Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
HUGO: LET’S BOSS BARCA
Have faith in your ability and prayers will be answered with a Nou Camp miracle, says Spurs keeper Lloris
HUGO LLORIS has told his Tottenham teammates they must believe they can pull off a miracle in the Nou Camp.
He admits a faultless performance is vital, as is stopping “sensational” Lionel Messi to have any chance of reaching the knockout stages.
A win guarantees Spurs progress, but Barca have the longest current unbeaten home record of 28 games in the competition. They can equal Bayern Munich’s all-time Champions League record if they avoid defeat tonight.
But Lloris knows all about winning big games having captained France to Russia World Cup glory, and says they must also take heart from Real Betis inflicting a rare La Liga defeat at the Nou Camp last month.
“It’s a big task because Barcelona aren’t used to losing many games at home,” said the Spurs keeper. “But they did this season so we need to believe in ourselves and that we’ve a chance of winning and going through. First of all, we need to believe in ourselves.
“We expect a tough game, it’s a hard place to deal with, a lot of top players and historically Barcelona is one of the best clubs in the world. We’ve huge respect for them.
“But every single player in our squad has proper experience with their clubs and countries.
“You can talk about Belgium, you can talk about English players who had a great run in the World Cup and it has to be helpful for the team. It’s not about me or any one player, it’s about the leaders in the team and we’ve players with big experience.”
It has been a strange year for the Spurs captain. He lifted the World Cup, then was banned for drink-driving and in his first game back from injury against Barcelona at Wembley in October made a rare mistake.
He rushed out and gifted Philippe Coutinho an early goal in a 4-2 win for the Spaniards. But the night belonged to Messi (left), who scored twice in a masterclass.
Lloris warns that Spurs
must learn the lessons of their first encounter. “At this level, one little mistake can change the game,” he said.
“For my part, it was my first game after a few weeks of injuries and probably I missed a little bit of judging the distance, but sometimes you need to accept mistakes.
“I think we played very well in the second half and we came close to coming back. To be fair, Messi on this day had an amazing performance. Every time he touched the ball he created chances and it’s difficult to get the result you want when you give too much freedom to a player like that. We need to have more control of him.
“He was sensational. He is used to showing that type of game. He is one of the best players in the history of football so he can turn games when he decides.
“Obviously, September as a month was not easy for two reasons. The main reason was because I was injured. The second one is there was some turbulence and that’s something that can happen in life.
“But in that sort of period, you shouldn’t lose focus on the main things and the simple things in life. Most importantly, I am playing well in goal at the moment, as I showed in the last few games and few weeks.”
Lloris will need to be at his very best to stop Messi and Barca, and having made such strides under Mauricio Pochettino in the past four seasons, it would be a major blow both financially and in terms of prestige if Spurs do not reach the last-16.
Lloris added: “Like all the players, we want to go as far as possible in every competition in which we’re involved.
“There’s always something to learn from and the most important thing is to move on and to learn from the success and from the failure.
“We’re still in the process in the development of the club and the team. We’re not a contender to win the Champions League, like Barca is.
“But I think that type of club has to inspire us to success and to be winners.”