The England manager sees Real Madrid as the greatest threat to Barcelona’s attempt to retain the trophy they won so emphatically against Manchester United at Wembley last season.Capello expects the Premier League contingent to reach the final stages of as usual, but it is Jose Mourinho he rates as most likely to scupper Pep Guardiola’s European aspirations.
“I think this year that Real Madrid will be really close to Barcelona,” said Capello, a former manager at the Bernabeu.
“They play a different style and are improving a lot. I don’t know whether Barcelona will get to the final at the end of this season. The squad at Real Madrid is really strong which means they can change the players around and this will help them. I can see that important players for Barcelona are injured now. I hope they will be fit for the next part of the season.”
Manchester City will take on La Liga opposition, Villarreal, in Spain on Wednesday, but Capello is making no bold predictions about the prospects of the English representatives.
“Teams like Manchester City, Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea are improving and could reach the final stages,” said Capello, who was promoting Wembley’s Exhibition of Champions tour.
“For me another team you need to watch is Bayern Munich. This is a really good team. The way that they played against Man City was really something. They have good balance, a winning mentality and they are scoring a lot of goals. And for the first time after a very long time they have got a good goalkeeper and this is really, really important.”
Capello was a Champions League-winning manager with AC Milan in 1994, an achievement he still ranks as his best as a coach.
No comments:
Post a Comment