Arrigo Sacchi congratulates Juventus for reaching the Champions League final, and offers advice on how to beat Barcelona.
The Bianconeri will face the Catalan side in Munich on June 6, and the former Milan Coach believes reaching the final has boosted Italian football.
“Juventus have brought Italian football into the sun after so many years of darkness,” Sacchi opined in an interview with Tuttosport.
Arrigo Sacchi congratulates Juventus for reaching the Champions League final, and offers advice on how to beat Barcelona.
The Bianconeri will face the Catalan side in Munich on June 6, and the former Milan Coach believes reaching the final has boosted Italian football.
“Juventus have brought Italian football into the sun after so many years of darkness,” Sacchi opined in an interview with Tuttosport.
“For five years an Italian team didn’t even go beyond the quarter-finals. And with Inter, it’s true that they won the Champions League, but with pretty much no Italian players, and that’s a real shame.
“Here in Italy, we’d sell our soul to the devil to win.
“Clubs in other countries – and I include Real Madrid, even though they have the most famous and expensive players – want players of their own nationality, but here we say ‘just win’.”
“Juventus have grown a lot in recent years, they won in Italy and are now doing well in Europe, which is a ten-times bigger reward.
“The credit goes to the club, the coaching staff who have worked so hard these past four years, and to the lads.
“I hope Juventus will win the Champions League, but also do it playing on the front foot.”
The Blaugrana have a formidable attack, with Luis Suarez and Neymar supporting the man widely believed to be the world’s best player, Lionel Messi.
“When I’m asked if Messi will decide the game, I say: ‘it depends’. It depends if his teammates get the ball to him.
“You shouldn’t talk about who will mark Messi, because he’s above systems or formations. If you send a man to mark him, he’ll still be better, and then you’ve lost a player.
“You should always think of playing as a team, not of playing against an individual. In the same way you play with a team, not with an individual.
“So how can you stop Barcelona? First of all by making very few mistakes, and then with the power of the collective, with organisation.
“Before games at this level, but really before every game, you should go over and over every move in training, so that when he takes the field, every player has in mind what’s coming, and therefore what he should do.”