HUGO: LET’S BOSS BARCA
Have faith in your ability and prayers will be answered with a Nou Camp miracle, says Spurs keeper LLoris
vHUGO 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 Barcelona Q Tottenham Inter PSV 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 P W D L F A Pts 5 4 1 0 13 4 13 5 2 1 2 8 9 7 5 2 1 2 5 6 7 5 0 1 4 5 12 1 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 Live on BT Sport from 7pm
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