Play like who we are – Pep on Real Madrid clash

Pep Guardiola has asked his team for one thing in the UEFA Champions League clash away at Real Madrid – ‘Play like who we are’.

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Wednesday’s encounter will be the eighth time we’ve been drawn against Los Blancos and the fifth season in succession we have faced the Spanish side in Europe’s elite competition.

The highlight was undoubtedly beating the 15-time Champions League winners in the 2022/23 semi-finals on our way to a glorious Treble.

But in the two seasons since, it’s been our rivals who have had the upper hand.

We were defeated over two legs in the quarter-finals in 2023/24 on penalties as our opponents eventually triumphed over Borussia Dortmund in the final.

Last time out, we went out of the competition in the Play-Off phase after losing 6-3 on aggregate across two legs.

Guardiola is relishing the latest assignment in Madrid and has called on his players to be themselves in the UCL cauldron.

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“It’s never an easy place,” said the boss.

“We missed an opportunity against Leverkusen to be close but we are going to do our game and we have three options to get the points we need to go there [the knockout phase].

“It’s another competition. Hopefully we can play like we are. Always I wish when you go to play on the big stages is play like who we are.”

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Guardiola made 10 changes for our last Champions League encounter against Leverkusen as we went down 2-0 to the German side at the Etihad.

But of late the manager has not rotated as much, making only one alteration to his starting line-up in his last three games for our wins over Leeds, Fulham and Sunderland.

His decision to rotate against the Bundesliga outfit raised eyebrows in some quarters and the manager joked with the press when asked why he’s kept a settled side of late.

“You destroyed me so I said I don’t want to be destroyed again for substitutions. I want to be kind to you,” he added.

“No reason why. I decide to do that. In Bernabeu we will see what happens with the momentum. We will see.

“Now is time to enjoy today and tomorrow is time to think about Champions League.”