Arteta Wants Man City Win the Champions League

The Premier League was achieved. Also the other domestic competitions in FA Cup and League Cup. The performance is stable with offensive and entertaining, signature style of Pep Guardiola. However, there is still one trophy awaited by the fans: Champions League.

Just like Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), another Europe rich clubs, Man City, have the ambition to prove himself as the best club in Europe by winning the Champions League. Their journey often eliminated in the qualification round. The best achievement was in 2015-2016 when The Citizens entered the semifinal round.

The chance to win is wide open for Man City this season. They join the relatively easy group with Olympique Lyonnais, Hoffenheim, and Shakhtar Donetsk in Group F. Man City started the match by playing against Lyon at Etihad Stadium on Thursday, September 20, 2018, at 2 am GMT+7.

The team showed their superiority in the Premier League last season. Now, Man City set the target to Champions League title. Mikel Arteta, Guardiola’s coach assistant led Man City in the match against Lyon due to UEFA’s sanction to Guardiola for his protest last season, also stating that the Champions League title is the team priority for now.

 

Man City

---

“That’s the aim (to win the Champions League). We have a young squad, they have gained experience and we feel better prepared than in the previous two years. We are preparing every single detail and learning from the past because we believe we can do better,” Arteta said quoted by Telegraph.

“But in the Champions League winning or losing is more detailed. We are preparing every detail to improve what we’ve done in the past. We believe we can do better and tomorrow everything starts. A new competition and we know how hard it is to play against the teams in Europe,” he emphasized.

Thanks to the excellent performance filled with the talented squad in Europe, Man City become one of the most favorite candidates to win the Champions League along with Real Madrid, Juventus, and Bayern Munchen. Arteta was surprised with the honor. He asked the players to change the compliment to motivation in achieving it.

“I am surprised we are favorites when you have a team that won it three times in a row,” Arteta added ahead of a game against a Lyon side who have had a poor start to the season in France. “But that means we are doing things really well, people seriously think we are candidates to compete against other teams in Europe,” Arteta added.

“That has to be a motivation, not a pressure and that’s the way we take it. Hopefully, we can improve on the last two seasons because we came short. For me, the favorite has to be Real Madrid, they have something special in this competition. They deal with every detail better. The rest, we have to catch up,” the former Arsenal player concluded.