Man City suffer team news blow as Real Madrid reveal key figure will return: ‘Everything is at stake’
Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti has claimed that his side is ready to welcome back Antonio Rudiger for the visit of Manchester City.
The injury boost will be a blow to City’s chances, given they can now push Aurelien Tchouameni into midfield to help strengthen them further, with the impressive Raul Asensio set to continue in defence after a brilliant performance last week at the Etihad Stadium.
Having earned a late comeback victory Ancelotti’s side, the reigning champions, head into the game leading 3-2 in aggregate but suffered a setback in the league over the weekend drawing 1-1 with Osasuna.
Whereas City waltzed past Newcastle United, beating them 4-0 thanks to a first-half hattrick by January signing Omar Marmoush and Pep Guardiola’s side won’t be put off by the size of the task at hand.
Speaking to the media ahead of the game, Ancelotti revealed that Rudiger is ready to play but Lucas Vasquez, an experienced figure at both right-back and midfield, is only ready for the bench.
“We are trying to prepare very well players to recover who can help us,” said Ancelotti.
“We try to have the same game as we played one week ago is the idea. Obviously, we have to take into account every difficulty that we have in this kind of game, which is a play-off where everything is at stake in 90 minutes.”
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Ancelotti hails Kylian Mbappe amid Man City threat
He also praised Mbappe, who netted an important equaliser last week, even if it was deemed a fortunate goal, deflecting in off his shin, in light of his struggles this season. Despite the teething problems, the Frenchman has 24 goals in 36 games.
“He is motivated and physically fit, as he shows. He is a very calm and peaceful man. He handles stress very well and has good stress management skills. He is doing very well.”
Ancelotti was then quizzed on Guardiola’s comments claiming they have a ‘1% chance‘ of being victorious in the second leg.
“I’ll ask him before the game tomorrow. Do you really think he thinks he just has a one per cent [chance]. Of course he thinks he has more possibilities and we don’t think we have a 99% chance.
“We think we have a small advantage, one which we have to take advantage of. We will try to play the same game we played in the first leg – things worked out very well then.”
There was some fears of Erling Haaland’s fitness ahead of the game after seemingly suffering a knock at the weekend, but Guardiola cleared up any issues after the win over Newcastle. “When he was down everyone was scared,” said Guardiola.
“He got up, walked smiling like always. I didn’t speak to him but the doctors didn’t come for bad news. Hopefully [will be fine for Madrid].”
