giving his pre match press conference today. Pep hit on many topics including his thoughts about Real Madrid. After a two week training spell Pep feels the players are ready as they’ll ever be.

So, let’s dive in.

Pep on game-

“I have the feeling today we are ready to play tomorrow, have a good performance and win the game,” a bullish Guardiola said.

“That’s my feeling: we are ready.

“Yeah, we want to [make history]. We want to win this competition, for sure.

“To win it, you have to beat teams like Madrid. We have to win tomorrow and the next rounds.”

“We want to impose our own style, whether we are defending or playing on the counter or Madrid are countering. We want to take the game to certain areas of the field where we can hurt Madrid and show the qualities of our players...”

“Quite often managers plan for games but in the end the game speaks for itself. You can set up a certain way but the way the game develops dictates how you will play...”

“More than just conceding goals is the way we concede. If they are brilliant, we have to accept but most of them we could have avoided and we have to avoid making mistakes. This competition punishes you a lot...”

Pep on preparations-

“Yeah, definitely [that’s an area we need to improve],” he said.

“More than just conceding, it’s the way we concede. If it’s a good action, we accept - but most of them we could have avoided.

“We know it, we spoke about that. Not now but in the last years.

“We know it. If we want to win this competition, we have to be better in this area.”

Pep on Kun Aguero-

“Right now I don’t know. He is in Barcelona. He is getting better. I spoke to doctors and everything is what we thought, Hopefully he can be back with us but I don’t know.”

Pep on Sergio Ramos and Karim Benzema-

“Of course he [Sergio Ramos] is key to them and he has been a great player throughout his career, but as I just said now, we are focusing more on what we can do to influence and win the game than who might or might not be playing for Madrid.”

“Fantastic player (Benzema), I have been aware since he was young and he’s a great player but since my time at Barcelona there have been 20 players that have come on the scene and people have asked if we can compare with Messi. 20 players.”

Pep on Madrid/Zinedine Zidane-

“In past, we played the first leg and what we can remember from that we will put to good use. Since then, we’ve watched all Madrid’s games since La Liga restarted so we’ve spoken about how we think Madrid might approach this game...”

When you think that you’ve got one of his tactical plans covered, he’ll hit you with another or revert. It is already very difficult to analyse tactics...”

That’s it for this week! The squad and coaching staff are ready now we await the game.

Keep it here for a preview and more soon.